Paly Junior to Compete at Skating Championships

While most Palo Alto High School students are at home recovering from hours of studying for their first semester finals, Wilbur Ji will training harder than ever. This weekend, the Paly junior will compete at the 2012 United States Figure Skating Championships, held at HP Pavilion in San Jose.

Ji will compete in the novice men's competition, skating his short program on Jan. 22 and his longer free skate on the Jan. 23.

“I’m going to have to do two routines,” Ji said. “One is the short program, which is two minutes and 30 [seconds], and the other one is the freeskate, which is three minutes and 30 [seconds].”

Ji placed fourth at the Pacific Coast Sectional Figure Skating Championships in Salt Lake City in the novice level, which qualified him for the national competition.

At sectionals, Ji was in sixth place after the short program, but completed all the elements in his long program to move into fourth. Last year at the Culver City sectionals, Ji placed seventh, missing the cutoff for nationals.

Ji competes on behalf of the Skating Club of San Francisco, but primarily trains at Belmont Iceland.

“[We’re] so proud that one of Belmont's own will be competing [at Nationals], especially because they are so close to home,” Alyssa Lewis, Manager of Belmont Iceland, said.

In San Jose, Ji will compete against 11 other male skaters from throughout the nation.

“My [goal] for this competition is to just have fun,” Ji said. “I mean, how many people can actually say they skated at nationals? Only 11 other guys throughout the US at my level will be competing against me.”

Ji has been skating competitively since he was 7, waking up as early as 5 a.m. to train before school in Belmont. In addition to perfecting the choreography of his two competition programs, Ji has also been working on his triple jumps (1080˚ rotation in the air) and increasing his stamina.

“The hardest part [of training] was landing all my triples and building up enough stamina to get through it without looking like I’m about to die on the ice,” Ji said. “I have to stretch, too, because there’s a lot of flexibility needed for ice skating and because it helps to prevent me from getting hurt.”

Although the novice level competition will not be shown on TV, live results can be found here.

The US Figure Skating Championships will be held from Jan. 21 to Jan. 29. For more information, schedules and tickets, click here.