Saratoga News
News
Photograph by George Sakkestad
Saratoga's Margaret Wang ranks among the top figure skaters in the nation. Wang placed 17th at the U.S. figure skating championship held Jan. 24 in Spokane, Wash.
Wang competes among nation's best skaters
By Shannon Burkey
Since she was 5 and took to the ice for the first time, Margaret Wang has worked hard to reach the top echelon of competitive figure skating. Now, 13 years later, the Saratoga High School senior has made it.
Wang competed in her first U.S. figure skating championship on Jan. 24 against 20 of the country's top skaters, including reigning world champion and Olympian Kimmie Meissner and Olympian Emily Hughes.
Although she placed 17th, Wang said the chance to compete at such an elite level and in front of 10,000 people was one that she will never forget.
"Being there was such an honor. Only 21 people in America get to compete at this level," Wang said. "I just wanted to enjoy every moment of it because it's something that could come only once in a lifetime."
Wang's road to nationals has been a long one, filled with hard work and dedication, but an accident on the ice in November 2005 nearly ended her journey.
While trying to land a triple jump, Wang landed wrong and broke her ankle.
A doctor misdiagnosed her, thinking it was only a sprain, and told her to take two weeks off. After the two weeks, Wang continued to skate and compete on her broken ankle. It wasn't until February, when she had another fall, that doctors realized it was broken and had been for several months.
"I was devastated when I heard the news," Wang said. "I felt like I had to recover twice."
Wang spent the next four months in a cast wondering what the future would hold for the sport she loved so much.
"I wasn't even thinking about nationals," she said. "I was just thinking about being able to walk and skate again."
The cast came off in June 2006 and Wang said she had to train herself to walk normally again because her leg had shrunk considerably from being in the cast for so long.
It wasn't long, though, before she was back on the ice, and in August she began competing again.
She placed first in a regional competition that qualified her to compete in the sectional competition. The top four in the sectionals qualified for the national competition--and Wang placed fourth.
"It's so unbelievable that she made it," said her mother, Gloria Wu.
Being able to watch her daughter compete at the national level was one of her proudest moments, Wu said.
"I had to try to remember to breathe during the competition. We always hold our breath for our children. But once she landed her first jump I knew she would be OK," she said.
Even though skating is a big part of her life, Wang knows her education is just as important. Unlike most other competitive skaters, who spend entire days on the ice and are home-schooled, she is a full-time student and skates only before school and on the weekends.
"I've always really liked school," Wang said. "Plus, I always knew an injury could happen at any time, and if I put all my eggs in one basket, what would happen if I hurt myself? What would I have then?"
She has seen this happen to other skaters.
"I know people who have given up everything to try to go to nationals, and they never make it. It's really sad," she said.
When she is not on the ice or in class, Wang has several things that keep her busy.
On top of singing in her school choir, playing tennis and hanging out with her friends, she also wrote and self-published a book of haiku poems, Haiku on Ice. The book, which is available on Amazon.com, contains poems about her childhood as a competitive skater. She donates all of the proceeds from the book to the American Heart Association.
As if all of that is not enough to keep her busy, she also founded Heartskate, a skate-a-thon to promote awareness of sudden cardiac arrest and to raise money for the American Heart Association, the Heart Rhythm Society and the Kathleen Davey Fund. Over the past three years, Heartskate has raised $8,000.
The idea for Heartskate came to her after Davey, the wife of her teacher Mike Davey, went into a coma because of sudden cardiac arrest.
"She had two young children, and what happened to her made me so sad," Wang said. "I wanted to create Heartskate to raise money for her and her family."
Around the same time, Wang read an article about San Jose resident Jack Grogan, who was revived after suffering cardiac arrest because an automated external defibrillator was used on him. That inspired her to persuade her school to purchase two of the machines.
Her life is filled with many different ventures, but for Wang it's all part of what makes her who she is.
"I just try to take one step at a time," she said.
Her next step will take her to college; she is not sure what the future holds as far as skating goes.
"It's hard to leave the sport because I love it so much and have done it for so many years. But there is collegiate skating--that's always an option."
