Before this season, Ellie Kam's experience in pairs skating was fairly limited. She had only watched her more seasoned partner, Danny O'Shea, compete on television and YouTube.
Remarkably, in what will be just their fifth competition as a team, the pair is headed to the ISU World Figure Skating Championships 2023 in Saitama, Japan, from March 20 to 26.
With no expectations of skating competitively this season, O'Shea was assisting coach Drew Meekins in preparing singles girls for entry into the pairs world. Kam had competed one season – or "two-thirds of a season" to use her phrase – in pairs, but was not currently in a partnership.
"Ellie didn't know it at the time, but I was definitely interested in skating with Ellie, having watched her perform," O'Shea said.
What they had over the course of two days couldn't quite be deemed a tryout, per se, the duo said, but an introduction to each other. On the third day, O'Shea laid out technical elements for a short program for Meekins' and Kam's consideration. The choreography flowed from there for their program, set to "The Prayer" by Josh Groban and Charlotte Church.
The team's free skate, set to "Nocturnal Animals" by Abel Korzeniowski, took more time to flesh out … five days.
"I have a whole album of videos on my phone of different dance lifts, transitional lift type things, that I've saved from a lot of ballroom dancers, acro-yoga and cheerleading," O'Shea said. "There's a ton of really neat things that you can find out there. We picked which of these things we wanted to add as an exit, which one of things we wanted to put in transitions. It's never exactly what you see on video, but it's kind of an inspiration for what you could do."
Within a week, both programs were complete but uncertainty remained around the pair's ability to compete this season.
"Trying to stay present in the moment was the toughest part of those early days," Kam said. "We had to slow down and go with what happens."
They soon got the green light, going on to win IceChallenge and place second at the Golden Spin of Zagreb. Then, they stood on the podium with bronze medals at the 2023 Toyota U.S. figure Skating Championships. They followed that up with a sixth-place finish at the ISU Four Continents Figure Skating Championships 2023.
"Even though we like to make it seem like a lot of things have jelled, it's still all so new," O'Shea admitted. "I think that it shows that we are a very good match for each other. The things that we still have to make a lot of adjustments on look pretty good to most people watching it."
What is it that makes this partnership work? O'Shea, a familiar face on pairs podiums for years, saw his former partnership with Tarah Kayne culminate in five U.S. Championship medals – including the title in 2016 – and a gold medal at the 2018 Four Continents Championships.
Kam, essentially a rookie, said that she jumped right into a partnership at the junior level with her previous partner last season. Even that was a whirlwind; she transformed her singles programs into a pairs programs and took it from there.
"Danny having all the experience helped a lot because he already knew what was going to happen," Kam said. "I just had to worry about being there and keeping my feet under me. He was able to guide my team with Drew. It was super helpful. Skating with Danny is exciting – he's Danny O'Shea!"
O'Shea knew they had something special from the start, but he kept his thoughts close to the chest. Heading to Worlds in their first season together felt like a longshot, but not impossible.
"I mentioned it to Drew in a joking way when I was talking with him," he said. "I was like, sure would be nice to make the World team in the first year! He laughed at me and then we didn't talk about it again for a while."
"I'm actually grateful that you didn't tell me that was on your mind, because I think I felt a lot of pressure – I put a lot of pressure on myself skating with you," Kam responded during the interview. "Knowing you were thinking that we could get to this point would've been a lot."
Pressure and expectations notwithstanding, the team plans to put out a performance everyone in their inner circle can be proud of in Saitama. But this team is looking even further into the future.
"It's amazing how much I trusted her immediately with this whole process," O'Shea said of his new partner. "I think that that speaks a lot to her character. I'm excited to be able to go through all of this next four years together with her."
