Short Trackers Xavier Lawrence, Sean Shuai Bringing New Energy to the National Team

Confidence is an important part of every athlete’s toolbox, but for 17-year-old short track speed skater Sean Shuai, success began to come only after he took an honest look at his skills two years ago and decided that he wasn’t very good. 

There was a quote, he said, that summed it all up. And although he couldn’t remember the exact wording, he was able to describe the gist. 

“It basically says that if you’re an amateur and you think you’re the best, you really haven’t learned anything yet,” Shuai, of Tulsa, Oklahoma, said. “And you reach a turning point where you know you’re not at the top yet. That was what I reached, a turning point where I knew I was nowhere near the top. So, I sat down and asked myself, ‘How can I get better?’”

As US Speedskating’s 2023-24 Short Track Development Skater of the Year on the men’s side, it seems Shuai found his answer. Shuai and another up-and-coming young skater, Xavier Lawrence, were both named to the Short Track National Team for the first time this season.

For Lawrence, the addition to the team roster comes after a big mental change over the course of the last year.

“I’m (skating) more for me now than for other people,” said Lawrence, 18, from Chicago. “I feel like in the past I would always keep skating because I wanted to please other people and make other people happy, but that didn’t lead to the outcomes I thought it would. So, I just flipped a switch in my mind that if I wanted to do this, I was going to have to do it for myself. Success is only going to come if I want it.”

Lawrence started speed skating at 8 years old. A figure skater at the time, he wasn’t really enjoying that sport but wanted to stay on the ice. When his mother, a native of Trinidad, saw a flyer at the local rink about a speed skating team, she suggested he give it a try.

He took to it right away.

“I think it’s more the adrenaline for me,” he said. “Just hitting a really fast lap and not knowing if you’re going to fall or not. That’s all part of the excitement. It’s also another reason why I picked short track, not long track. I like the passing, the contact, the racing in general. That’s what I really love.” 

Shuai also started in a different sport on ice — hockey. But after watching a speed skating club take the ice after a practice when he was 11 years old, he ditched the hockey skates.

“I think it’s just the speed I liked,” he said. “I didn’t really know anything else about it. And it got more fun as time went on because I didn’t know the racing was that fun and unpredictable when I started.”

Both Shuai and Xavier eventually ended up in Utah to train with the Olympic Oval’s F.A.S.T. (Facilitated Athlete Sport Training) program and credit coach Li Geng for their development. 

Shuai made his international debut last fall, and then made history at the Gangwon 2024 Winter Youth Olympic Games.

Shuai thought he might medal in the 1500m race on the first day of competition and was heartbroken after he finished fourth. Then in the 1000m he “did something stupid” and was disqualified for the way he blocked a fellow competitor. 

The second day, he called Coach Li.

“I promised her no matter what happened I would definitely get a gold medal that day,” he said. “I didn’t care which race. I told her if I didn’t get a gold medal, she could kick me off the team.”

As he moved through the heats in the 500m, Shuai finished first in every round. The quarters and the semifinals got faster, and he continued to clock the best times. Then in the final, he was passed on the last lap by China’s Zhang Xinzhe, but he went “really wide and took a late crossover” and was able to pass him back in time to cross the finish line in first place with a time of 41.498, winning by just by 0.257 of a second.

“I felt like I was about to cry on the ice,” he said of the feeling. “I just had so much leading up to that. I promised myself and promised my coach I was going to win gold, and I was like, I can’t lose now.”

Shuai not only won the first U.S. Gold of the Youth Olympic Games, but he also became the first American speed skater ever to win a title at the event. He also won Silver in the mixed gender relay, then in his first trip to the Junior World Championships took Silver in the 500m.

Lawrence, whose best event is the 500m, also made his international debut last season, recorded his fastest lap ever and began training with the National Team members who weren’t overseas during the international season.

He learned he’d officially made the National Team for the coming season when he saw a post on Instagram.

“I was driving home and saw an email that was the skater list for the training program for the year, and I was like, ‘OK, I’m going to do what I did last year,’” he said. “A week later I saw the post saying this is the National Team, and I was like oh wow, that’s really cool.”

Lawrence will continue this fall as a part-time student at the University of Utah, where he’s studying finance with the hopes of starting his own photography business one day. His goals for on the ice include medaling at the Junior World Championships.

Although he made a big jump physically this past season, Shuai said, he thinks his biggest improvement was in the mental side of the sport. As much as the turning point of accepting that he wasn’t very good sparked his motivation to get better, he now seems to have struck a balance between knowing that while he still has much to learn as a young skater, he’s also one of the best junior skaters in the world.

“Now I know I’m somewhat decent at what I do,” said Shuai, whose goals for the coming season include working on his longer distances, winning Gold in the 500m at the Junior World Championships and making the podium in the 1500m at that same event.

“You do anything on the world stage and you get a medal, that’s pretty good. That was the biggest change after that 500m (at the Youth Olympic Games). Something clicked and I’m like, ‘I’m not bad anymore at this sport. I’m actually pretty good.’”

Karen Price is a reporter from Pittsburgh who has covered Olympic and Paralympic sports for various publications. She is a freelance contributor to USSpeedskating.org on behalf of Red Line Editorial, Inc.