By Sophia Sandoval, Team FSO contributing writer
Photos by Robin Ritoss
As Logan Higase-Chen prepares to make her U.S. senior Nationals debut later this month, she is surrounded by American figure skating titans.
The 16-year-old and 2024 U.S. Junior Champion trains in Colorado Springs under Tammy Gambill alongside some of the top American women, including Elyce Lin-Gracey, and 2024 U.S. Champion and 2024 Grand Prix Final Champion Amber Glenn. Their success and work ethic inspire Higase-Chen every day, but it is also the friendships she has formed with them that are just as meaningful.
Being an elite figure skater is an individual, specific experience that not many people can relate to, so it is comforting being surrounded by teammates who understand and support her, especially Lin-Gracey, who is around the same age as Higase-Chen.
“She’s like one of my best friends at the rink and we always support each other,” Higase-Chen said. “I think she has my best interests at heart, and that’s nice to have, especially since we’re competing against each other, and not everybody’s like that.”
Higase-Chen started her season with a second-place finish in the junior event at the Cranberry Cup International. After not having a Junior Grand Prix assignment in 2023, Higase-Chen was back on the circuit, competing at the Junior Grand Prix in Bangkok, Thailand just a few days after her 16th birthday. While she skated an ISU personal best overall score at the event, a rough short program had her climbing from ninth place going into the free skate, and she ultimately placed eighth.
Despite struggling in the short, it was an important learning experience for Higase-Chen, who is eager to get as many international assignments as possible. While she didn’t get a second JGP, she was assigned to Santa Claus Cup in Budapest, Hungary where she won the junior women’s event. Higase-Chen is allowed to compete on the senior level domestically, but due to the newly implemented ISU age rules, she still has to wait another season to make her senior international debut.
Despite this, her main focus has been on maturing every aspect of her skating; not just the spins and jumps, but also seemingly minuscule aspects like the way she enters the ice and bows. She wants her skating to be elevated to senior-level material before getting there.
“Since I can’t do like senior internationals for another year, I want to be one of the best in juniors while I’m here, and then be ready for seniors when I get there,” she said.
An important part of that is skating to programs now that push her both in artistry and skating skills. Senior-level judging demands much more out of athletes in the program component score.
“My skating skills need to grow a lot, and I think it’s important for me to have programs that push me so I improve throughout the season,” Higase-Chen said.
Higase-Chen’s short program is a medley to Star Wars: Rogue One choreographed by Lori Nichol. In the program, she portrays a space princess in a war. She has skated to music from movies before but is trying to put extra emphasis on developing the character and taking the audience through a story during the program. She hopes that the program evolves over the rest of the season, and credits Nichol with being an asset to her training, creating programs that are challenging yet play to her strengths. For her free skate, Higase-Chen is skating to “Los Moros” by Gino D’Auri.
While numerous figure skaters her age do school entirely online to help maximize training hours and for flexibility purposes, Higase-Chen goes to in-person public high school while incorporating some online classes.
“I enjoy going to an actual school because I get to interact with kids my age and teachers,” she said, who is a sophomore at Cheyenne Mountain High School.
For the average high school kid in America, her schedule is staggering. Maybe not for student-athletes, but a kid on a football team cannot relate to flying out to Bangkok during a weekend for a sporting competition.
She skates extremely early in the morning, goes to school, and then has another training session in the afternoon. There are only 24 hours in a day and it can be difficult to manage her hectic schedule, so avoiding procrastinating on assignments and studying is imperative for her.
As Higase-Chen puts on the final touches before Nationals, she doesn’t want to place any specific expectations on herself. For her, it is more important to aim to skate clean rather than a specific score or placement. Taking this an important step in her career can be daunting, but she views pressure as an asset rather than a detriment.
“Pressure can be good, but you can’t let it get too far to where you are worried about it all the time,” Higase-Chen said. “So it can help, but you can’t let it take control over you.”
