Stittsville’s Special Olympians skate to winning 7 medals at National Winter Games

(On March 3rd, Stittsville’s Special Olympians arrived home from the 2024 Special Olympics National Winter Games held in Calgary, Alberta. We were pleased to meet with the group at their home rink on March 4 to hear about their experience. l-r: Jack Fan, Katie Xu and Michael Raytchev display the medals they received for their performances at the SONWG. Photos: Stittsville Central.)

Every Monday from 5:00 to 6:00pm, Cathy Skinner can be found on the ice at the CARDELRec Centre-Goulbourn coaching the Goulbourn Skating Club’s Special Olympians. Cathy has been a dedicated skating coach at the club for thirty years.

Cathy and Special Olympians Katie Xu, Jack Fan and Michael Raytchev have worked extraordinarily hard this past skating season in preparation and entrance to the Special Olympics National Winter Games held in Calgary, Alberta from February 27 – March 2, 2024.

Their training and dedication didn’t go unnoticed by the judges at the nationals. The trio came home with seven national medals for their figure skating talent. A proud moment for Coach Cathy, the athletes’ parents, Stittsville and the Goulbourn Skating Club.

The week was jam packed with activities and competition from the Law Enforcement Torch Run (LETR) and opening ceremony on February 27th hosted by the Calgary Flames Foundation to the games closing ceremony and the ever-popular athletes’ dance on March 2nd. When athletes are not competing, various organized activities and events took place. It is a very busy week for all of the Special Olympians.

Beginning on February 28th, the figure skating performances took place at the Seven Chiefs Sportsplex in Calgary. Performances for the competition took place every day, with the last competition taking place on March 1st.

Upon return from Calgary, Cathy was so proud and excited to share the good news, she sent us an email – “We returned last night from the Special Olympics National Winter Games, where all 3 (Jack, Katie & Michael) were awesome – bringing home 7 National medals!” It was certainly a proud moment for the entire group.

The team, made up of Michael Raytchev, dance pair Jack Fan and Katie Xu, along with their Coach Cathy Skinner, were successful in bringing home medals consisting of five gold, one silver and one bronze.

• Jack: Level 5 men – Bronze; Level 2 solo dance – Silver; and Level 2 couples dance – Gold
• Katie: Level 4 women – Gold; Level 2 solo dance – 4th; and Level 2 couples dance – Gold
• Michael: Level 1 solo dance – Gold and Level 4 men – Gold 

Even after their late arrival home, Jack, Katie and Michael could be found on Monday at their regular time training for their next competition – the Worlds (if chosen by the selection committee) to be held in Turin, Piedmont, Italy from March 8 to 17 in 2025. Cathy invited us to share in the celebration and to speak with these young Special Olympians and medal holders. An opportunity we didn’t want to miss.

Cathy had the trio show us several of their movements from footwork to loop and flip jumps to the shoot the duck, we were immensely entertained by these fine young skaters. Once off the ice, we were able to speak with Jack, Katie and Michael. We wanted to know their feelings about their time in Calgary.

Katie told us, “it was great, amazing. So many places to see and to make friends. We met new people from across Canada and to compete in this sport. It was nice to see Elizabeth Manley again.” In 2019, Katie and Jack were invited to perform in the Rock the Rink at Ottawa’s TD Place where the pair skated with Canadian skating greats – Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir, Patrick Chan, Kaetlyn Osmond and Elvis Stojko.

Michael was quick to share, “it was a good time. The whole event was exciting especially seeing friends from other teams. Overall a great trip.”

Jack too wanted to let us know, “I had fun in Calgary. The airplane trip was the best part.”

And, of course, what gathering of athletes doesn’t include pin collecting, which they all had collected on their trip. The Skate Canada pin seemed to be the most popular of those they collected.

Katie Xu began skating at age 10 and has been figure skating for fifteen years. She also enjoys playing soccer and swimming with Special Olympics. In Katie’s spare time, she is an avid crafter and loves working with her Cricut cutting, writing and drawing. Katie works at Brown’s Your Independent Grocer and is also currently attending Algonquin College where she takes a computer course in App programming.

Jack Fan began his figure skating career at age 9 and has been skating for seventeen years. While Jack enjoys track events swimming with Special Olympics and will be attending the spring Provincial games in the swim competition. But above all he loves classical music and can be found with earbuds in listening and bopping to the great composers.

Katie and Jack have served as ambassadors for the special needs community from the time they joined the Goulbourn Skating Club in 2011 and partnered as a Dance Pair in 2013. Katie and Jack have received acclaim from Skate Canada and Special Olympics Canada, for their success in competitions over the years, achievements that have made them decorated figure skaters. Among many notable achievements, Katie and Jack have been named World Champions as each skater scored three medals at the Special Olympics World Winter Games in Austria in 2017. Formerly Rink ‘A’ at the CARDELRec Complex-Goulbourn, was renamed in 2018 after the skating pair and is now known as the Katie Xu and Jack Fan Rink.

Having started figure skating at age 9, back in 2016 at age 14, Michael Raytchev started his journey of solo figure skating and winning at every skating championship in which he competed. In 2016, he placed first in the Eastern Ontario Championships and consistently placed first in 2017 and 2018. For his winning performances, in 2019 Michael was chosen as the sole Special Olympic male athlete for all of Ontario to compete in the Canada Winter Games in Red Deer, Alberta. His solo performance at these championships brought him home with a Gold medal, having placed first. Michael also swims for the Nepean Swim Club and will be competing at the Provincial competitions this Spring. Michael also attends Algonquin College where he is enrolled in computer program development.

Michael, Jack and Katie have been invited to perform at the March-Kanata Skating Club’s ice show on April 13th. Come out to watch Michael skate his medal winning solo performance, while Jack and Katie will be dancing to contemporary music in a special routine. https://www.mkskate.ca/.

We leave you with this short video as Jack, Katie and Michael thank Cathy and Stittsville for all of your support!