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Just five months ago, American Taira Shinohara won the silver medal at the 2024 Prevagen U.S. Figure Skating Championships junior division, moving up six spots from his last appearance in 2023. Despite his disappointing short program result, he noted that the points difference for the next place was very close.
“I believed I could come back,” he said of his free skate. “There were a lot of strong skaters in the competition so I didn’t have any expectations about the placement, but I knew I could finish with a score I was happy with.”
Shinohara feels her relationship with skating has improved, mainly due to the addition of the triple Axel jump in competitions.
“But I think it’s also the result of a stronger connection,” he said. “After the 2023 U.S. Championships didn’t work out, my goal for 2023-24 was to skate for myself. That’s why I chose the music for my program myself and decided which elements to include in it.”
“This year, even though I had been doing the triple axel, I wasn’t able to do it,” he continued. “Throughout the summer competitions, I started skating better and more confident. I felt like I had more control over my skating and its trajectory. And then I felt like I was ready to add the axel to my programs, so I started doing it in the next few competitions.”
Last season, the skater felt fortunate to have been able to train with top skaters Yuma Kagiyama and Ilya Marin during the summer and before the U.S. Championships, respectively.
“This experience has opened up a new perspective on my future in skating and where I want to take it,” Shinohara explains. “I really understood why I skate and I have more passion for it than just skating for the sake of continuing to skate.”
The skater, who is a member of the Chicago Figure Skating Club, also worked with a mental performance coach to help with her daily training.
“I felt most prepared for competition, with helpful tips for landing the jumps in my programs in practice and competition,” he said. “This helped me a lot in developing my programs throughout the season.”
Shinohara will compete as a junior this season and hopes to compete overseas, but his goal is to compete at nationals as a senior.
From soccer to skating
Shinohara started skating at the age of six.
“Figure skating is a winter sport I started during the soccer off-season,” he said. “When I was six, my older sister Tamaki and her friends started taking figure skating lessons, so instead of waiting for them in the stands, I decided to join in too.”
Five years later, he mastered the single Axel, after which his sister’s coach invited him to compete in the pre-qualifying division at the 2018 Upper Great Lakes Regional meet.
“There were only four boys in my area, so even though I stumbled on the camel spin, I came in second and won the box (trophy),” he recalled. “I was a little disappointed that I didn’t win, so I started taking it more seriously the next season. You could say that was the start of my competitive career.”
Shinohara currently trains under the guidance of Dennis Myers, Tommy Steenberg, Jeremy Allen and Ksenia Ponomariova. Allen was Shinohara’s first coach in 2018. Myers and Steenberg joined the team the following year.
“Tommy actually started out as my choreographer for my junior programs,” he recalls, “and I started working with Ksenia last year.”
“Tyra’s potential has been clear to me from day one,” Allen said. “It’s been amazing to watch him grow over the years since we started working together so many years ago. I think Tyra has limitless potential both technically and artistically, which is a rare combination, and as he continues to grow, I think we can expect to see some really great things coming out of him in the future.”
Shinohara, who just turned 18 last month, said his first inspiration was skating superstar Yuzuru Hanyu’s performance at the 2018 Olympics.
“That was the first time I realized the competitive side of figure skating, as opposed to the hobby skating I had been doing,” he recalls. “Then I looked up to Nathan Chen’s success. Now I admire his incredible growth last season. All of these skaters have it all, from difficult jumps to artistry to near-perfect performances. I want to be the kind of skater that others can look up to.”
“Piano Man,” “Sparkle,” and… Jason Brown
Last season, Shinohara skated to Billy Joel’s “Piano Man” in her short program.
“I don’t remember the first time I heard it, but I always have a playlist of songs I want to use in my programs,” he said. “Last year was the year of ‘Piano Man,’ especially because this year I was really focusing on my skating. I picked the song myself, but Tommy helped me with the choreography. In this program, I portray Billy Joel at a bar performing the song to the audience.”
Steenberg choreographed her free skate to music from “Sparkle,” a well-known animated film released in Japan in 2016. your nameShinohara read the original novel and watched the film, and apparently liked the origins of the story and his role in it.
“The song is performed when a meteorite is about to hit a rural town, and the two main characters and the townspeople work together to survive the disaster,” the skater explained. “The lyrics are in Japanese, and it was my first attempt at editing a song. The program depicts a boy who is thrown into an unknown world, slowly understanding the system and chasing the destiny he desires.”
Shinohara has two new programs prepared for next season that he is looking forward to performing: he worked on the short program with Jason Brown and the free skating with Scott Brown.
“I had a lot of fun with both choreographers!” he said. “It was my second year working with Scott, so we knew each other well and he was happy to try out new ideas. On the other hand, it was my first time working with Jason, but his preparation and personality made the process very smooth. We also got to watch the solar eclipse together, which was a great memory from the week!”
Strengthen your quadriceps
Shinohara currently does quad training about twice a week, but says it depends on how she feels that day. There are times when sticking to the program is more important.
“I also don’t want to push myself and risk injury,” the skater said. “For now, I can land the quadruple toe jump and the quadruple salchow.
He’s also been working on the quad lutz, quad flip and quad loop, but his favorite quad jump is the toe.
“The dopamine rush I get when I land a quad toe jump is incomparable!” he says. “My weakest point varies from day to day, but edge jumps are usually inconsistent because they require precise timing and pressure on the edge to land well.”
What’s certain is that the skater will include a quadruple toe jump in both his junior and senior free programs, and he hopes to have it in his senior short program by the end of the year.
But one of Shinohara’s main goals for next season is to gain confidence in every match. This is more important to him than getting the highest technical score that is beyond the limits of his ability. He plans to “increase the difficulty little by little over the course of the year.”
“I also want to continue to hone my artistry,” he said, “especially this year, competing as a senior nationally and my composition scores aren’t that high. I have my eye on future success and want to continue to hone the artistic side of my skating at an early stage.”
“I think the difference between the seniors and the juniors is the expression and projection that they bring to the program,” he added. “I think Dear Evan Hansen This year, we practiced dance, and I feel like we’ve gotten a lot better at expressing our emotions. We’ve also been performing a lot of other group songs, which is a lot of fun, and a valuable experience in learning how to entertain an audience.”
Roots, education, pets
Shinohara’s parents are from Japan – her mother is from Fukuoka and her father is from Hokkaido. Her 16-year-old sister also skates, and the family also has a goldendoodle named Poe.
““It’s amazing that she does both single and synchronized skating!” the skater said proudly of her sister. “She was on the U.S. synchronized team as a junior last season and is working on the triple Lutz.”
Shinohara graduated from Conant High School last month. Her favorite subjects were physics and mathematics. She plans to study mechanical engineering at university next fall and has decided to attend the University of California, Irvine.
The skater grew up speaking Japanese and is fluent in both language reading and writing.
“I went to Saturday school in Japan and finished my compulsory education in Japan,” he said. “I come from a Japanese family and it’s easier for me to speak Japanese, so I consider it my first language. But I’m also good at English and I passed my honors and AP English classes with A’s.”
hobby
Shinohara likes going for walks with Po and working on DIY projects, like making little robots using microcontrollers and motors. He hasn’t played soccer in a while, but he still kicks a soccer ball around to warm up.
“Our family has gotten really into pickleball lately, so we’ll probably get back into it when the weather gets nicer,” he said.
But his main project is an app called “Score Skates,” available on the iOS App Store.
“This is a figure skating scoring app that runs on IJS, which is used by the ISU,” Shinohara explains. “You can easily calculate your program score with buttons and slides. You can also save your score on your smartphone and check your progress with points. It incorporates all the details of IJS, such as under-rotation, second half bonuses, jump rules by level, PCS, etc. I have also created a tutorial video on YouTube that explains the details of the app.”
He hopes to retire from skating and become an engineer in the future.
“I want to combine software and technology to create something that will benefit many people’s lives,” he said.
Lessons learned from 2023-24
Shinohara understands the importance of taking the time to evaluate his own “normal” and make sure what he is doing is in line with what he truly wants. Like many skaters, he is caught up in the daily routine of going to the rink, doing his program, doing his homework.
“What was helpful for me was to reflect regularly, instead of just blindly going through a program,” he said. “For example, what intention do I need to work with to prepare for my next competition? Or is the training I’m doing every day actually benefiting me? Or am I wasting energy on less important things instead of working on more important weaknesses? Or on a bad day, should I fight back to have a good day, or resume the next day to release my frustration? I feel like I was more mindful of my training this year, which helped me to have a better understanding of who I am and what works best for me.”
Mentality is another area Shinohara sees as key to her development. She feels she has always been “good at competing,” in the sense that her matches accurately reflected the results of her practice.
“I thought the mental aspect wasn’t that important and that all I was lacking was technique and consistency,” he explained. “But through my sessions with my mental coach, I learned that I can effectively use mental techniques to improve my training and limit frustration. I also learned to use the energy in a match to skate better than I usually do in practice. Looking back over the past few years, I feel like I wasted my entire career not knowing these things, but I’m glad I learned this now because I have an equally long career ahead of me!”
Shinohara plans to compete at Skate Milwaukee in 2024, which will host the U.S. Junior Team Cup in July, with the hopes of qualifying for the JGP. His other goal is to finish in the top 10 at the 2025 Prevalence U.S. Figure Skating Championships, where he will compete as a senior.
