Looking for good lens to shoot synchronized ice skating

.. need to keep about 10 girls in focus at somewhat long distances (figure length of ice arena and from 3-4 levels up in stands).

Have the following systems:

- OMD-EM5 with 40-150 f4-5.6

- Nikon V2 with 70-300 cx f4.5-5.6

- Sony a6000 with 15-70 kit, sigma 60mm

- Nikon D7100 wth 17-55 f2.8, 18-200 f4.5-5.6, 80-400 vr f4.5-5.6

So.. lots of systems.. but slow lenses that have proven not to have the sharpest results.  Was thinking of the pan 35-100 f2.8 or the only 40-150 f2.8...  also, thought about getting a Nikon 70-200 VR for my D7100... or the Sony 70-200 VR f4...

Yikes... decisions.... please help!  Thx!!!

The key issue in my opinion is that you need to keep 10 girls in focus at a good distance -- that would lend itself to m4/3's, where you can maximize DOF at a wide aperture.

With that in mind, I would suggest the 40-150mm f/2.8. If the Pany 35-100mm f/2.8 gives enough reach, that would be a cheaper, lighter alternative, and it is an outstandingly sharp lens also.

You clearly need to keep the shutter speed as high as possible, so I also would suggest that you consider using the DTC function if you need the reach. That allows you an f/2.8 aperture with an 80-300mm FOV on the Olympus Pro zoom. If you can keep your ISO at 800 or below you will get very good quality images.

Obviously, your image use, lighting, etc. will affect the range of options.

I don't know about clearer or cleaner... if you you a tele converter you lose light as a central portion of the len's image circle is enlarged. With the digital TC the same amount of light hits the sensor but the camera uses less of it's sensor.

Depends on your requirements; the choice is:

56-210mm f/4 @ 16mp
or
80-300mm f/2.8 @ 8mp

The second option is actually: 80-300mm f/2.8 @ 4 MP (16 MP resampled in-camera)

There are obviously trade-off's using the DTC.

The 1.4 TC will definitely give better resolution than the DTC at the cost of 1 stop of light.

Also, the DTC will only produce a 16 MP Jpeg (resampled from a 4 MP crop in-camera)

However, the results from the DTC are amazingly good in my experience, and depending on your needed level of IQ for output will produce very good print files -- as long as the ISO doesn't go above 800 or so -- and of course you gain a 2X FOV and stop of light versus the 1.4X and loss of a stop.

Here are a couple examples shot with my 35-100mm f/2.8 and the DTC: