The Austrian is the 10th International Ice Dance she has passed, so she also earned her 6th US Figure Skating Gold Medal ...she's now passed Senior Moves, Senior Solo Free Dance, Senior Pairs, Gold Dance, Senior Free Dance, and all 10 International ice dances! I'm a very proud mom!
(Scroll below the photos below to read more about Rebekah's figure skating journey.)
#WeGetUp @usfigureskating
Rebekah, in a way, is one of those GET UP stories. In October of 2015, something really bad happened to her related to a setback at a drama school in Colorado. What happened was very serious and what happened made Rebekah want to give up: not only did she stop singing, acting, and dancing, but she also stopped skating. It took some time to move forward and "get up."
Of course, Rebekah eventually did move on, but didn't skate much for almost two years....
Then...
When Ben Agosto came to Colorado Springs in 2016, Rebekah was reluctant at first to begin skating and ice dancing again, but when her sister Annabelle went to Israel for two months to study in January of 2017, Rebekah decided to take Annabelle's lesson slots with both Ben Agosto and Logan Giulietti-Schmitt and work on International Ice Dances "for fun." She re-discovered her love of skating because skating with Ben and Logan was so challenging. (She also began to play the piano again and sing and took part in a musical, The Music Man, with the Colorado Ballet Society.)
Logan moved away to Dallas. Then, Ben went away for the summer of 2017 to choreograph Cirque du Soeil, so he suggested we go to Sun Valley, Idaho to work with Brent Bommentre for the summer. Brent was so impressed with how quickly Rebekah learned steps, that he suggested she take all 10 International Ice Dances at one test session in Sun Valley. And guess what? She passed NINE of those 10 dances with Brent in Sun Valley!
It turned out that Rebekah tested the remaining international ice dance, the Austrian Waltz, three times. This pass on January 14, 2018 that earned her sixth US Figure Skating Gold Medal was the third try and she passed by all three judges. She knows that getting a "Retry" on a US Figure Skating test means to not give up, keep working, and to "Get Up."
Rebekah is a busy college student at this time and will earn her Associate Degree at Pikes Peak Community College in May of 2018. She was very excited she got "straight A's" in the fall semester 2017. She also just started teaching skating at Sertich Ice Center in Colorado Springs and is so excited about sharing her love of skating with others.
Rebekah is truly representative of a true GET UP story! Yes...the saying that "If you can handle ice, you can handle anything" does hit home...
(By the way, Rebekah's sister Annabelle has already earned SIX US Figure Skating Gold Medals in Moves, Solo Free Dance, Free Skate, Pairs, Gold Dance, and Senior Free Dance. Annabelle has two International Ice Dances left to pass and hopes to earn Gold Medal #7 before June of 2018.)
Rebekah passed her very first US Figure Skating test in April of 2005 when she just turned nine years old. Who would have known then that she would become a US Figure Skating Sextuple Gold Medalist thirteen years later! Go Rebekah!
Rebekah's Gold Medal record:
7-2-2011 Senior Moves in the Field passed
8-4-2013 Gold Dance Test passed
5-4-2014 Senior Solo Free Dance passed
6-1-2014 Gold/Senior Pair Test passed
6-8-2014 Senior Free Dance passed
1-14-2018 International Dance Test passed
Below is the bio on Rebekah that will appear soon in Sertich Ice Center's Coach Brochure:
Rebekah Schneider-Farris
(719) 660-4182 rfarris2@ymail.com
I was born and raised in Colorado Springs and I began skating as soon as I could walk and one of the first ice rinks I skated at was Sertich Ice Center! I have competed in singles, pairs, and ice dancing, and I earned a silver medal at the US Championships in Juvenile Dance and earned other medals at the Midwestern Championships in both pairs and ice dancing with my brother Joel. I am a US Figure Skating Sextuple Gold Medalist: I've passed the Senior Moves in the Field, Senior Solo Free Dance, Senior Pair Test, Gold Dance, Senior Free Dance, and have passed all of the 10 International ice dances. I love teaching people of all ages all I know about skating.
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