Liberty Championships July 15 -18, 2009, Aston, PA

Junior Men SP

About 5 of the 15 men skated to "Tango De Los Exilados". The only man to skate a clean short was Alexander Zi(Spelling). Aiken came in second. Today I will see the LP.

I saw Chan practicing at the Fred Rust arena, but he was not listed in the program. They will post the roster today for tomorrow's event. I will look for his name and confirm tonight.

MasterB said:

Junior Men SP

About 5 of the 15 men skated to "Tango De Los Exilados".

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Heh, heh. Maybe I should take earplugs to Skate America.

Sylvia, you wrote:
Bulanhagui 42.35 3A-2T (gutsy attempt, good height, but downgraded).

I guess you meant 2A-3T??

Thanks for the reports and tweets!

Spun Silver said:

Sylvia, you wrote:
Bulanhagui 42.35 3A-2T (gutsy attempt, good height, but downgraded).

I guess you meant 2A-3T??

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Nope, it was a 3A attempt as reported by Sylvia.

It was quite an eye opener for sure. I hope Melissa tries it in the LP...it was very, very close, else she would not have been able to tack the 2t on the end of it.

Spun Silver said:

Bulanhagui 42.35 3A-2T (gutsy attempt, good height, but downgraded).

I guess you meant 2A-3T??

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2A-3T would not be a legal combination in the senior ladies' short program, because a solo 2A is required and it's not allowed to repeat the same jump in two different elements.

Did Ashley withdraw?

Tammi said:

Nope, it was a 3A attempt as reported by Sylvia.

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Well, WOW! I didn't know the US had someone who could do 3A in combination... even almost! Go, Melissa!

Has she ever done a solo 3A (in competition)?

Thanks for the rules reminder, gkelly.

I've never seen her do it before. In fact, AFAIR, the only US lady to land 3A2t in the SP was Tonya Harding, and I think she only did it once at Skate America, I think in 1993? (Not sure of the year)

Here's a link to Mr. Ski's video of Melissa's SP

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3uVNW8hA-R8

Unfortunately, the camera is dying the slow death, and the camera work is therefore not up to his usual standard. I'll be linking to some other vids he took as we get them uploaded, but don't expect too much. I apologize in advance. Melissa's is one of the better ones.

Ski has been ill, and his stamina is still not up to par, so we only saw the Sr. Ladies SP (parts A & B) and the Sr. Men's SP.

Sylvia has already given you the placings and the jump calls, so I'll just throw in some random impressions.

The ladies' field was very skimpy. Ashley Wagner was at the event, but not skating. She is being monitored tomorrow. She was sitting with Adam Rippon, watching the Sr. Men. Adam is also being monitored tomorrow. Adam has his curly hair back. Patrick Chan is still here. I saw him in the lobby, talking to friends. No one is absolutely positive he is skating in the LP. I have my fingers crossed.

In fact, the audience was skimpy at the ladies' event, because there were no major names skating. The arena was packed full for the men's SP.

The reason Ryan Bradley placed so low in the Men's SP would be that he fell on his quad toe combination, which was downgraded to a 3t, and did a 2A. OTOH, his footwork was a lot more complex than in previous years, and I wonder whether that hasn't been a focus for him this early in the season. He skated to a version of Dark Eyes I hadn't heard before. He also may be nursing some injury--he wasn't performing for the crowd in the same way he did last year at Liberty, but it may just be focussing. This may be a great program later in the season. (8th, I think)

Armin Mahbanoozedeh fell on his 3A attempt, but had a very nice combination.

I really like Tommy Steenberg's program. He had some unique moves and a Bobrinesque kind of sideways flip in his footwork. His jump content was weak (2a, 3s, 3/2) but it was very entertaining. (No vido ) The batteries died.

Shaun Rogers managed his 4t but it was low, so no combo. Good 3A and 3 lz-and then he missed a spin entirely (should have gotten no points because it stopped before it started) He could well have finished higher.

Keegan Messing gutted out holding on to his triple axel with a very low Stojko-esque landing. His spins are absolutely amazing for their speed, and he had a couple of great positions, too. He ran out of rink on his triple triple combination and was only able to get a single toe because he was at the boards. He has amazing acceleration and changes of direction very much like Scotty Hamilton in his competitive days. (6th)

Jonathon Cassar did a program reminiscent of Ryan Jahnke. He has a great spread eagle sequence and a lot of style. We did not get a video. Think he was third?

Ross Minor landed all his jumps to finish second. He skated to a version of Carmen performed on the trumpet. He may or may not have put a hand down on the 3A, but a great effort for him. His father sat near us, and he was obviously thrilled with Ross's performance. His spins were rather weak, and the ending with a Sandhu butt spin was not the greatest choice for Carmen , I thought.

Douglas Razzano won with a well performed, fluid performanced. He did reverse lunges (forward and backward, one right after the other) which I really liked.

Joelle Forte won the Senior ladies B section.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_6O6ZYaG54

She has reported that she will probably be skating for another country other than the US. Performances like this should help.

Dorispulaski, thank you so much for your report and for making efforts to provide the video of the event. I really appreciate it and any quality video is better than nothing.

Great report on the SPs, Doris. Looking forward to reading more on the LPs, particularly, of Bulanhagui, Cassar and Razzano (two very much gifted skaters beyond the tech.)

Appreciate precise reviews and videos as well. I've been monitoring this thread heavily. Million thanks!!!

Thank you Ms. Doris!

I just read on Sylvia's twitter that Chan landed a quad. It's amazing. Vancouver will be even more ecxiting if he does it consistently. I'm looking forward to read the results and the report of this competition.

dorispulaski said:

Joelle Forte won the Senior ladies B section.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_6O6ZYaG54

She has reported that she will probably be skating for another country other than the US. Performances like this should help.

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Thank you soooo much for the videos Please dont apologise for the quality. I am sooooo thankful for the videos:yes: I hope you guys are having a wonderful time at the competition and I hope Mr Ski is feeling much better soon. Give my thanks to him for the videos as well.

Please take care and have a wonderful day!!

dorispulaski said:

I've never seen her do it before. In fact, AFAIR, the only US lady to land 3A2t in the SP was Tonya Harding, and I think she only did it once at Skate America, I think in 1993? (Not sure of the year)

Here's a link to Mr. Ski's video of Melissa's SP

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3uVNW8hA-R8

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Her 3A did not disrupt the program, and I would love to see a slomo of that. Her 3F or 3Z what ever it was did disrupt the program. However, she is skating very competitively and looks very determined.

GiuliaPlum said:

I just read on Sylvia's twitter that Chan landed a quad. It's amazing. Vancouver will be even more ecxiting if he does it consistently. I'm looking forward to read the results and the report of this competition.

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Was that in competition or in practice? I thought he was not going to compete.

Chan - landed the quad in warm-up but, failed in the program. Takahashi's version of this program was way more passionate. If he skates this program cleanly he might be able to give you some goose bumps, I hope. I really like his style.

Cassar - stole the show, for me. His program to Schindlers list was awesome. He turned out of some of the triples but, nobody cared. The audience was left breathless. Overall he has gotten stronger on his triples. I wanted to tell him what a great job he did but, Sylvia and some other lady were gushing all over him, trying to interview him. Funny thing is, these two reporters did most of their reporting from the cafeteria where the music is very low but, for Cassar they ran to see him after his performance.

Bradley, Farris, Gilles, rippon and few others were reviewed by the USFSA. I dropped in to see if they were going to do their program but, they didn't. They did a run through with a bunch of singles and then they had them redo certain parts of their programs. It's too bad that they didn't do the actual competition.


The ladies were a bust. The worst part is that they made us wait nearly an hour between the two skimpy groups. They could have put them all together and saved us some time. That rink was freezing.

Joelle Forte was by far the strongest lady in the field. She should have won, not Maxwell.

Thank you MasterB. I'm particularly interested in Cassar who wowed me in last year's Nats. I guess he will still have to skate the Sectionals.

Is there any youtube of Cassar?

all thost skaters you named being reviewed will be in the GPs (Cassar will not). I'll revew them then.

Joelle is a very good skater come lately. I'm sure she will make Nationals.

What about Patrick's music? Is he using the same cut of Daisuke?
Thank you if you want to describe it a little for us