\u00a0<\/p>\n
With partner Eve Chalom, Mathew Gates was a two-time US National silver medallist and competed at the 1997 and 1999 World Championships. He briefly returned to the eligible competitive scene in the 2002-2003 season with Emilie Nussear, finishing 5th at US Nationals.<\/p>\n
In Newington, Connecticut, Gates coaches Kaitlyn Weaver and Charles Clavey, a novice team who recently won the free dance portion of the Lake Placid ice dancing championships. He recently took some time to answer a few questions from ice-dance.com about his coaching pursuits and other experiences.<\/p>\n
Mathew, awhile back you had worked on choreography with Michael Weiss. Have you created other programs for singles skaters? Are you interested in doing more singles choreography? What are the challenges for choreographing for singles as opposed to dance? You were with Shpilband back when the Detroit FSC had the top four or five dance teams in the country, and later worked with Tarasova when she had several teams as well. When you were in Texas, it was a smaller program. Which training atmosphere do you prefer?<\/strong> Tell us about Kaitlyn Weaver & Charles Clavey? Are you coaching other teams in Newington as well? If you were offered a few hundred thousand dollars and asked you to put together a skating show, what kind of show would you put together? \u00a0 With partner Eve Chalom, Mathew Gates was a two-time US National silver medallist and competed at the 1997 and 1999 World Championships. He briefly returned to the eligible competitive […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6039,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_gspb_post_css":"","_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","_themeisle_gutenberg_block_has_review":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1073","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-articles-interviews"],"blocksy_meta":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/Articles.jpg?fit=957%2C566&ssl=1","uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/Articles.jpg?fit=957%2C566&ssl=1",957,566,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/Articles.jpg?fit=150%2C150&ssl=1",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/Articles.jpg?fit=300%2C177&ssl=1",300,177,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/Articles.jpg?fit=768%2C454&ssl=1",768,454,true],"large":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/Articles.jpg?fit=957%2C566&ssl=1",957,566,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/Articles.jpg?fit=957%2C566&ssl=1",957,566,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/Articles.jpg?fit=957%2C566&ssl=1",957,566,true],"et-pb-post-main-image":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/Articles.jpg?resize=400%2C250&ssl=1",400,250,true],"et-pb-post-main-image-fullwidth":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/Articles.jpg?resize=957%2C566&ssl=1",957,566,true],"et-pb-portfolio-image":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/Articles.jpg?resize=400%2C284&ssl=1",400,284,true],"et-pb-portfolio-module-image":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/Articles.jpg?resize=510%2C382&ssl=1",510,382,true],"et-pb-portfolio-image-single":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/Articles.jpg?fit=957%2C566&ssl=1",957,566,true],"et-pb-gallery-module-image-portrait":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/Articles.jpg?resize=400%2C516&ssl=1",400,516,true],"rpwe-thumbnail":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/Articles.jpg?resize=45%2C45&ssl=1",45,45,true]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"Team IDC","author_link":"https:\/\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/author\/idcadmin\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"\u00a0 With partner Eve Chalom, Mathew Gates was a two-time US National silver medallist and competed at the 1997 and 1999 World Championships. He briefly returned to the eligible competitive […]","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7GOSM-hj","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1073","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1073"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1073\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6039"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1073"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1073"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ice-dance.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1073"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
<\/strong>I did some choreography for Michael, but it was more focused towards the footwork sections of his programs. I also worked on his basic skating for a month or so. I would have liked to continue developing his style but took the Dance directorship in Dallas. I\u2019ve been interested in doing other choreography as it\u2019s one of my many passions but I\u2019ve put more focus on developing Kaitlyn and Charles. I\u2019ve recently done a senior long Pair program for a new team taught by Natalia Mishkatunok. I think the team is going to be representing Azerbaijan. I really enjoyed that and I hope to do more in the future.<\/p>\n
<\/strong>I don\u2019t think there is too much difference between singles and dance choreography these days. The way I create programs is much the same for singles, pairs or dance.<\/p>\n
When I lived in Detroit I didn\u2019t know any different so I always wanted to train alone and have all the attention from the coach. After moving to Dallas I realized that it\u2019s really important to train with other teams or at least have other competitive teams around, but I do think there are exceptions. Although I liked having the sole attention from a coach I found myself wanting a competitive environment that I had for so many previous years. Sometimes you don\u2019t know when situations are good unless you\u2019re in a place where you can tell the difference. I relished the idea of training with other teams again when I re-enstated. The daily rivalry was truly fun and brought a new vigor in my thought process. I think if Eve and I had moved to Tarasova it could have been a completely different story. I\u2019m happy to have gone back to skating to confirm what I had believed for the previous two years about what kind of training situation works best. I wish I had done it in my prime, but I learned so much from my experience I feel I have so much more to offer than before.<\/p>\n
<\/strong>Kaitlyn and Charles came to me a couple seasons ago driving up from Houston to Dallas on weekends. When I decided to get back into skating they felt they had no other option but to follow to Hartford, Connecticut. They are so well matched physically — they\u2019re often mistaken for a brother and sister team. They work hard and have a good temperament, which is key to staying together and working in the system. They\u2019ve improved from day one and have now started to develop the skills needed to be competitive. I\u2019ve really enjoyed training and coaching them.<\/p>\n
<\/strong>I\u2019m only teaching one team at the moment. I\u2019ve been teaching at other rinks Katonah, Cromwell and Simsbury.<\/p>\n
<\/strong>I\u2019ve been teaching a little with Eve lately and have discovered that we work well together in a teaching environment. Like in skating I feel we complement each other in coaching, choreography. So, I would hire Eve for a start. I would love to do a show like Kurt Browning\u2019s Singing in the Rain T.V special. That is one of the most amazing things ever done on ice in my opinion. I would do it exactly like what Kurt did but along those creative lines. I guess it would be more like Ice Theatre with a cast of my choice. Iceskating is such a unique sport\/art\/dance. It encompasses so much and has so many dimensions — the possibilities are exciting and endless.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"