So far, Karen and Mariah are off to rough starts. Amber and Bradie both seem to have or have had injuries. Alysa is skating beautifully, but having underrotated combos. Her triple axel is coming along. Hopefully it can land consistently and be rotated in competitions soon. It is still very early on in the season though. Isabeau has really developed and improved much, and though she is under age for the Olympics, she is a very consistent skater, and is also working on her quad toe. Lindsay has been attempting her triple axel, and is looking super good so far this season. She is also usually landing her jumps consistently. And there are other US ladies with potential who will also be trying to go for the Olympics. This is a very intriguing group of US ladies.
The flip calls were nonsense.
No, I think she'll go even if she finishes fourth. I think after last season, Karen and Bradie will be in good standing with the USFS (Karen especially). But personally I hope Audrey Shin makes the team over Bradie or Mariah lol (for Karen/Audrey/Alysa).
I get the impression that Bradie will be given more leeway than the rest as well. Meritorious service indeed. Haha
That technical controller needs to get her eyes checked.
We have not seen Bradie compete yet this season. My prediction for now is that she will skate strong at Nationals, but have problems with underrotating (which the US ladies have a tendency to do already). Mariah does not underrotate a huge amount of the time, but her landings tend to be scratchy. We will have to wait and see how the US ladies do at the Grand Prix events.
I think Bradie, Mariah, and Karen are in that tier of experienced skaters that, if they medal at Nationals, they'll go to the Olympics even if they have a rough GP season. Skaters like Amber and Lindsey will have to do more than just be great at Nationals. Amber has opportunities to face off against Bradie, Audrey, and Alysa during the GP series and beating any of them will help, as I think medaling in her events will be a tough task. Lindsay is off to a good start in the Jr GP series and hopefully she continues to show improvement.
Perhaps you're feeling this way because Bradie is quite respected among fans even if she's not one they prefer?
There is an epidemic of flip calls this year-including Trusova and Valieva. They used to just pick on Kaori, but now everyone is getting called out...lol. The problem is we have an entire generation of skaters who do the flip like this, and it is hard to unlearn. While I am in favor of calling the wrong edge on a lutz, the flip call seems to me to be nitpicking over a stylistic issue.
Anything that looks remotely flat for a flip is dilligently called out but egregious flutzes are ignored. The ISU's own training videos say that a deep inside edge is a poor quality flip too. I just don't buy that they can see the difference between slight inside and flat but not the difference between flat or clear inside and deep outside.
Yes, most skaters tend to either lip or flutz. It is related to each skaters individual anatomy. Those with good outside Lutz edges tend to lip. Rika Kihira is the only women skater ( that I can think of right now) with a really pronounced outside Lutz edge who has never gotten an edge call on her flip. Some skaters jump both from what is essentially a flat edge ( this is quite common actually-Kamila does this and so do many many other skaters from every country). Technical panels though tend to call flips and ignore rather obvious flutzes so flat edge jumpers like Kamila can get called on the flip but not the lutz even when both have a similar shallow take-off. Sasha, Alysa, Liza T. who all have clear lutz edges get called on their unclear flips, too. I don't mind the calls, but I do mind the inconsistency.
