- Joined
- Feb 23, 2014
Which GP events were they assigned to?
NHK and Rostelecom
Which GP events were they assigned to?
Now, this girl should go try out with Drozd immediately. Got skills.
I was responding to the post above, which implied that this split was in some way a good thing for the parties involved. My logic is that this split is in no way a good thing for Kana, Chris, and the development of Japanese ice dance.
Of course, it will be a good thing for Spain. (And if I didn't appreciate the quality of H&K, I wouldn't have named them. I think their odds are very good this season. Though why recycled Pink Floyd and Libertango? Why?).
I think Smart & Diaz will still be neck and neck with Sara & Kirill at Spanish Nationals. We'll see who the Fed sends to World's. No doubt they'll make it a convuluted decision again though!
I am so much looking forward to seeing them place top 10 finally at the upcoming Worlds in Japan, then will see two teams at the Worlds; Kana/Chris AND Komatsubara/Koleto, next season which is something none of Japanese pairs/ice dance have done before... It really IS within the reach this season, I thought.
You are thinking of Allison Reed. Both Cathy and Chris skated for Japan their entire senior career and Cathy is coaching in Japan now. I really wish people would stop throwing shade at the Reeds for country hopping when Chris and Cathy have only done so once and they did it early on as teenagers, presumably before the US Fed spent much on developing them. Not to mention that Cathy's post competitive career also shows her dedication to Japanese skating. As for Allison, as another poster has mentioned, male skating partners don't exactly grow on trees.
I would suggest Kana to convince Ryuju Hino to switch disciplines. He's tall enough and has reached his ceiling on singles.
There were only 5 teams at Japanese Nationals last year.
#2 Komatsubara & Koleto are married and just did the Asian Open.
#3 Has anyone heard whether Fukase & Tateno are still together? They weren't assigned to NHK, which I thought they might be as they met the World minimum scores at the end of last season. And on the list I just checked, they didn't appear to be listed for any Challengers, which one would think would be much more likely. They did Lombardia last year. They also aren't listed for the upcoming Quebec dance event, which I think they competed at last year and/or the year before.
#4 Orihara & Mori have split. She is now skating with Lee Royer. So Mori may be looking for a partner.
I don't know anything about the fifth team.
Again, to add to above summary via re-posting what I've summarized for the current Japanese ice dance teams from Fan fest discussions-
- Senior teams from National last year:
#Komatsubara&Koleto
#Fukase&Tateno: Tateno has surgery to his left shoulder earlier in Feburary. He just got back to Montreal at the beginning of Aug. to start training with the new season
#Iida&Ishibashi: competed together at domestic competition (Mikasa Cup) in Jun [but they have been skated together for only about 2 years and both are over 20]
*Orihara&Lee Royer: new team paired up this year
- Also from last year's junior couples, there were at least 5 team from Jr. Nationals, among these:
#Yajima&Shimazaki: Jr. National champions last year. They were at JWC (didn't make it to FD). This year they skated also at Mikasa Cup and reportedly have moved up to senior level at least domestically (One of them is a college student and may be aged out for Jr competitions).
As for the rest of the Jr couples, there's at least one team (Kashino siblings) who had been skated together for a while. It's not for sure why none of them are sent to JGP this season.
Finally, although it's sad about Kana and Chris's split, I think they should also be acknowledged for their dedications and contributions to push ice dance in Japan. Also there's Chris' sister, Cathy Reed, who is not only working as a coach and choreographer in Japan right now, I believe Cathy is also much involved in developing local ice dance team from younger generation. She's supporting at least a pair of younger age (as shown recently in her blog entry).