COACHES
Email Lori (208) 559-0211
Lori Benton
Born and raised in San Diego, Lori completed at the amateur level through college and medaled at the United States Figure Skating Championships and World University Games while attending San Diego State University. After college, she went on to earn the title of World Professional Figure Skating Champion in 1989.
Lori performed as a principal soloist in Ice Capades, Holiday on Ice and numerous shows worldwide from 1981 through 2002 and has shared her technical and creative love of the sport of figure skating with her students, National Competitors and Olympic Medalists since 1985!
A professional choreographer, Lori has contributed her creativity and signature style to professional ice shows over the past twenty five years including Tacoma’s Lakewood Winter Club annual ice shows, summer productions of the Sun Valley Ice Show now known as Sun Valley on Ice, and since 2011, the Manchester Ice & Event Centre’s McCall Starz on Ice!
Marie Furnary
As a PSA Double Master-rated coach in Skating Skills and Group Instruction, Marie has more than 30 years of coaching experience, and is a US Figure Skating Gold Medalist in Ice Dance. Marie’s primary coach was Olympic Team pairs/dance coach Ron Ludington, who ingrained techniques of his coach, Maribel Vinson-Owen, in all of his skaters. She also holds a PSA Level II ranking, a Certified Rating in Ice Dance, a Registered Rating in Freestyle, and is a Level 1 & 2 hockey accredited & power skate coach with the PSA.
Marie's MFSC skaters include 19 Gold/Senior USFS Test Medalists since the club’s inception in 2003. Her skaters’ other achievements include competing as co-captain of the 2012 National Collegiate Champion Team: receiving the highest IJS score out of 44 Preliminary girls at the 2013 US Figure Skating NW Pacific Regionals; performing as a cast member of the 2015 Holiday on Ice European Tour of Passion as well as in the 2015-2016 US tour of Disney On Ice: 100 Years of Magic. She has also taught at the Dartmouth FSC in New Hampshire, and at the Johnstown FSC in Pennsylvania.
Email Marie (208) 630-4028
What do we offer?
In a small rural town like McCall, skaters would be lucky to have any highly-qualified figure skating coaches. Aside from their own achievements (competitive and performing credits, PSA ratings, and and the achievements of their students), Marie and Lori bring the legacy and techniques of their own foundational training under some of the nation’s best Olympic coaches.
Lori trained in San Diego under John Nicks, whose skaters have included Dorothy Hamill, Jojo Starbuck & Ken Shelley (pairs), Tai Babilonia & Randy Gardner (pairs), Tiffany Chin, Kristi Yamaguchi, and Ashley Wagner. She also learned techniques from Frank Carroll, whose skaters included Linda Fratianne, Michelle Kwan, and Evan Lysacek.
Training in Wilmington DE, Marie’s primary coach was Ron Ludington, a four-time US National Pairs champion & Olympic Bronze medalist, who trained under legendary coach Maribel Vinson-Owen. His skaters included Kitty & Peter Carruthers (pairs), Melissa Militano & Johnny Johns (pairs), Stacy Smith & John Summers (dance), Suzie Semanick & Scott Gregory (dance), and Karen Courtland & Todd Reynolds (pairs). Marie has also consistently updated her knowledge over the past 20 years,by traveling to training camps and PSA conferences to learn current practices and techniques from coaches such as Rafael Artyunyan, Judy Blumberg and Kim Navarro & Brent Bommentre.
Our MFSC coaches bring this foundational legacy to our skaters every day, along with lessons in mindset, performance, and practice methods that enhance skaters’ skills beyond what they might have hoped to find in this small resort town in central Idaho.
