Everyone now knows that Nashville is a hockey town. It may have taken almost two full decades, but by the time the Nashville Predators made the franchise’s first run to the Stanley Cup Finals in 2017, Music City had given its chilly, gold-drenched smilodons a warm embrace.
But Nashville’s status as a Southern figure-skating hub isn’t as well-known. Twenty months prior to the Predators’ first game at Bridgestone Arena, the downtown venue — then known as Nashville Arena — played host to the 1997 U.S. Figure Skating Championships, jump-starting the city’s status as one of the premier figure-skating locales in the South.
Seeing stars like Tara Lipinski and Michelle Kwan in person was surely a big moment for local Olympic hopefuls, but there weren’t always easy pathways to high-level skating instruction within reasonable driving distance. Attempting to excel in any nontraditional sport can put a financial and logistical strain on families. Laura Sanders Holzman, an ex-pro figure skater who has taught young athletes across the state, started Nashville Skating Academy with that in mind.
“I had to travel a lot for my amateur career, because there wasn’t a lot of skating in the South,” Holzman tells the Scene. “So when I started to coach professionally, I came back to my hometown to train under my original instructor, and since then, it’s just been a goal of mine to bring figure skating to the South.
“We’re really proud that most of our skaters are homegrown — they’re here from Nashville,” she continues. “One of the things that I wanted to do was not have to have people leave their family and their homes to go and train elsewhere, which is what I had to do.”
Nashville Skating Academy, which operates out of the Metro-owned Centennial Sportsplex, has around 60 coaches — many of whom are former students — teaching more than 2,000 skaters six days a week across all skill levels throughout the year, including what Holzman calls the “largest learn-to-skate program in the Southeast.” They have also partnered with the Metro Parks disABILITIES Program to field a competitive adult skating team.
Nine of the academy’s elite-level skaters were recently invited to the 2026 U.S. Figure Skating National Development Camp in St. Louis, which takes place alongside the yearly U.S. Championships. The camp functions as a developmental pipeline for the country’s top youth skaters to be introduced to U.S. Figure Skating, the sport’s official governing body in America.
“It was a really good experience,” says 12-year-old Nashville native Liyah White, who competed alongside her twin sister Lexie in St. Louis.
White has been skating for a decade despite her young age, and Nashville Skating Academy has helped shape her into an elite youth skater — something that would not have been possible locally in years past.
Olympic gold medalist Scott Hamilton
“The coaches are great,” White adds. “I’ve worked with Laura for so long. … We’ve had a good experience and good relationship between all of us, and I could definitely tell a big difference from when I first started with her. And I could definitely see a big difference between everyone that skated with her.”
One of the academy’s coaches, two-time Olympian Bill Fauver, was honored on the ice in St. Louis alongside his former U.S. teammates for the 50th anniversary of their performance at the 1976 Winter Olympics in Innsbruck, Austria. Fauver, a longtime Nashvillian, has seen the city’s transformation into a figure-skating hub firsthand.
“Nashville has been a scene of excellence, really, since we hosted the [U.S. Championships] at Bridgestone Arena in 1997,” Fauver says. “In fact, in the figure-skating world, they know that Nashville is a hub of activity.”
With two high-level skating programs in the area — longtime Franklin resident and Olympic gold medalist Scott Hamilton operates the Scott Hamilton Skating Club at the Ford Ice Centers in Bellevue and Antioch — the future looks bright for any hopeful Olympians in Middle Tennessee, or even those just wanting to get in a few wobbly laps around the ice.
“We try so hard to let people know that it’s here and that it’s available, and it’s available at all levels of interest,” Holzman says. “Whether it’s to become a national competitor or to win an Olympic medal, or just to get some good exercise.”
Nashville Predators at the Olympics
Filip Forsberg
While the students at Nashville Skating Academy will be tuning in to see American figure-skating stars like Ilia “The Quad God” Malinin and Amber Glenn at the 2026 Winter Olympics in Italy, local sports fans may want to check out the hockey competition. For the first time since 2014, when then-Preds captain Shea Weber won a gold medal with Team Canada, NHL players will be participating in the Olympics. Four Nashville Predators will be among those taking the ice in Milano-Cortina.
Current captain Roman Josi will suit up for Team Switzerland. He is the only Predator of the four who has previous Olympic experience, having been selected for the Swiss roster in 2014.
Star forward Filip Forsberg will be looking to add to his 2018 World Championships gold medal with some hardware for Team Sweden in Milano-Cortina.
Outside of Team USA of course, Team Finland might be the team for local hockey fans to cheer for, as both forward Erik Haula and goaltender Juuse Saros will be representing the Finns.
None of Nashville’s Canadians were named to Team Canada’s roster, most sadly so for veteran Steven Stamkos. The 2009 World Championship silver medalist was named to Canada’s team for the 2014 Olympics, but broke his tibia prior to the start of action in Sochi.
