From their Northern Ireland coaching base at Dundonald International Ice Bowl, former Olympic skaters Kevin van der Perren and Jenna McCorkell led four of their local skating team to success at the ‘Blackburn Opens’ competition in England, earlier this month.
Competing across several categories, the local skaters each secured notable competition success, between them securing a second-place silver medal, as well as fourth, fifth and eighth place positions. Taking newly choregraphed programmes to the ice, they also increased their previous personal best scores by an average of five points each, and achieved competitive national test passes enabling progression to the next skating level.
This success comes after intense focus by international coach Kevin van der Perren and his wife and coaching partner Jenna McCorkell, to develop the technical skating and presentation skills of their Dundonald based team.
After representing Belgium at three Winter Olympic Games and securing two European Championship bronze medals, Kevin is now an international coach and technical specialist, splitting his primary coaching responsibilities between Northern Ireland (NI) and Belgium, with Dundonald International Ice Bowl as his local coaching home.
Fellow Olympian and eleven-time British champion Jenna McCorkell, completes the coaching powerhouse, with the husband-and-wife team working closely together to develop their team of local and international skaters.
Commenting on the skaters’ performance, Kevin said, “After months of hard work to enhance core skating skills and develop new techniques, we are immensely proud our NI team’s performance, as they competed against skaters from across the UK.
“Our ambition, as we coach and develop our skating team at Dundonald, is to build the next generation of local skating talent here in NI, and the recent success of our team at Blackburn gives us a solid foundation for further growth”.
Jenna added, “After 20 years of professional skating and coaching internationally, I am delighted to have relocated back ‘home’ to where my skating career began. Working in partnership with Kevin, it is immensely rewarding to see the accelerated progress of our local skating team.
“As we continue to nurture local talent, I am excited to see how ice skating can further develop and continue to grow as a competitive sport in NI.”
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