Seventeen years of figure skating later, and Master’s student Caroline Mura isn’t ready to get off the ice. After graduating with honors and a degree in biology and minors in math and psychology, she returns to NYU to complete a master’s in biology and to continue skating for the Violets.
Mura was the 2024 Junior Women Bronze Medalist at the US Collegiate Championships and the 2022 National Champion in the Novice Women Short Program, Excel Novice Women Free Skate and Senior Solo Free Dance, among other awards.
In an interview with WSN, Mura — who will finish her master’s program this spring — spoke about her experience as she heads into her fifth year of NYU figure skating.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
WSN: How did you get into skating?
Mura: I started skating when I was 7 — in first grade. I started skating because of my dad. He played hockey his entire life and grew up with a literal lake in his backyard, so he skated on the frozen lake every winter. He played hockey from elementary school through adulthood, so he wanted all of his kids to know how to skate when we were younger. I mean, he actually tried to get me into hockey first, but my mom was like, ‘Absolutely not. If she’s gonna skate, she’s gonna be a figure skater.’ And so I started taking skating classes with both my brothers. They hated it and they gave up, but I was like, ‘No, I quite like this,’ and I never stopped.
WSN: What made you want to continue skating at the collegiate level?
Mura: Figure skating was a club sport, not school-sanctioned, so I didn’t really feel like I had a senior season. I never felt like I had a finish line after high school because I was always skating on my own time, on my own terms. When I was finishing up high school, I definitely did not want to stop. I just really love the sport. I also didn’t feel like I’d achieved everything I wanted to achieve, so I didn’t see a reason to stop because there’s no shortage of things you can do in the sport. There’s always something to get better at, something new to learn, something else to try. So that always gave me the motivation to keep going. I know a lot of people who were not going to skate in college and made that choice, but that was never an option in my head.
WSN: What is the highlight of your skating career?
Mura: The biggest highlight for me was qualifying for my first sectionals last fall, because it was crazy that the first time I ever made sectionals was my senior year of college. It’s easy to feel like you peaked at a younger age, but that was proof to me that I’m actually still getting better at this. That was really special. A team highlight was our third-place finish at nationals in 2023. I won three different events, which I was pretty proud of, and that was a huge result for the team. That was crazy for us.
WSN: What are your hopes for this year?
Mura: For the team overall, it’ll be a really interesting year, because we had a lot of people graduate last year, so we’re kind of going to be looking at a lot of internal turnover. So first and foremost, I really hope that everyone who does join finds what I got out of the team for themselves. That sense of community and renewed love for skating is really special about a collegiate team. In terms of more tangible results, the last three years at nationals we were fifth, third and fourth, and, not going to lie, another bronze medal would be nice. I’d like to see if we could even go bigger than that.
WSN: What are your plans after this year?
Mura: My master’s is a 4 plus 1, so I’ll graduate again in the spring. My plan is to apply to medical school — I literally take the MCAT on Thursday. So I want to continue building my resume for medical school and apply, and then hopefully be accepted somewhere. That’s the goal.
WSN: Do you want to continue skating after this year?
Mura: I will always make the time to skate. If you ask me the first thing I want to do with my free time — it’s skating. I don’t know exactly what skating will look like, especially once I’m out of school, but if I get into a medical school that has a skating team, collegiate skating might see me for four more years.
Contact Sidney Snider at [email protected].
