Robbinston woman to skate in Olympics opening ceremonies

ROBBINSTON – As a little girl practicing on the pond behind her family’s home, Melissa Townsend dreamed of one day skating in the Winter Olympics.

On Feb. 8, the former Washington County woman’s dream will come true.

Townsend will take to the ice during the opening production of the 2002 Winter Olympics.

“It’s an opportunity of a lifetime,” she said, Monday, from her home outside Salt Lake City.

Prohibited from providing details of the opening number, Townsend said she is one of approximately 300 skaters who will perform during the opening ceremony at Rice-Eccles Stadium in Salt Lake City.

“We’ve been practicing twice a week since November for four to eight hours a day,” she said. “It is an hour’s drive there and back so I’ve been working at it 15 to 20 hours a week.”

Townsend moved to Utah in December 1998 when she married her husband, Matthew, who is a student at Utah Valley State College.

She said she answered a radio call by Olympic organizers last spring. The cast for the opening production is all volunteers.

“I filled out an application online and I auditioned in July,” she said. “They sent me a letter in October telling me I’d been accepted.”

With tickets to the opening ceremony selling at $1,000, Townsend said neither her family members in Maine nor her husband could attend the event.

Matthew is permitted to attend the dress rehearsal on Feb. 6, she said.

Townsend’s parents, Howard and Mary Ann Duval, will watch their daughter on television in their Robbinston home.

Mary Ann Duval said Monday that her daughter’s love of figure skating has been obvious since she was 4 years old.

“We had a pond behind our house and we used to skate,” she said. “She’d be out there pushing a chair, like children do when they are first learning.”

Howard Duval was an avid hockey player and has skated all his life, his wife said. He introduced Melissa and her 22-year-old brother and sister, Jeremy and Jodie, to the ice when they were small, she said.

Duval said her daughter began taking lessons in St. Stephen, New Brunswick, when she was 4, and one of her coaches was Elaine Driscoll of Perry.

“Melissa belonged to the St. Croix Figure Skating Club, and one of their requirements was to help teach younger children,” her mother said. ” She loved coaching the little ones.”

Townsend said she skated from childhood through her graduation from Calais High School, but was unable to keep up the practice when she went to St. Michael’s College in Vermont.

“The rink was too far away and I didn’t have a car, so I just skated recreationally,” she said.

The Feb. 8 opening production is approximately 10 minutes long and Townsend said she’ll be on the ice for six or seven minutes.

“I’m very excited,” she said. “As a little girl, it’s your dream to be in the Olympics.”