Harbin, China, August 17, 2025: For Cambodian pair Sen Bunthoeurn and Bunyay Puthireach, the Asian Figure Skating Youth Camp in Harbin has been a real eye-opener.
Coach Sen and athlete Bunyay, both from Phnom Penh, are hopefully the flag bearers for figure skating in Cambodia. What they have experienced over the last eight days in Harbin will leave a lasting impression, and one which with a bit of luck, will spark the sport’s development back home.
“We both are learning all the time. Almost everything is new to us and we are most lucky to be here,” says Sen as he uses his smartphone to video every lesson on ice by the instructors from the International Skating Union, as well as off ice lessons including the OCA’s ‘Guarding the Asian Games’ initiative.
Sen represented Cambodia in figure skating at the 2017 SEA Games (Southeast Asia) in Kuala Lumpur – “I finished last,” he laughs – but a few months after returning home, the only ice rink in the capital closed down due to a combination of the onset of COVID and financial issues.
Sen, not only trained, but also worked at the rink, and its closure left him with a job forcing him to try his hand at selling insurance and deal in real estate.
“Fortunately, a new private rink opened last year, and I’m now back there coaching. Coming to Harbin has been fantastic as back home there was no one I could turn to if I had a question to raise. Being around these international experts has been hugely beneficial,” Sen says.
As for Bunyay, 13, he was to be accompanied by a female athlete. But the young girl twisted her ankle a few days before departure and there was no time to process a visa for her replacement.
Bunyay is a novice. He had only been training for six months before being picked for the Harbin camp.
“He is enjoying it a lot. Now he doesn’t walk with me, or eat meals with me. He has found new friends,” smiles Sen, happy to see his young charge blending in, on and off the ice.
Sen is pragmatic. “Bunyay and I are both novices to figure skating. But you have to start somewhere. I try to get involved as much as possible, and get involved in the warm-ups too, trying to learn all the time. If you don’t do it, you will never learn it.”
