Meet Dan Osterud, Red Arrow Park's graceful, bearded figure skater

If U.S. figure skater Dorothy Hamill and any of the dudes from ZZ Top had a baby, the creation of their work might resemble that of Dan Osterud.

Among the couples and kids holding their parents' hands, gingerly making their way around the Red Arrow Park Slice of Ice rink in Downtown Milwaukee, is the 52-year-old Osterud, gliding effortlessly between the pedestrian skaters with grace and poise.

“I don’t look like most figure skaters,” admitted Osterud, of Milwaukee, with his foot-long goatee blowing in the wind and hair that reaches down to the middle of his back wrapped neatly in a ponytail.

“It’s as close to flying as I’m ever gonna get,” explained Osterud when talking about his love for figure skating that started 14 years ago on his birthday when he and his wife went for a skate at Red Arrow Park.

While he was never really very good at skating as a kid, he was hooked. “The next day I went to the thrift store, …bought a pair of skates and I just started coming here.”

He figures he hits the ice probably three to five times a week.

“It’s free. Your mind just lets go. You just get out there and dance and move around. It’s fun,” said Osterud in his denim jeans with his earbuds in his ears wired to a first-generation iPod.

“Just me being me.”

This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Meet the bearded, graceful skater from Red Arrow Park in Milwaukee