Well, I'd feel uncomfortable asking anyone, even if paid, to film the rink for 60 minutes!
I don't know what is so difficult in the range thing. Folks at arduino forums hinted that currently there is no economic / simple way of handling tracking with arduino + openCV even without considering range.
Was originally thinking a good webcam, servo, and computer running real time video analysis to follow the emitter on skater would do. Guess I am still asking too much.
Anyways, got my tripod at least