Congratulations to Port Elgin resident and Shallow Lake Skating Club skater, Gus Bolton
In late February of 2022, Gus Bolton competed at a provincial qualifier in Keswick, Ontario, and is now ranked number one in the province heading into the 2022 Skate Ontario Provincial Championships in both the Star 9 (short program) and the Gold (long program) Men’s Freeskate. In recreational skating, these are the highest level of competition. Provincials will take place in Mississauga on March 24th-27th.
Bolton has represented his club well at many competitions over the years, qualifying for the Provincial Championship at increasingly difficult levels every year since 2016. As a competitive skater at the Pre-Novice level, he was within 0.5 points of qualifying for the 2020 Skate Canada Challenge, the national championships for that level. In February, 2020, he had moved up a level and was able to compete as a Novice Level competitive skater. Due to the pandemic, shortly after that competition, the 2020 skating season ended and the Skate Ontario Provincial competition was cancelled. The championship was cancelled again in 2021.
Bolton has also had success in the Skate Canada StarSkate Test Stream. He is a Quadruple Gold achiever having completed all testing to the Gold Standard in the four categories – Interpretive, Skills, Freeskate and Dance. This is a remarkable achievement and a testament to his dedication and hard work in learning and skating a total of 43 tests.
He has been fortunate to have been coached by many wonderful, skilled skating coaches over the years. A special thank-you to Coach Val Weber, for knowing that Gus was a skater as soon as he hit the ice, and for being with him every step of the way. Thank-you also to Amanda Spaetzel, Kris Dawson, George Han, Curtis Moore, Cyndi Seifried, Michael Koshilka and to the many other coaches that have touched his life.
Gus is in Gr. 12 at Saugeen District Senior School (SDSS), where he has been an active member of the music and drama programs.
