Ladies LP

[R.D.]

Before people start declaring Meier world medalist let's remember what happened to other skaters who looked promising in the GP and later on struggled or tanked. Irina, the 2006 Olympic Champion, Czisny, Potential Olympian, Miki Ando, World Champion and Kostner, Olympic medal contender.

You just don't know.

 

[rain]

Before people start declaring Meier world medalist let's remember what happened to other skaters who looked promising in the GP and later on struggled or tanked. Irina, the 2006 Olympic Champion, Czisny, Potential Olympian, Miki Ando, World Champion and Kostner, Olympic medal contender.

You just don't know.

Oh, hey, I'm not saying Meier is even a favourite at this point, but she has shown herself to be a contender, which I would not have pegged at the beginning of the season. All of the top skaters so far this season have shown themselves to be mortal with disappointing skates among the good ones. Worlds will be a dogfight.

 

[bekalc]

The jumps are soooooo beautiful. She is one of the few skaters I've seen who can travel distance in the air with her jumps. It's not just up and down but up up and away before down.

Spin positons could be better. Flow is gorgeous and I also notice a bit of body language - another one of my nitpicks on almost all skaters. She needs a bit of facial expression, a better turn out in arabesques, and a desire to win (which I think is lacking.)

Definitely in the top category. Check out that first jump and notice the distance she is in the air!!

Joe

Why do you think Yu-Na's desire to win is lacking? From the little I read about Yu-Na. I have heard that she is considered to be a competition skater. This girl had a back injury, and was apparently a bit hampered in practice and still went out and did her job. If she didn't have any desire to win, I highly doubt she would have skated so well.

I also want to point out that I think that Sarah is a contender too. In order to medal, I think that Sarah will definetly need some mistakes from others, but I think that Sarah's biggest weapon is consistency.. Whereas Miki/Caro's downfalls have always been consistency. Still I think Sarah will need help from others to medal.

 

[antmanb]

I really doubt she said that.

I thought the same thing!!!!!!!!!!!

Ant

 

[antmanb]

For everyone this is Yu-Na Kim! Grand Prix Final Champion Free Skate and SP

The Lark Ascending
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_lgHbHKifbI

Just watched the SP and i enjoyed it but just had on question - Yu Na does no steps into her solo triple lutz - not one - at the other side of the rink she does a cross over glides to the other side crosses left foot over right and does the lutz. What is the GOE reduction for having no steps? Looking at the protocol there are -1s and -2s but two 0s as well!!! What is thatall about?

Ant

 

[antmanb]

The jumps are soooooo beautiful. She is one of the few skaters I've seen who can travel distance in the air with her jumps. It's not just up and down but up up and away before down.

Spin positons could be better. Flow is gorgeous and I also notice a bit of body language - another one of my nitpicks on almost all skaters. She needs a bit of facial expression, a better turn out in arabesques, and a desire to win (which I think is lacking.)

Definitely in the top category. Check out that first jump and notice the distance she is in the air!!

Joe

The air time she gets on her jumps is pretty impressive - i'd never noticed the length she gets on the jumps. Have you seen carolina Kostners jumps too - she doesn't get very high in them but she gets great length in them too.

I like Yu Na a lot but agree her spin positions could be better - she makes no attempt at turning out her free foot in her layback spin and i always think it looks ugly having the toe pick poitning right down in a layback.

Ant

 

[antmanb]

Yes.

BTW, there is nothing surprising about Sarah Meier's result by itself. Her point total of 170.28 is in line with her World's performance (170.47) and her scores at Skate America (169.01).

Ironically, it was her worst marks of the season (159.17) that gave her first place at Cup of Russia and got her into the GP final in the first place.

Maybe they were a little inflated because it was a national panel but at Swiss nationals sarah won with a score of 178.17. She did land 5 clean triples (includnig two Lutzes and two flips) five level 4 elements and one level 3.

PCS ranging from 6.50 to a couple of 8s, mostly in the high 6 to mid 7 range though.

Ant

 

[bubbleyum]

I just watched Mao's and Yu Na's skates and noticed that Yu Na does Sandhu's butt-spin (or whatever it is called) for a few revolutions.... it looks very pretty on her! But why does that girl never look happy? I think that is why overall I prefer Mao. She looks like a happy kid, as she should at that age. Yu Na has the look of an imprisoned princess waiting to be freed. As much as I admire her skating, and I totally do, I don't enjoy watching her.

I wonder what happened to Mao? She seemed to come back nicely from her first fall with a good spirit but it happened again. Is she coming down with flu too?

why do you think she looks like an imprisoned princess? she is normally a shy girl, and i think she does very well with being at the expression level that's suitable to her programs. would you rather she did a lot of wild facial exaggerations and fake eyebrow crunching like some skaters/ice dancers do? (btw, she knows about the presentation side of it. she is working on that and also her spirals too, from what they said on tv.)

i think a lot of these ideas about yuna being miserable as a skater is due to "lost in translation" issues. all athletes have to work hard and make sacrifices. if she didn't really want to do it, and didn't care to win, she wouldn't be out there skating through her injuries.

miki ando sure didn't look like she cared to win, and you can tell that from the way she skated. i don't care if ppl say she had the flu etc etc. after she popped a couple of jumps you can tell she just doesn't care. there were a few times during her program where her arms were hanging down and i thought she was about to skate to the sideboards and just give up!

and mao only looks happy if she skated well. did you look at her face during her free skate at skate america and the grand prix final? didn't smile at all, even during the final bow. no bouncy cheerfulness there.

 

[R.D.]

The top competitive skaters like to win. The US skaters Kimmie and Emily seemed to be more or less cheerful though after their GP skates.

 

[temperboy28]

None of the girls look unbeatable at all. Kim won a loaded GP event and now a GP final without skating clean performances or posting huge scores. Any of Meissner and Kim and Asada and Ando can win Worlds this year. Any of Rochette and Meier and Suguri can win a medal of some color at Worlds since there will probably be enough mistakes they are all capable of posting a medal winning points total in short and long together.

It is unfortunate Ando and Asada were sick and could not skate like they would have though.

 

[ksharony]

Was Asada sick?
Yu-na also had back injury and knee pain.
I think Yu-na is stronger than Asada and Ando in mental power.

 

[Lumi]

Was Asada sick?
Yu-na also had back injury and knee pain.
I think Yu-na is stronger than Asada and Ando in mental power.

I think it is way too early to say anything about mental power of Asada and Kim. They both have been on senior stage such a short time.

 

[R.D.]

^ agreed. Give it about 3 years.

 

[bubbleyum]

None of the girls look unbeatable at all. Kim won a loaded GP event and now a GP final without skating clean performances or posting huge scores. Any of Meissner and Kim and Asada and Ando can win Worlds this year. Any of Rochette and Meier and Suguri can win a medal of some color at Worlds since there will probably be enough mistakes they are all capable of posting a medal winning points total in short and long together.

It is unfortunate Ando and Asada were sick and could not skate like they would have though.

i heard about ando being sick, but asada being sick is news to me.
i think she just sortof loses focus once she makes a couple of mistakes in her program. isn't she known for this? she said in some interview after nhk trophy that she was proud of herself for not letting the first mistake on the triple axel affect the rest of her program, like it normally does.

statements like that remind me of emmanuel sandhu.

 

[carol45]

I was in St. Petersburg and I don't think Asada and Kim were sick. They both skated in the Gala while others who were sick did not. Besides the fact that she has a terrible free program, Asada just did not skate well.

Absolutely none of the women looked like they were enjoying the experience or that there were other human beings watching them. There was zero connection with the audience - EXCEPT for Sarah Meier who simply lit up the ice. Sure she does not do triple/triples, but the delicate piano music suits her and Salome Brunner has designed a program for her that was better than any other female skater and better than most of the men as well. While the others were skating from one end of the rink to the other preparing for the next jump, Sarah was just floating over the ice with this look of utter joy on her face. The program was intricate and totally lovely. This is what skating is supposed to be all about.

I think she is going to win Europeans and has a shot to finish in the top five at Worlds.

 

[Mathman]

Thanks for the first-hand view, Carol. I wonder if the lack of expression from Asada and Kim are more reflective of their age than anything else. They are concentrating so hard on that next jump that -- as you say -- they completely forget about the fact that this is supposed to be a performance.

 

[rain]

Thanks for the first-hand view, Carol. I wonder if the lack of expression from Asada and Kim are more reflective of their age than anything else. They are concentrating so hard on that next jump that -- as you say -- they completely forget about the fact that this is supposed to be a performance.

Interesting you should note about them concentrating so hard on the jumps.....I saw Asada's performance from Skate America recently, and while it was a disaster in terms of jumps, she actually performed the choreography with significantly more feeling, IMO, than she did at NHK where she made montrous scores with big jumps. Perhaps for her right now it's one or the other, she is not capable of both at the same time.

 

[Joesitz (RIP)]

I'm all for a great performance in an exhibition, but I seldom get that from anyone.

Performance in competition skating is part of the score but only part.

Joe

 

[bubbleyum]

i wish some of these gala performances would make it on to youtube. the only one i've seen has been the skate canada one.

 

[bubbleyum]

i wish some of these gala performances would make it on to youtube. the only one i've seen has been the skate canada one.

never mind, i just found yuna's from russia. also watched mao's from skate america. they both seemed to skate the best they could, didn't look like they "didn't care." of course i was not there in person and i haven't seen mao's from russia. i agree with the others who think that this audience connection will come with more experience and a better comfort level. i guess some skaters have it coming right out of the gate, like michelle (or even irina), and it doesn't come so naturally to others...