My Take on Campbell's - Spoiler

SPOILERS

I love to watch live competitions no matter the out come. the following is my critic:

MEN - in order of appearance

Tim - Music was good (QUEEN), the choreography was okay, no big improvement. Did not do any quads, however did do a triple axel, double toe, triple loop combination step out. Did the rest of the standard triples. The crowd was ready for him to do well.

Ryan- Skated to some jungle music. Very good Choreography. His body moves great. He landed twoooo beautiful triple axels in warm-up, but failed to do any in the program(he has a definite mental block on that jump). He tried a quad toe but two footed. he popped some other jumps. He missed a great chance to steal the thunder from the favorites.

Michael - skated to soldier music and amazing grace, so-so choreography. tried the quad but fell. first triple axel attempt failed, hit the second one and several other triples. looks to be about as strong as last year. consistancy needs building


Honda - new costume( ala Yagudin) I forgot the name of the music but it was the same as the one that Midori Ito use for her short program the year she flew out of the rink. quads were a mistery to him too. the program was kind of flat.


Plushenko - sorry nothing new in the music department, same as last year, however he blew the house down with a nearly perfect program. He had no reason to do any quads, but he did them anyway. the audience was very very happy they got their money's worth out of him. He treated this comp. like it was the worlds. THe rest of the Fellas should take note of that.


Smith - skated to some Jazzie/blues number, it was kind of slow, bad costume, too plain for this level. He nailed a great triple axel, triple toe combo. fell on the quad salcow. overall a good tried for a replacement.


LADIES

AP - costume was awful( my taste) too many feathers under the arm, and of course too much sequence. She was leaning way too much to her right side on her jumps. landed 5 out of seven triples, code of points will kill her on this flaw. Choreography could have been better. Spins were good.

Jennifer - Skated to the same program as the year before. In warm up she looked very strong and faster than years before. She fell twice but landed 5 strong triples, spins were slow

Michelle - pretty lavendar dress by none other than vera wang. landed 4 of the easier triples, pop one lutz at the end and two footed the first one. That was too bad, as she was nailing them in warm up. Music was Tosca, not my favorite and looked too much like her old slow programs. any one of the following ladies could have taken her now.

Fumie - had a nice teal dress, skated to Mozart music but her jumps failed her. I think she complete about two triple flips. she let an excellent opportunity go by. Oh well

Sokolova - this girl couldn't be her. she looked about 30 pounds heavier, i am not lying, and couldn't land a triple. I think someone was playing a trick on us. When the marks came up the crowd was booing, which made me wonder, how many were really educated in the art of skating

Sasha - creative dress, some liked it , some didn't, I did. nailed 5 triples, two in combos. I held my breath to see where she would screw up. her axel was a little scratchy and she two footed a second flip I think towards the end. She however skated the strongest and won. finally beating Kwan ( her lifelong dream). She was very happy. She looked like she had won worlds.



Overall thought- the arena should have played the music a little louder, it was kind of hard to get into the programs when the music was so low. I am kind of mad with these skaters because they weren't taking this event seriously(with the exception of Plushenko). We all know it's not worlds, but when you want to sell your sport and create new events for it you should treat it serioulsy. People pay serious money for this event and they want to see strong performances. Otherwise they won't show up next year. It's sad that the skaters are not taking advantage of these kind of opportunities. If you were there you know the crowd was ready for excitement, you could feel it. If you don't take your sport seriously no one else will. one positive note was that the pair team came out and did a great short program without any warm-up.

While I know this post is labeled as a spoiler, can it be moved to the Campbells folder so as not to spoil people waiting to watch on TV the 19th? Thanks.

Thanks for your review, Master F. Interesting comments and insights. I was in the audience too and I'd like to respond, but I think I should wait until this is moved to the Campbells folder
Rgirl

Thanx for the insights.

OK, this has been moved to the Campbell's folder for a reason. Please respect those who wish to not know results before a competition airs on TV and post reports like this in the right folder in the future. Its what they are there for so use them a LOT!

I was there too and am wondering that you think Plushy was the only one who took the event seriously ... since he was the only one to use last year's program. And while I think he was clearly the winner ... his performance IMO, was hardly inspired.

I would never miss the opportunity to see a comp in NY ... but understand ahead of time that these early season events are never really high quality ones. The skaters for the most part are just getting their programs out there for the first time, and have a good way to go before they're ready for primetime, so to say.
I enjoyed it nonetheless.

And I met Rgirl!!!!

I think (I haven't seen the event, just read the 100 review around the web) that when it is mentioned that Plushy was the only taking the event seriously is because he seems to be the only one who try to do what it takes to win. I mean, I'm sure Jahnke and Smith try their best, it just that this two skaters are not in the level of the rest (I believe Janhke is close to be but it seems he has like a mental block when it comes to compete). Honda seemed to have an off night.

Weiss didn't land a quad and didn't do a combo, although I read somewhere that he did a 3f/2t, but with a 3f/2t, you don't even win in the ladies event.

Goebel was not injured so there was no reason for him to not do a quad at all, he knows that so far he won't beat Plush in the presentation department, so at least he needed to try to challenge him in the technical one and he didn't.

Finally Plushenko does not have his new programs ready, that's no surprise, he always shows them on the GP series, so it's a matter of taste, what would you preffered, to see a non-ready program or a program that worked for him for a season?

I don't say quads are everything but by now, everyone knows that at least you need one to win a men event and that's what Plushenko did.

Ximena said:

Goebel was not injured so there was no reason for him to not do a quad at all, he knows that so far he won't beat Plush in the presentation department, so at least he needed to try to challenge him in the technical one and he didn't.

Finally Plushenko does not have his new programs ready, that's no surprise, he always shows them on the GP series, so it's a matter of taste, what would you preffered, to see a non-ready program or a program that worked for him for a season?

I don't say quads are everything but by now, everyone knows that at least you need one to win a men event and that's what Plushenko did.

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Tim mentioned in an article that he chose not to do quads, because he wanted to see how the judges who are scoring him with cop would score him without quads. He said this progam was about getting the choreography out there. Anyway this is just a test run fluff comp. I doubt Tim was aching to beat Plush here, he just wanted to try out his program.

I went to the Campbell's competition all on my own and well, leave it to me to have to sit next to THE most annoying woman in the entire world. She had a voice that I can only say reminded me of a female version of my boss (trust me, it was an irritating voice) and she insisted on talking throughout the entire competition and giving her "take" on everything and stating the obvious (like repeating the scores as they came up) "oh, 5.6".

She also had binoculars which she used to look towards the Kiss & Cry area and everytime she did that she had to face me so she was on top of me and kept "nudging" me with her elbow. To make things worse, as if she didn't have 3 people with her to talk to, she starts talking to me out of the blue, (was I looking at her or smiling or trying to get into her conversation? NO, I most certainly was not!!) "So, are you enjoying the show?" she says to me. I sit there thinking "Is she talking to me?" cuz I was not even looking in her direction. So I turn around and sure enough she's staring at me. So I just said yes. Then later she nudges me about somone's scores "those are pretty low don't you think?" and gives me a stupid look and I gave her a stupid look right back.

She was so loud and her voice so irritating and annoying that people kept turning around to see who was talking. I spent half the show saying to myself "shut the F--K up!!". Then, get this! When people were screaming "I love you Sasha" or whatever -- she had the nerve to say (very loudly) " Oh shut up! let the girl have her concentration for christ's sakes!" I wanted to scream "No, YOU shut up and let US have our concentration for god's sakes!!!" I couldn't wait to get away from her.


ANYWAY!!

the competition was pretty cool. In the beginning they announce who the judges are - I could see Dick and Peggy but from far away because I was on the other side -- their booth is right above the kiss and cry area.

then the skaters come out for the warmup -- the men were first. Yvgeny Plushenko was fantastic and got a huge applause. I'm a big Takeshi Honda fan now -- he made mistakes but he is SUCH a beautiful skater and those two put the American guys to shame. Michael Weiss was the best out of the Americans -- Timothy Geobel SUCKS -(sorry to any Tim fans!!) he was so boring and has no artistic quality at all that I could see. OK, maybe that sounds harsh, but I was really shocked at how little I enjoyed his performance. Then there were two young american guys that were unremarkable but I enjoyed them more than Tim.

Tiffany Scott and Philip Dulebon came out to do an exhibition -- she fell doing the death spiral spin (or whatever its called) -- they were boring. and then Tanith Belbin and Benjamin Agosto came out and did a West Side Story number and it was pretty good. Of course the Witch next to me spent the entire program going on about how she never heard the name "Tanith" before and kept repeating it to herself "Tanith.... Tanith" Thank God I got myself a beer before the show started !!!!

Then there was a break -- afterwards the ladies came out for their warmups. They were all stretching before hand and keeping loose --so Einstein next to me is looking at them with her binoculars and starts saying "OH, they have them posing for pictures!" -- they did not have them 'posing for pictures' they were just Stretching you idiot!!! I could see this with my naked eye so how could she not see this with her binoculars? Everytime she had the binoculars out she started doing her own commentating about what she thought they were doing in the kiss & cry (very loudly of course as if she was doing us all a favor) but it didn't look like she knew what she was talking about.

So finally the girls skate -- Michelle got such a huge round of applause -- I love her new Long Program - the music is a Puccini opera (I think Turandot??) and the outfit and everything looked so great. I thought her scores were too low even though she made a mistake. Jenny Kirk did her LP from last season - she's probably going to keep it b/c it was VERY good -- even though she made mistakes on jumps she is a beautiful skater, I was so impressed with her and I hope she can get more confidence on her jumps because if she does I think she could be world championship material. Ann Patrice McDonough was just OK --very immature in presentation. That other Russian girl skated (not Irina and not Victoria) and she was very boring. Her scores were low and the crowd booed but I think its just because they felt sorry for her sitting there, nobody seemed too impressed with her skate. Sasha skated last and did her new LP to Swan Lake and it was really fantastic and she skated it clean and got a standing ovation - she was very good but still not as dramatic looking on the ice as MK - MK looks larger than life out there and Sasha looked very small in comparison but I think perhaps that is because Sasha is just such a little lady and even though so is MK, Sasha is much smaller in stature. Fumie Suguri was also there -- she made a lot of mistakes but I liked her outfit and the general tone of her program.

After Sasha's scores, I promptly got the hell out of there because I figured Einstein and her buddies would take 5 years to get out of their seats and the thought of being stuck behind them listening to that Voice for another second was just too much to bear -- I excused myself and naturally she couldn't let anything pass without a comment "Oh, sure Honey, you go beat the crowds" - or some stupid type of comment she made -- on my way out I saw Shae-Lynn Bourne and some lady accosted her for a photograph -- I took it for them -- that's the second time I've stood right next to her.

I got out of there in like 2 seconds because everyone was watching the skaters take a final bow.
I think they are going to air the show on October 19th.

OH, and when they were taking the final bows I was watching from the tunnel where you walk out (where I took the pic of Shae-lyn) and Michael Weiss had to be such a show-off. Everyone else came out and took a normal bow and he had to come out and do a back flip. Such an applause whore!

overall, it was thoroughly unenjoyable thanks to the annoying lady besides me.


one more thing -- during the warmup -- Sasha got in the way of a lot of people and almost collided with several of the other girls. She seemed to have trouble sharing the ice with 5 other girls and I got the impression she was just a bit clumsy. and although I enjoyed Sasha and Michelle's programs they were both a little predictable in the choreography.

My rankings would have been:

Sasha
Michelle
Jenny
Fumie
Ann-Patrice
Russian girl

Yvgeny
Takeshi
Michael
2 other american guys
Timothy

I'm sorry to hear about the annoying lady sitting next to you, I just can't stand people like that, I'm happy that overall you enjoyed the competition. I'm always happy when I hear good comments about Plushy

Michelle's music is Tosca of Puccinni, not Turandot.
The other Russian is Elena Sokolova, I though her marks were fair considering she did mostly doubles than triples.
As for Michael doing his back flip at the end, it's good that he made it, last time he tried was at the Crest challenge and he end up falling in hi behind causing the laughter of the others skaters there

(Sasha) skated the strongest and won... She was very happy. She looked like she had won worlds."

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I love that. I am so happy for her. (Even though I like Michelle the best of all, LOL.) I hope they show Sasha after her skate and in the kiss and cry on TV.

"One more thing -- during the warmup -- Sasha got in the way of a lot of people and almost collided with several of the other girls. She seemed to have trouble sharing the ice with 5 other girls."

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I have seen Sasha skate in person twice, and I saw the same thing in warmups both times. She seems to have a way of always going around in the opposite direction from everyone else. Or of skating to empty spots just ahead of the flow of traffic. Has anyone else noticed this?

Mathman

now THAT I would have liked to see (Mike falling during his final bow) haha.

Tosca - thank you, I get all of those operas confused but the music is nice. I also liked her purple dress. I liked Sasha's, Fumie and Jennifer's dresses as well. Ann-Patrice - no. Another example of annoying lady next to me stating the obvious: she repeatedly pointed out to everyone unfortunate enough to be sitting in our section that there was a swan on Ann-Patrice's chest. I suppose this was for the benefit of any blind people in the audience that night because I don't see how anyone could miss that hideous swan! (and just for the record, annoying lady thought it was very pretty) (I did not).

sasha warmup woes

Mathman - I agree with everything you said about Sasha's warmup. She was always in the way.

Sasha simply doesn't look out to see if she's skating in the path of the others. It's almost that she expects everyone else to look out for her (as if they instinctively know where she is at any point in time).

Incidentally, Sasha and Michelle are exactly the same height--5'2"--so Michelle doesn't really have more 'stature' than Sasha.

Annoying audience members

Dear Seonoid,

You reminded me of one last thing, We too were sitting in front of some annoying talkative people. They just would not shut up. These people really tested our patience. My friend kept yelling "shut up", and they just did not get it.

Incidentally, Sasha and Michelle are exactly the same height--5'2"--so Michelle doesn't really have more 'stature' than Sasha.

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Though I know this says this on the usfsa site, I'm not sure that it's factual because I've heard numerous other places that sasha is either 4'11" or 5'0". I know it's an official site...but maybe it's a typo? I read 5'0" in a program for something, and on a few websites...

Kat

My take on the Campbells: Everyone had their problems as I had anticipated, except Sasha. Sasha had the skate of her life up to this time! No one came near her - not even Evgeni.

Joe

Originally posted by Seonaid920:

one more thing -- during the warmup -- Sasha got in the way of a lot of people and almost collided with several of the other girls. She seemed to have trouble sharing the ice with 5 other girls and I got the impression she was just a bit clumsy.

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Seonaid,
Oh, dear. I was afraid this might come up. I was there too and because I've heard opposing opinions on how Sasha skates in the warm-up--some say what you and Mathman say, others say she's fine--I watched the warm-up very carefully and looked for any signs of intentional or unintentional problems with Sasha. I hope you take this the way I intend it, but I could not disagree with more with your assessment. I thought Sasha skated her warm-up just like the other five ladies. The only thing I saw with Sasha--and I hesitate to bring it up because I don't want to sound like I'm trying to open old wounds--was near the end of the warm-up. Sasha was skating backwards, not very fast--and believe me, all those ladies zoom around out there, especially during the first couple of minutes--and Michelle was skating forward perpendicular to Sasha. There was what I would call a "mutual avoidance move" when Michelle going forward and Sasha going backwards came a little close but noticed each other in time to adjust their skating and avoid any problem. It was neither skater's fault; in fact it was very much like the situation where Anton S. and Jamie S. collided at the Olympics except Michelle was skating forward the whole time, not turning like Anton was, and was coming around a curve and then skating perpendicular to Sasha before the "avoidance move." However, from what I saw, most of the the other ladies also had similar "avoidance moves" or moments of skating close to each other. Every warm-up I've ever seen has had such moves or encounters if you will. There was nothing different about this one.

Here's my theory on why different people see Sasha's warm-ups so differently. IMO, there was such a brouhaha over Sasha's allegedly intentional bump or near bump into Michelle at '02 Nationals that people tend to see what they expect. If they were at '02 Nats and felt Sasha indeed nearly bumped Michelle, they expect and thus continue to see problems in her warm-up. It they were at '02 Nats and felt, as some do, that it was Michelle who nearly bumped Sasha, they never saw a problem with Sasha's warm-up and still don't. Having not been there and being on the fence because I'd heard opposite things from people whom I consider to be equally reliable sources, I thought at Campbells, "Here's my chance to see for myself," and as I said, I did not see a problem with Sasha's warm-up. I'm not saying you and Mathman didn't see what you saw; I just think that the other ladies warm up the same way but that because of expectations, Sasha is seen as having a problem even though she warms up just like everyone else. JMHO and attempt to find an explanation as to why reliable and knowledgable people could see the same thing so differently.

In any case, I did not see any problem with Sasha's warm-up at all and the last thing I would call her is clumsy. To me she looked aware of the other skaters but concentrated as well, just like all the ladies did.
Rgirl

PS My heart goes out to you for having the loud-mouth woman next to you. I had a whole family behind at an SOI show once who literally yelled four seats across at each other, "MA! LOOK! IT'S TAHHD!" and then "IS THAT KURT?!" "NO, MA! IT'S TAHHHHHHD!" At another event a guy in front of me was futzing with his camera the whole time, changing lenses, rolling film, leaning all over the place trying to get a good shot, which I don't think he ever got since we were so high up. OTOH, I've met some nice people. But I swear, next time I go to see figure skating live, I'm taking a squirt gun just in case.

Rgirl ... I totally agree with you!
I chuckled when I saw that Sasha-Michelle "almost" ... but I agree ... noone's fault.

Thanks RGirl,

" next time I go to see figure skating live, I'm taking a squirt gun just in case "

Me too.
Me. Too.


re: Sasha's warmup: I should point out that I don't think Sasha was getting in anyone's way intentionally, just getting in the way in general more than the others. I didn't see the other warmup you were talking about from a few years ago but at Campbell's I didn't sense any ill-intent on Cohen's part.

Getting in the way intentionally, is of course, a flagrant violation.

Not getting in the way intentionally could mean a disrespect for others.

However, I didn't really notice anything amiss at Campbell's. If they show the warm-up on TV, let's watch but I doubt they will show much of it.

Joe