The Skyliners are vice-champions of the United States. They won the Short Program event at the Nationals for the first time this year. / Credits: Skyliners

Today, you learn more about the Skyliners team that will represent the United States in Helsinki in a week (also with the Haydenettes team). Emily Kirillov takes us behind the scenes of her team!

How is your team doing?
Emily Kirillov: Coming out of a great National Championships, we were so excited and motivated to get back to work and to keep our momentum going into the World Championships. At Nationals, we earned our season’s best scores in both the short program and the long program, winning the short and getting second place overall! 

A few days before your trip to Helsinki, what are you working on?
Following nationals, we’ve been working on the technical elements in both programs to make sure we can execute all of the levels we have choreographed. Also, we’ve been working on cleaning up our transitions between elements. We have taken in all of the feedback from Nationals to improve our technical elements and components so that we can put out our best skates at Worlds!

This will be your second World Championships. How do you prepare for this competition?
Our regular practice schedule continues after Nationals until we leave for Worlds. Our skaters travel from different parts of the US and some drive 4 hours to get to practice. We meet for practice on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays. Our schedule is normally around 7 hours on-ice and 3 hours off-ice each weekend. Each practice, we are improving on the progress made the prior day. 

Do you feel the pressure?
There is definitely a lot of excitement representing the United States on the world stage and we are so honored to have this opportunity! Nothing beats the feeling of hearing the crowd cheer “USA! USA!” as we take the ice. Although there is pressure to skate our best, we feel prepared to deliver two amazing programs!

When are you leaving for Finland? And what will be your schedule there?
We leave for Finland on April 6th. Upon our arrival, we have both on the ice and off ice practices scheduled for each day. We are also looking forward to having some time to explore Helsinki! 

Have you ever been to Finland and Helsinki?
I have never been to Finland but I have heard so many wonderful things about the country! I am so excited to get the chance to go sightseeing in Helsinki. I love the Panda Suomi chocolates and will definitely buy some to bring back home for my friends. Also, since synchro is so popular in Finland, I can't wait to perform for the crowd in Finland! It will be such an amazing experience to compete in a sold-out arena.  

Do you have a goal for the 2019 World Championships?
Our goal is to skate two clean programs. We want to end the season with our best performances.

Skyliners Senior is thrilled to compete at Worlds this year and we can't wait to cheer on our Team USA teammates, the Haydenettes! Good luck to all of the teams competing!