I never thought that she openly talked about her feelings like this.
Interview excerpt from the Nikkei
-How to handle my speed
If I look relaxed? When I was learning from Prof. Tatiana Tarasova, it was dificult to have many opportunities to stay with her on the ice rink because she was in Russia and I was in Japan. As I often did my practice by myself, I might be kind of tensed in some way. I'm not so tensed right now. That's why people may think so.
Since Prof. Sato began to teach me, he or his wife, Prof. Kumiko, has always been with me to instruct my training. That might be easing me.
Prof. Sato has been teaching me from skating. I should not move my shoulders and fix them while skating. That would be the base of everything including jumps. My challenge for this season is how to handle my speed. He told me "Speed is the most important and attractive aspect in figure skating."
-Lesson from the last season
I try not to forget about my failures as well as my accomplishments in the last season. For example, the jumps and my trainings. It is true that people can not bring a success without making mistakes and failures. But I should not repeat the same mistakes either.
This season, we'll discuss and plan our contents beforehand. I usually decided whether I made a triple axel or not on a day of the competitions. But I am going to do the exactly planned performances through my run-through practice.
-To create an interesting princess character for a program
I'm going to continue to do "Liebestraume" for my FS. I have a feeling I've been getting into the performance. While practicing this program, I think my face and feelings are expressing "affection."
My new SP is "Scheherazade." Whenever I visited Prof. Tatiana for getting her choreography lessons, this music was always included in her list. Every time I listened to the music, I thought about using it someday. Many skaters used "Scheherazade." And Prof. Tatiana's program has a unique arrangement for the music, too. A character is going to be a princess who is described not only as tough but also with a sweet heart.
-How I can enjoy this season and get a result
I heard many people worrying about me in the last season. I hope to show good performances. I try to do what I can do rather than challenging new things.
This season we have new seniors such as the Russian skaters in their teens. This is very natural move. Once I was one of them, too. I respect each skater has her own style. In my case, I hope I can be a skater to reach my ideal.
As for competitions, I need to have a strong motivation to compete. And I have to care about winning or losing in some respect. How I can enjoy competitions with these thoughts and feelings would be a theme for me.