Available Ice Times: Week of May 21 - 28, 2010 - these are great times that you can rent at a moment's notice!

Friday 5/21: 8:00 - 10:00 am and 1:15 - 3:45 pm

Saturday 5/22: 2:30 - 9:00 pm

Monday 5/24: 8:00 - 10:00 am and 1:15 - 5:15 pm

Tuesday 5/25: 1:15 - 5:15 pm

Wednesday 5/26: 1:15 - 4:00 pm

Thursday 5/27: 1:15 - 5:15 pm

Friday 5/28: 8:00 - 10:00 am and 1:15 - 3:45 pm

Available ice times are also listed on our schedule under Available To Rent

Public Skating, Stick & Puck and Freestyle Ice Times

Thanks for your feedback. We have heard from many that the list you usually find here is a bit much to take in so we are now directing you to the website for the entire schedule. With easy to read daily ice times, this link will show you the times of all the groups skating on any given day.

Listings can be found here: Skating Schedule

Scene Around The Rink

Open Pick Up Hockey is here! Drop in hockey is here! Starting Friday May 28th The Ice Center will be offering regular drop in hockey from 8 - 9 pm for skaters 13 and over. For $10 players can come and get into a game with friends and new faces. Full equipment required and no checking. For more details click here.

Waterbury Area Food Shelf and The Ice Center have teamed up to bring you Free Public Skating. The first Saturday of each month The Ice Center will offer free public skating to community members who bring in a non-perishable food item for the Food Shelf. This is our way of saying Thanks! for being part of a great community and supporting us for the past six years. At the same time let's show our support to those in need. Next FREE skate is June 5th

Freestyle Ice: We had added more Freestyle Ice time for all those Figure Skaters in the area! Check out the Freestyle page for more details.

Hockey Clinics You asked for it and we brought it to you. The NOVICE clinic is well under way and we have 21 new players who are hooked on hockey. Do you have other ideas or programs you think we should try to implement? Let us know and we'll see what we can do about it.

Birthday Parties When you think about it, throwing a birthday party at your house is a whole lot of work. Cleaning before the kids take over the house and having to clean up after them is just not what its cracked up to be! Let us do it for you! We have the perfect birthday party package for you, just look and see.

Learn To Skate We have new Learn To Skate (LTS) programs in place now for youth ages 3 and up as well as adults. See what our professional skating coaches can offer you so that you can enjoy skating for the rest of your life! New Friday night and Saturday morning sessions starting this week.

FACEBOOK The Ice Center has gone digital! We now have a Facebook page and think you should check it out and "like" us! Keep up to date on schedules, new pictures and post your own ideas.

Rink Rules are in place for your safety and for the sake of the community! Please take a minute to get familiar with these rules so we can keep The Ice Center a place where you want to come back to!

• No street hockey allowed inside the rink
• Please do not get on the ice until the Zamboni gates are closed
• Parents / coaches / players: please check the locker rooms and pick up after the team prior to leaving the rink
• No spitting on the benches or in the locker rooms; it is REALLY GROSS!
• Please check in at the office prior to Public Skating, Stick & Puck Time and Freestyle Ice. You have to pay to play!
• Please use assigned locker rooms; there is a method to our madness
• Please get off the ice on time, chances are there is a  group on after you
• Skate hard & have fun! That's what its all about, right?

Managers  Notes or "Hey, that's my job!"

We thought you might like to know a little more about the "behind the scenes" at The Ice Center. Each week Jay, our Operations Manager and I, Kelly Lilly, Rink Manager,  will bring you a little tidbit to give you the inside scoop. Have you always wanted to know something about the rink and how it works? Let us know and we can address it.

Jay's Corner:

How do we keep 11,000 gallons of water frozen?

The 1” sheet of ice rests on a very level and smooth concrete slab with thousands of feet of pipe latticed back and forth inside it.  Two large compressors alternately condense and evaporate a chemical refrigerant, just like in your refrigerator at home.  When the liquid turns to a gas (evaporates), cooling occurs (just like when your sweat evaporates to cool your body). The box you see giving off steam at the rear of the rink helps with this process of getting rid of the heat taken out of the ice.  A device like the radiator of your car transfers the cold from the refrigerant to a salt and water mixture called brine.The chilled brine is pumped under the ice, where it removes the heat from the ice sheet as it snakes back and forth through those pipes in the concrete floor.  The other end of the loop returns the warmed brine back through the radiator-like device to give up the heat it absorbed from the ice sheet.  The brine circulates whenever the ice warms above a pre-set temperature.

Most of the time, we keep the ice at 21 degrees. We have to find a balance so the ice isn’t too hard for the figure skaters, and isn’t too soft for the hockey players.

So the next time you’re in the area and need a place to cool off, come on in!  We’d love to see you!

I know this because "Hey, that's my job!"

Things To Note:

If you are interested in learning more about The Ice Center, please visit our website at www.IceCenter.org We strive to keep the website updated with current information and schedules, lists of skating groups, staff information etc.

You can also learn more about the amenities offered here such as our Pro Shop, Skate sharpening, rental skates and more

Who are we? How did we get to where we are now? Learn more here and also how you can become a part of this great community facility, it's all on our website.