Ice Dance Opens Doors for Junior Team

When Vanessa Pham's coach first approached her about switching from singles skating to ice dance in 2017, she was not immediately keen on the idea.
 
Doing so not only meant learning a new avenue of the sport, but it also meant having someone else join her in the rink, and she was not sure how she felt about that. Skating by herself made her happy, and although she was still working on honing her craft, she considered herself to be a "decent" singles skater. Switching to ice dance meant altering her current path.
 
At first, she convinced her coach to allow her to continue skating in singles, but when she saw her ranking decline, her coach revisited the idea of transitioning to ice dance.
 
"I had tested a lot of my dances, and I don't want to say it was easy for me, but it was definitely not as much work as jumping was," she said. "My coach was kind of like, 'You're going to try it. If you don't like it, you can just quit after one season, but you're going to try one season.'"
 
She was paired with Jonathan Rogers, who had gotten into skating after watching his sister, Sarah Rogers, glide around the rink. He too had been performing as a singles skater, and like Pham, felt as though he had not reached his pinnacle on the ice. However, he had discovered one of his strengths as an athlete.
 
"I was definitely leaning more towards the artistic side," he said. "I was always really good at [the] moves and everything that wasn't jumping. So [I] was kind of approached … like, 'Hey Jonathan, you should go do ice dance.'"
 
The partnership was rocky at first. They had to grow used to skating together, and Pham had to shed her aversion to the change. But after performing in a few ice dance competitions, Rogers noticed an aspect of the sport that was a welcome change from what he had known before.
 
"I was kind of like, 'This is way more fun.' It's almost like a party," he said. "You have someone else here with you, [which makes it] less stressful."
 
Pham noticed the shift, too, and it helped her begin to embrace her new venture.
 
"I mean, the first time I skated, there were no nerves at all," she said. "I was like, 'Okay, we're going to do this competition, we're going to skate, it's going to be fine.'"
 
The more relaxed atmosphere gave the pair space to tap into their artistic side. Suddenly, Rogers found himself looking forward to skating practice and the new moves he would get to learn, while Pham began to express emotion more openly while she was on the ice.
 
"When I first switched, I think [our coach] would probably tell you that I had a bit of a poker face," Pham said. "My skating didn't have me at all in it; it wasn't filled with performance. And in ice dance, it's all about performance. So I've definitely learned to add [that]."
 
Viewing ice dance as an artistic outlet has led to rewards in the rink. The pair placed fourth in last year's Toyota U.S. Figure Skating Championships, and more recently brought home third at their first Junior Grand Prix in France back in August.
 
The Junior Grand Prix, held in Courchevel, France, served as the pair's first international competition. According to Rogers, the opportunity to skate overseas was a checkbox on his bucket list.
 
"The way it went down, it was like, 'Check mark!' We did it," he said. "There was a sense of pride in it [and] maybe appreciation. It wasn't 100% perfect like I wanted it to be [and] like I visualized, but as the season goes on, I'm looking back and … [Pride] is just growing the further we get away from it."
 
"I was taking advantage of my opportunities, and I had fun," Pham agreed. "It's like, all those times that I spent thinking, 'I don't want to skate anymore', [and] when I'm exhausted – it all pays off. Literally, blood, sweat, and tears – it all pays off."
 
The pair is riding that wave of success into this year's Toyota U.S. Figure Skating Championships. However, while it would be nice to place again and bring home yet another piece of celebratory hardware, their focus is on skating well and being sure to embrace the relaxed nature of ice dance that they first noticed all those competitions ago.
 
"[I want to] enjoy it a little more," Rogers said. "I get really caught up in [doing well]."
 
In Pham's eyes, achieving Rogers' goal would lead to a stronger performance.
 
"When we go into it saying, 'We actually like skating. We're going to have fun with it,' we skate better and the feedback we hear is better," she said. "So I think just having fun this competition [means] we'll skate better."
 
Pham may not have viewed ice dance through that lens when she first tried it nearly five years ago, but stepping beyond her comfort zone and embracing the nuances of the sport has led her to see that you never know what awaits when you branch out – and allowed her to experience a few items on her bucket list along the way.
 
Pham and Rogers look to add another piece of hardware to their collection in San Jose. To watch the duo live, visit the 2023 Toyota U.S. Figure Skating Championships Competition Central.