Parents cajoled their small children onto the ice.

Teenagers pulled one another by their mittens to grasp the side walls of GoKart Family Fun Center’s newly opened and newly covered ice rink - the only public rink in the Coeur d’Alene area.

Boys in hockey skates raced between wobbly skaters while a few women in the center of the rink looked like they actually might have a clue about what they were doing.

At least three of them do.

Karin Kunzle-Watson, former world champion, is an ice-skating instructor at GoKart. The other two are Nona Trujillo, a skating coach, and Janet Lehrman, assistant director of the ice-skating school.

Before moving here three years ago, Kunzle-Watson lived in California, teaching people of all ages and abilities.

“I had in California several octogenarians. I had one lady who finally stopped at 94 … when she couldn’t drive to the rink anymore.”

In the years since winning the 1976 Professional World Championship in pairs skating with her twin brother and competing in the 1976 Olympics for Switzerland, Kunzle-Watson has organized skating competitions, performed in exhibitions, coached competitive skaters and written for skating magazines.

That doesn’t mean classes at GoKart are only for potential champions.

“You have to keep this in perspective. These classes are for people who just want to skate,” she said.

Group lessons cost $38 for a half hour each week for six weeks. Private lessons are $40 per hour. Renting skates costs extra.

“The classes will go on until the ice melts beneath our feet or until the rink closes,” Kunzle-Watson said.

Hockey players can register for the rink’s league until today for $171, plus a $25 registration fee. Most teams will play 21 games; championship teams play 22.

The rink was completed two winters ago and opened for this season Dec. 28 - one day after its enormous cover finally was finished. Owner Joe Kamps expects it to stay open until around April.

“We only had it open about three months last year and saw the folly of an open-air rink,” he said.

Nature dumped excessive amounts of snow and ice on the rink last season. Since the compressors for the rink can only keep a few inches of water frozen, the added precipitation piled up and then melted into a chunky, sloppy mess that had to be cleared away periodically.

The new roof - 176 feet long and 110 feet wide - towers above skaters’ heads like an enormous umbrella.

“It’s a lot easier to keep the rink clean,” Kamps said.

He and co-owner Tracy Singer started planning the roof last January. They plan to add Plexiglas barriers to the waist-high walls lining the rink soon. That will make it easier for hockey players to check other players without sending them flying over the barrier.

They’re also thinking of installing bleachers for spectators and pouring cement to make the rink usable in warmer months for in-line skaters or even basketball teams.

Sometime in the future, the owners may expand the rink enough to accommodate sanctioned ice-skating competitions.

Trujillo, the skating coach, came here from Canada, where even small towns have skating rinks.

She was disappointed to discover that the Coeur d’Alene area lacked one and was delighted when GoKart filled the void.

“I can’t imagine living in this climate and not having a skating rink,” she said. “We need this here.”

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color photo

MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: DIMENSIONS The new roof is 176 feet long and 110 feet wide.