Q: What are your skating goals, both short-term and long-term?
I want to return to competitive ice dance after an extended break because I don’t feel like I’m done with the sport and I’d like to see what I and a partner are capable of if I’m able to focus on ice dance. I stopped competing after a knee injury in 2017 and thought I was fully retired after competing in intercollegiate in 2022, but I keep being drawn back to the ice. I also recently found a treatment for the knee injury from 2017 that works, so I can train again, which was the lynchpin for making this idea realistic. I’m currently a PhD student and expect to defend summer 2027, so I wouldn’t plan to be competitive until the 2027-28 season. I’d like to find a partner to make this comeback possible.
Q: What qualities do you possess that would make you a good partner?
I have a very strong foundation in ice dance and have been skating for almost 24 years. While I primarily did solo dance when I was competitive before, I have a lot of non-competitive partnered dance experience as well. I’m particularly skilled with twizzles, I know the steps to every pattern dance (including all the internationals), and I have strong edges, speed, and ice coverage, even considering that I’ve been essentially retired for several years now. I’m very technically-oriented, owing to my coaching experience (I’ve been coaching since 2017) and to my scientific background - when I got injured I decided to go to college and ended up at MIT, and now I’m doing a dual PhD in geosciences and astrobiology, so I approach skating in a very similar way to how I approach science.
Extra comments:
As mentioned above, this is a comeback and I need to finish my PhD before I can fully devote myself to skating. I’m expecting to finish in summer 2027, so in the meantime I plan to get myself back into shape and work on my stamina, since I haven’t competed in several years and only recently have been treated for a knee injury that allows me to workout again. I will also note that I am not a naturally thin person and I refuse to have an eating disorder to find an ice dance partner (been there, done that!). I spin and jump lefty (clockwise), but can also spin counter-clockwise and I can twizzle equally in both directions. I am willing to relocate for the right partnership once I’m done with my PhD. I don’t currently have a coach, since I’m the only high level dance coach in my area, but I’m open to a number of training situations. I also have a number of videos of my skating on my Instagram account, @juliana.drozd.
