In addition, the Synchroettes - Red Preliminary Team was also a very strong team, winning Sectionals with 5 first Place votes out of 7 judges. If Preliminary had been a qualifying level for Nationals, I think they might have won there also.

We have come a long way with our state's synchro programs. It wasn't that many years ago when Garden State SC sent an Intermediate Team to Nationals as the first ever New Jersey team to make it there. This year marked a new record in the number of our teams attending both Sectionals (17 versus 15 in 2009) and Nationals (5 versus 4 in 2009).

Hopefully, with the success of our figure skaters in the 2010 Olympics, our clubs can build up their membership, which will also help build our synchro programs. For example, Essex has 154 skaters involved with synchro this year...that's two or three times the total membership of most of our clubs. The best potential area is the Beginner Teams, out of the USFS Basic Skills program.