“In my understanding – I can not speak for them of course – they are considering an Ice dance career, at least to try in Japan.” Romain Haguenauer commented on Marin Honda and Shoma Uno visiting Montreal for a couple of weeks for training
Romain Haguenauer commented that while Marin Honda and Shoma Uno recently trained in Montreal, there are no plans for a permanent move, and their competitive future remains undecided.
original source: Sports by Maya Bagriantseva
Romain Haguenauer, one of the coaches at the IAM academy, told Sports correspondent Maya Bagriantseva that Marin Honda and Shoma Uno visited Montreal for a couple of weeks for training, initiated by Misato Komatsubara, but there are currently no plans for a permanent transition to the group.
“They are working with Misato Komatsubara, she was our student so she reached out to us. They wanted to learn about ice dance a bit more and to be surrounded by real dance teams as in Japan they train by themselves, they have shows etc.
They were here just for a couple of weeks – for a dance camp, let’s say. So far there are no talks about them joining the IAm.
In my understanding – I can not speak for them of course – they are considering an Ice dance career, at least to try in Japan. It could be some regionals first, then Nationals. But the fact that they came to Montreal shows they might plan to do it. They wanted to learn how to do Golden Waltz, and work on some technical stuff – you don’t do these things for exhibition numbers. So I think they may want to work on the competitive program.
We’ve been mostly working elements and a bit on Golden waltz. It’s a tough dance for everyone, it’s really difficult to understand the tracking, holds, and how to lead and follow each other.
Jean-Luc Baker did their exhibition number Vivaldi – this program could serve as a free dance with some adaptations. So far they don’t have a RD. They were just here to work on Golden waltz for the idea to compete, but it’s a little be too early to declare they are coming back as ice dance team.
They really looked interested in what they saw in IAm. Maybe it was a bit of a shock for them to find themselves in the middle of a big ice dance school as they mainly train alone in Japan. All the teams around them – strong teams – were working on golden waltz, so I think it was great for them to spend time here. It gave them some perspective how much work is ahead of them should they want to continue this path.
I’ve known Shoma for quite some time because he used to come to Montreal as a single skater to work on skating skills – it was before he partnered up with Stefan Lambiel. But ice dance is very different. Doing parallel twizzle is great but that’s not everything. Lifts, intricacy of the steps, holds – it’s a challenge. But it’s not the first time I’ve done that – Lewis Gibson is a good example, he started ice dance after having a career in singles, but of course he was not as good as Shoma in singles.
Of course they spend very little time with us but I’m sure they will develop that in Japan with their coach. And maybe come back another time.
It was so much fun working with them. One day I arrive at the rink and I see Shoma, Marin and Rika on the same ice. And I was like ‘ok, what’s next? Ilia Malinin and Alysa Liu?’ It’s really great for ice dance – to have these great stars of figure skating back and learning ice dance.
From my side – I think it’s great, it’s new, they have great ability – they are already great on transitions, they go full out with the twizzles, they have amazing qualities individually and they can do so much more together. It’s really interesting.
I also like the look of the couple – it may be really surprising but very interesting.
I know some people question if there is a future in ice dance for partners who are not that tall. But it’s a very interesting case – not to have an ice dance team that fits into ‘perfect ice dancer’ criteria as it used to be. One should also take into account the ice dance evolution – Shoma and Marin are really filling into that perspective.
It’s super interesting for me as a coach – because we can create new stuff, new look, new vision of how two skaters can dance together. It’s a great evolution to show that you can really ice dance at a very good level even if you don’t have the traditional academic vision of the man where he should be a head higher than a girl.
I think it’s great for the ice dance – not everyone looks the same, it’s great to have different teams. At the end of the day it is this that should be judged – how you skate, and not how you look, even though the impression is part of the artistic mark. And I see that Shoma and Marin can deliver this impression. It’s like breaking the traditional academic idea – and I really like that. Something new and different,” Haguenauer told.
Related topics: Marin Honda, Romaine Haguenauer, Shoma Uno
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