2018-19 U.S. Ladies' figure skating

[Skater Boy]

I have a silly question And why does Gracie have to even skate? I mean if she wants to fine. But it really should be because she wants too and I mean she has to search deep within. We are not mind readers but as the TSL concluded the look on her face to start the program - she didn't want to be there. Has "society" pressured people like Gracie to thik they have to compete to be of value. You could tell Dave and Jonathon were being diplomatic about her prospects. We no know her spot at nationals 2019 was guranteed even if she pulled out - but that begs the question - why does Gracie even have to go to this Nationals? A lot of people say i have to have something but do the have to have it or do they simply want it or think they want it? I have to have that piece of cake. No not really it isn't life or death and once you get it sometimes you relaize it is overrated kind of lilke new ear's eve and the big party. I am not saying Gracie shouldn't be a competitive elite skater but she has accomplisehd so much. She doesn't need another medal. She probably could coach or do shows or join those cruise ships and perform There is more to life than competitive skating. I work with a lot of collegiate level atheltes and they often enjoy not being on the team so they can have a life.Gracie has accomplished so much more than most collegiate athletes. She has gone to the olympics and been part of the bronze medal winning team.. She has won medals and accolade and the admiration of many as we can tell in all this support. Has anyone really heard Gracie and what she really wants? Does she know what she want? Has she been given that time? Yes, we all know this will be a wonderful story for a book but this is a real person and a real life. I have great empathy for this skater. I believe she has huge potential and yes, one of the best overrall skaters of her time another emanual sandu or sasha cohen - such talent. Not all talent gets "fulfilled though. in the sence of world medals and titles.

the "fall from grace" - didnt she almost have it all - was very sad to watch; I hope in Gracie's times and terms we will see her determine her fate the Gracie Gold way regardless of money, medals and other competitors.

I think Dave and Jonathon also hinted we don't know the whole storyi and while they don't know for sure how it affects Gracie there are huge financial issues as they mentioend whith her dad not having a license to be a doctor; it is unknown if she has any endorsements or sponsors left. That too must be hard to have been once (and maybe again the it girl) the star skater from a family who loved and supported her emotonally and financially and now things are much harder.
find peace in whatever she does

 

[frida80]

I have a silly question And why does Gracie have to even skate? I mean if she wants to fine. But it really should be because she wants too and I mean she has to search deep within. We are not mind readers but as the TSL concluded the look on her face to start the program - she didn't want to be there. Has "society" pressured people like Gracie to thik they have to compete to be of value. You could tell Dave and Jonathon were being diplomatic about her prospects. We no know her spot at nationals 2019 was guranteed even if she pulled out - but that begs the question - why does Gracie even have to go to this Nationals? A lot of people say i have to have something but do the have to have it or do they simply want it or think they want it? I have to have that piece of cake. No not really it isn't life or death and once you get it sometimes you relaize it is overrated kind of lilke new ear's eve and the big party. I am not saying Gracie shouldn't be a competitive elite skater but she has accomplisehd so much. She doesn't need another medal. She probably could coach or do shows or join those cruise ships and perform There is more to life than competitive skating. I work with a lot of collegiate level atheltes and they often enjoy not being on the team so they can have a life.Gracie has accomplished so much more than most collegiate athletes. She has gone to the olympics and been part of the bronze medal winning team.. She has won medals and accolade and the admiration of many as we can tell in all this support. Has anyone really heard Gracie and what she really wants? Does she know what she want? Has she been given that time? Yes, we all know this will be a wonderful story for a book but this is a real person and a real life. I have great empathy for this skater. I believe she has huge potential and yes, one of the best overrall skaters of her time another emanual sandu or sasha cohen - such talent. Not all talent gets "fulfilled though. in the sence of world medals and titles.

the "fall from grace" - didnt she almost have it all - was very sad to watch; I hope in Gracie's times and terms we will see her determine her fate the Gracie Gold way regardless of money, medals and other competitors.

I think Dave and Jonathon also hinted we don't know the whole storyi and while they don't know for sure how it affects Gracie there are huge financial issues as they mentioend whith her dad not having a license to be a doctor; it is unknown if she has any endorsements or sponsors left. That too must be hard to have been once (and maybe again the it girl) the star skater from a family who loved and supported her emotonally and financially and now things are much harder.
find peace in whatever she does

Very wise words.

 

[eaglehelang]

Carolina, or Mao for another example, was rebuilding from like 6 (out of 10) while Gracie is practically almost at 0. I can't think of any other skater who had to rebuild from that low. Can anybody name someone? So really there almost is nobody to compare her situation with, nobody she can use as her blueprint. She's basically the first and will have to do it her own way whatever that may be.

Female I cant think of any,male skaters yes. In terms of physical injuries. Plushenko has gone thru dunno how many surgeries, on his knees and back.
A more recent example, Sota Yamamoto, Japanese male skater. He was touted the big up & comer along with Shoma Uno.
Then in 2016, he broke his RIGHT ankle during practice. Went thru 3 surgeries, long rehab. Then, couple of months later, he re- injured his ankle again doing a double jump.

Came back 2017, he was doing 2A and triples at sectionals. Only this season, 2018, he got his 3A back. He participated in NHK GP, no quads, finished a respectable 6th.
He has youth on his side, he's only 18 now.

Though I dont know where he had the mental strength to endure thru the surgeries, pain,long rehab.

 

[MK's Winter]

I don't think we should blame anyone really for that, you could see it both ways cause if you tell her only good things, never push her to work harder she could have arrived at Nationals with this shape.

Instead she went to Russia and faced the reality: this is your level at an international event with no home bias for you, if you want to get better you have to keep working hard for months, that's the message i hope she got from this outing.

My only concern is more on who can really fix her issues and pushing her to the right direction, i don't know much about her current coaching team besides their their careers as skaters.

The point is she didn’t need to go to Russia to face the reality. Reality is her progress in the rink everyday. Vincent, along with others, as the one who is advising her is absolutely to blame. He is her coach. The one she is supposed to look at for guidance and advice and a training regimen. One of the stand out gems in this recap is this- “He needs her more than she needs him”

 

[drivingmissdaisy]

Dave made an interesting comment in the recap... allegedly Mitch told Gracie that if she wanted to pull out from Russia, she would still get a bye to nationals since USFS already awarded it to her by approving her to get a GP and her getting assigned. Dave said USFS should’ve encouraged her not to go after seeing her practice and should’ve worked with her on a training plan. I totally agree. There was a complete lack of anyone that cared about Gracie. Vincent is a rink hopper that is looking for the next skater he can attach his name to.

(I don’t blame her Gracie at all by the way.)

It's Gracie's career, and she's an adult, so she's largely accountable for her career. If she steps onto competitive ice, she is choosing to be there. Maybe others should encourage her to modify her training and competition plan, but ultimately she has the final word.

 

[jgordon]

I’m so grossed out by all of the speculation on Gracie’s financial situation might be, which is personal and aside from her dads medical license issue none of us have any ide what her financial situation is.

And less problematic but equally annoying is the wild guessing and assumptions at what her training program has looked like thus far and how recent decisions were made. We have no idea how close her relationship with her coaches is, no matter how many times you replay and analyze a 10s clip of them in the k&c in front of an international audience, and we have no real insight on how she or her team may or may not have worked through decisions.

There is not a blueprint for Gracies comeback, she has a very unique set of challenges. Her training program and professional decisions have to come second to her mental health. On the weight issue alone, she has to navigate her recovery from an eating disorder with the pressure to lose weight and the understanding that she will probably not reach her career goals if she doesn’t. Not to mention the several other conflicts between her mental health recovery and the requirements of her job. She will have to balance those decisions every day and (not to be a speculator) but I imagine a part of this journey is and has been figuring out the road as they get to it and taking it day by day.

I will say as a sidebar, I would not be surprised if within the next month we got some good training videos. I think that her performance was greatly effected by the stress of the situation. I think even her practices probably were, she’s had the luxury of having a very private training situation so far and that’s a far cry from being in an arena on the ice with the Olympic gold medalist and being watched by judges and spectators. I have a feeling she’s had a lot more success with her programs in her home rink and I wouldn’t be surprised if they shared some of that to be even the smallest boost to her image.

 

[Seren]

No one knows what is going on inside someone else's head and you cannot make a determination on how someone is feeling based on how you perceive their facial expression. Speaking as someone who has dealt with lifelong depression and had an ED in the past I can fake it pretty convincingly. Figure skating is not an easy sport- it's a sport where the smallest movement can be picked apart. Gracie has been through a lot and maybe competing here wasn't the best idea but maybe it will end up being a motivator. I hope she is able to process the experience and move forward in the way that is best for her.

Truthfully though, she looked better than she did at Stars on Ice 2 years ago when she was struggling on double toes. I think another 6-8 months will be more telling for her skating wise.

 

[Mrs. P]

Hi jgordon, welcome to Golden Skate and thank you for your thoughtful post. Post often and post long!

 

[twirlingblades]

It's Gracie's career, and she's an adult, so she's largely accountable for her career. If she steps onto competitive ice, she is choosing to be there. Maybe others should encourage her to modify her training and competition plan, but ultimately she has the final word.

....right, except Gracie is the middle of a very delicate situation and time in her life and she needs people in her corner to give guidance. I have no idea if she thinks she was ready or not, or if she really wanted to be there. But that’s not my point. By point was that what happened in Russia was completely unnecessary and could’ve been prevented by a number of people. Yes Gracie is an adult, but so are a lot of other adult athletes that defer to their coaches suggestions. It’s way more than her being a legal adult.

 

[NanaPat]

That is... a bold statement :noshake:

You're being much to kind to that poster.

 

[twirlingblades]

The point is she didn’t need to go to Russia to face the reality. Reality is her progress in the rink everyday. Vincent, along with others, as the one who is advising her is absolutely to blame. He is her coach. The one she is supposed to look at for guidance and advice and a training regimen. One of the stand out gems in this recap is this- “He needs her more than she needs him”

Agreed. Everyone knew this was coming. She hasn’t been doing run throughs (because she physically can’t do them). She hasn’t been doing triples. She hasn’t had adequate time to prepare in any way. Her coach is a leech. The fact that they had the option to WD and retain a nationals spot and didn’t is shameful. Just throwing her out there to see what would stick was hard to watch. I hope this wasn’t too much of a setback in her recovery. I don’t want her to go to nationals until she’s mentally (and physically) ready, even if that means waiting until 2020 nationals.

That may sound harsh, but I think I’ve gotten angrier since the competition ended. This whole situation was just so completely avoidable.

 

[Mrs. P]

....right, except Gracie is the middle of a very delicate situation and time in her life and she needs people in her corner to give guidance. I have no idea if she thinks she was ready or not, or if she really wanted to be there. But that’s not my point. By point was that what happened in Russia was completely unnecessary and could’ve been prevented by a number of people. Yes Gracie is an adult, but so are a lot of other adult athletes that defer to their coaches suggestions. It’s way more than her being a legal adult.

I forget where I read and/or heard this, but I remember that Jason had actually continued training anticipating the possibility of competing at Worlds as the first alternate. But then when he was training with Frank Carrol, he advised him that he was not in the right place mentally -- i.e. he was still devastated about not making the Olympic team -- to compete at Worlds, so he ended up declining the invite when Adam W/D and went on a trip to New Zealand with his sister for two weeks. He said the time away is what made him realize he still wanted to continue his skating career.

It's a bit of an apples to oranges situation, but it is an example of one skater opting out.

Gracie made a different choice and we don't know how many "adults" be it her coaches, USFS officials or the other folks on her team, advised her against it. I will say that it was nice to see that practice clip of that FS program. I think even though she didn't do any jumping passes, I did see some potential in that program being pretty special for Gracie down the road.

I also think a lot of folks were happy to see she that she still wanted to be out there and she got a lot of support cause of that. So I don't feel like her trip to RC was completely waste of time.

 

[NanaPat]

Carolina, or Mao for another example, was rebuilding from like 6 (out of 10) while Gracie is practically almost at 0. I can't think of any other skater who had to rebuild from that low. Can anybody name someone? So really there almost is nobody to compare her situation with, nobody she can use as her blueprint. She's basically the first and will have to do it her own way whatever that may be.

Kaetlyn Osmond had to learn to skate again after she broke her leg. Her first competition back was very rough, but not as rough as Gracie's. At least it was at Skate Canada where she had direct crowd support. She also continued with the same coach, who really deserves a lot of credit for her comeback (taking nothing away from Kaetlyn; they both deserve a lot of credit).

 

[twirlingblades]

I forget where I read and/or heard this, but I remember that Jason had actually continued training anticipating the possibility of competing at Worlds as the first alternate. But then when he was training with Frank Carrol, he advised him that he was not in the right place mentally -- i.e. he was still devastated about not making the Olympic team -- to compete at Worlds, so he ended up declining the invite when Adam W/D and went on a trip to New Zealand with his sister for two weeks. He said the time away is what made him realize he still wanted to continue his skating career.

It's a bit of an apples to oranges situation, but it is an example of one skater opting out.

Gracie made a different choice and we don't know how many "adults" be it her coaches, USFS officials or the other folks on her team, advised her against it. I will say that it was nice to see that practice clip of that FS program. I think even though she didn't do any jumping passes, I did see some potential in that program being pretty special for Gracie down the road.

I also think a lot of folks were happy to see she that she still wanted to be out there and she got a lot of support cause of that. So I don't feel like her trip to RC was completely waste of time.

I really like the program and it has the potential to be great! I do hope we get to see it skated well, whenever that may be.

And yeah, don’t get me wrong, I was happy to see her in the sense that I missed her presence on the ice. A lot of people would’ve supported her even if she WD, but yeah I see your point. If it helps her in some way, then great! I just really hope it didn’t harm her in any way.

Edit: I also didn’t know that about Jason, that’s really interesting.

 

[Ic3Rabbit]

I’m so grossed out by all of the speculation on Gracie’s financial situation might be, which is personal and aside from her dads medical license issue none of us have any ide what her financial situation is.

And less problematic but equally annoying is the wild guessing and assumptions at what her training program has looked like thus far and how recent decisions were made. We have no idea how close her relationship with her coaches is, no matter how many times you replay and analyze a 10s clip of them in the k&c in front of an international audience, and we have no real insight on how she or her team may or may not have worked through decisions.

There is not a blueprint for Gracies comeback, she has a very unique set of challenges. Her training program and professional decisions have to come second to her mental health. On the weight issue alone, she has to navigate her recovery from an eating disorder with the pressure to lose weight and the understanding that she will probably not reach her career goals if she doesn’t. Not to mention the several other conflicts between her mental health recovery and the requirements of her job. She will have to balance those decisions every day and (not to be a speculator) but I imagine a part of this journey is and has been figuring out the road as they get to it and taking it day by day.

I will say as a sidebar, I would not be surprised if within the next month we got some good training videos. I think that her performance was greatly effected by the stress of the situation. I think even her practices probably were, she’s had the luxury of having a very private training situation so far and that’s a far cry from being in an arena on the ice with the Olympic gold medalist and being watched by judges and spectators. I have a feeling she’s had a lot more success with her programs in her home rink and I wouldn’t be surprised if they shared some of that to be even the smallest boost to her image.

All of this!

 

[Mrs. P]

Okay, let's a take a break and watch Alysa Liu's free skate!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=2&v=QnLp1zSwhqE

 

[CoyoteChris]

Okay, let's a take a break and watch Alysa Liu's free skate!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=2&v=QnLp1zSwhqE

My wife and I enjoyed it! Happy for all my grand daughters that made it to nats.....

 

[oatmella]

It seems a bit strange that so many are saying what happened at Rostelecom wasn’t Gracie’s fault. USFS doesnt appear to have pushed her to compete, it seems even possibly the opposite. I don’t know about her coaches - but cannot only put the blame on Vincent for wanting to attach himself to a big name skater. I assume Gracie chose him to be her coach, and it wasn’t like he would be the only option.

Hanyu chose to skate his FS despite his injury - there were posts about it being his choice - he’s an adult, fully able to make his own decision. Gracie is the same age as Hanyu - I would think she should be accountable for her own decisions as well.

 

[ice coverage]

I think it is very hard to generalize about whether "deferring" to coaches is in a skater's best interest.

Regarding Jason, I am paraphrasing, but didn't he recently imply -- without using the word "deferential" -- that trying too hard to please others (coaches? USFS?) contributed to things going awry for him during the last quad?

(I am not referring to his withdrawal from 2018 Worlds.)

---

Okay, let's a take a break and watch Alysa Liu's free skate!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=2&v=QnLp1zSwhqE

Sorry, Mrs. P. My first time chiming in after Rostelecom. Wishing the best for Gracie going forward.

Returning to the subject of sectionals, I am happy esp. for Akari and Brynne . Also Julia Biechler.

Sad about others: Emmy, Vivian, Katie McBeath, Paige, Livvy, Heidi.

Sad also that Emily Chan did not compete at sectionals although she had qualified (second at Southwestern Regionals).

---

ETA:

I strongly disagree with the notions that fans treat Ashley worse than anyone else or that fans coddle Gracie. [ETA: Ooops, I originally wrote "agree" -- which is the exact opposite of what I intended to say.]

Just about every well-known skater gets criticism, and some of the criticism can be very harsh.

For all skaters, I wish the criticism were not so harsh. (Lest anyone wonder, I like both Ashley and Gracie.)

Ashley is hardly alone in getting harsh criticism, and Gracie has not been immune from criticism (even during her hiatus from competition).

The good news is that just about every well-known skater also gets a lot of supportive comments. Certainly true for both Ashley and Gracie.​

 

[SnowWhite]

Not that this is going to happen, but it would be cool if Gracie went to TCC. She's not really going to rival Zhenya in her current condition and she gets the benefit of a pretty supportive community, including Jason.

But I do think Jason's approach is very sound and good model for Gracie -- although it's still a bit of apples and oranges since Jason wasn't starting completely from scratch with no intense training/skating for a good part of a year.

Actually, if we're talking about Canada, I always thought it would be cool if Gracie went to Ravi Walia, though I never expected her to - among other things, moving to Edmonton would be a pretty big deal. But everything he and Kaetlyn have said about how he helped her come back from that broken leg just made me think he could be very good for her (although the training his group does at West Edmonton Mall would have been the opposite of private). He talked about how Kaetlyn was afraid to get back on the ice after her injury - she didn't show up at the rink after she was cleared medically - and he did a lot to help her get her confidence back. He had to teach her to skate again, rebuild all of the jumps, he was working with her a lot with private ice at the beginning IIRC, so that she didn't feel uncomfortable/embarrassed when she was just getting back on the ice. He also talked about basically tricking her back into wanting to keep skating, having her do a lot of shows to get her confidence back and remember that she loves skating. He just really did a lot for her. Obviously her issues were different than what Gracie's dealing with, and he'd coached Kaetlyn since she was ten so they have a very strong relationship - but still.

Anyways, that's not something that I see happening. So hopefully the coaches Gracie is with will be able to give her what she needs right now.