Kirstin and Jon Hawayek arrived at their daughter’s apartment in southwest Montreal last weekend, well before the snowstorm, on a mission to pick up Kaitlin’s miniature Goldendoodle puppy.
Within minutes, she handed them a gold medal as well.
Old awards always end up back home in Western New York. The dog does, too, at least during competitions, and Kaitlin Hawayek and partner Jean-Luc Baker are about to perform in the 2019 U.S. Figure Skating National Championships, the country’s most prestigious annual figure skating event, on Friday and Saturday at Little Caesars Arena in Detroit. They compete in ice dance – imagine ballet on skates – and have risen from bloody knees to within reach of the podium.
“We’re going into the competition with the intention to win,” Hawayek said. “That’s what we’ve been training to do. That’s where our mindset is.”
Hawayek is determined to be the best in the world, and skating in the Olympics is a goal the 22-year-old has long pursued with a tenacity and charm born from her hometown of East Aurora. But to qualify to perform on the sport’s grandest and rarest stage, the 2022 Winter Games in Beijing, she must first take care of business in the United States………. read more here
