Here are more of practice notes, since I have nothing better to do with my life and was roped into the scam that is Peacock thanks to a "good deal".
G1
Jean-Luc and Polina open up by talking about their most insanely good programs - for Polina, it was her SP at Boston Worlds in 2016, which was her best SP ever and she did it right in front of her friends who were there to watch. For Jean-Luc and Kaitlin, it was US Nats in 2022 - they overcame horrible injuries, including Kaitlin's torn ACL (she taped it and SKATED WITH A TORN ACL my goodness this woman is incredible) and managed to deliver the free program of their lives to pull up to third place. We have a small collision - it looks like everyone is okay, just someone skating backwards into someone else and they both took a tumble. Alexandra Feigin opens up this group, marking her jumps except for a rather small 2A. Jean-Luc points out the very distinct style of Benoit Richaud's choreography, and Polina likes when skaters use music from popular media, because you get to see their portrayal of a character you know on the ice. When asked how they recovered their legs after a long day of travel, Polina recommends sleep and stretching, with paying attention to it in practices. She preferred to have fewer practices to save her adrenaline, otherwise she would crash too early in the week. Jean-Luc used NormaTec pants and tried to move as much as possible on a long flight. Polina shares that her mom has a video of her and Jason Brown doing leg lunges down the aisle of a plane
. Kristen Spours does a lovely 3F+2T and 3Lo - really great jumps and performance, and gets lots of love for her extension as well. A really remarkable practice for her. Olga Mikutina does a 2Lz+3T<, 2Aq, and 3Fq? - great skating skills and performance, she is so dynamic, with lots of transitions, but still struggling to get the pop in the jumps. Sofja Stepcenko does 3Lz+3T<< - I wonder if going for the 3+2 would be better for her to make sure she has a better chance of making the free - and a 3Lo (fall, off-axis). Mariia Seniuk is skating to
La Terre Vue du Ciel, which is becoming a warhorse. 3Fq+3T<< (falls), and takes a hard spill on a 2A, but comes back with a 3Lz with a neat transition out. She's off-axis - Polina says she needs to keep going straight backwards, and sometimes when skaters tries to go as high as they can, they end up tilted backwards. She has some really cool clusters in her step sequence - starting low and getting higher as the music builds, with great ice coverage throughout. Polina explains that she tried to use the whole practice time, particularly with skating skill drills at the end - she would do "Michelle Kwan stroking" at the end of practice, with good posture to finish with a good feeling - looking at the back row, trying to bring the energy and confidence up. Both of them also preferred having the audience down at rink level so they didn't feel alone and isolated. They also need to have other people, be it a partner or teammate, to keep you grounded and prevent you from spiralling. Polina disassociated - she focused on just "doing the job at hand". After the 6-minute warmup, Polina would do stretches and try to stay warm, especially if she was skating last, along with walkthroughs of her program - the worst thing you want is to have your muscles go cold, she explains.
G2
We open this group with Jean-Luc pointing out how nonchalant and calm Alysa Liu is, and singing the praises of her coach Massimo Scali. They explain how her programs are designed to show off how much she's grown, and Polina, who spends some time training with Alysa, has become more of an adult especially in how she trains - taking ownership in the training process. Livia Kaiser is up first - Jean-Luc loves her music, and sees how much this program has grown. Polina explains that while GP programs are competition-ready, it's not the same as the second half of the season - the choreo is muscle memory. Livia singles her two triples and walks through quite a bit of her program - she struggles on her CCoSp with a loss of speed when she goes to the camel position. Jean-Luc doesn't like all-black gloves on a costume, because it affects the ability to see the detail of the fingertips, which adds so much to a performance like with Julia Sauter, our next skater. She pops open on the 3Lz and marks the combo, but engages so much with this program. Jean-Luc and Polina are so happy to see the age representation with the 27-year-old Julia, and you can still skate regardless of age. Polina views Deanna Stellato-Dudek as a hero, but she does acknowledge that everyone has their own time and moment, and succeeds on different timelines. Alysa Liu is up next - she seems to chill, she was almost late to the practice and just had the biggest smile on her face the entire time. Polina and Jean-Luc think this is one of the best shorts of the program (for Jean-Luc, it is the best), and love the delicacy of the arm movements. She marks through her jumps while our commentators adore her transitions and her natural performance and talent. They are just gushing about this program - how she takes time to pause and breathe, and how a really well-choreographed program looks natural. Polina talks about how she doesn't like repeating programs unless you don't skate the program to its full potential - if they take it to Worlds, it might lose some of its magic by the next season. Lari Naki Gutmann is up next, and this group has some really amazing programs back-to-back-to-back. She marks through her program as well, and Jean-Luc points out how while Lara has speed, she doesn't have quite the same softness and attention to detail in this program as Alysa, but it is a totally different style of skating. This is exciting and cool, versus Alysa's "wow, that's beautiful" - Polina talks about how this played out during the Olympics in 2018 with Gabi and Guillaume's beautiful
Moonlight Sonata versus Tessa and Scott's energy, and there's not a right answer - it just depends on how you skate on the day and how the judges view it. Lorine Schild is up next - a little squirrely on the axis of her 3Lz+3T but it was cleanly landed. Jean-Luc talks about skating order - it impacts your score and audience reception, as well as your energy, and it can even be impacted by the music before you. They talk about skating to the same music back-to-back (which might happen in this event, we have three
L'enfer's and two
Naturals in the men's event). Here comes Wakaba with her
Dune program - 2A, 3Lz+3T<, 3F - a great runthrough, if she just gets a little bit more height on that 3T she will definitely score over 70 today. Polina explains how she commands the ice with speed and power, and despite being athletic, she still has soft arm movements and good musicality. Jean-Luc explains that she doesn't need facial performance, just eye contact and innate energy due to the intensity of this music, and he loves her twizzles with the head back and the entire step sequence, and Polina remarks on the excellent composition. They think this program will be a star in the arena. They conclude this group by talking about a program that impacts the audience - it may not get a medal, but a star program is far more memorable and captivates the audience. Alysa Liu laughs as she pops open on her 3Lz+2T - she has just been so relaxed and calm this entire practice session, it's actually insane. Jean-Luc's favourite skate that he's watched live was Josh Farris's long program at 4CC - he couldn't remember the music but he could
see the program in his head. He also mentioned Nathan's Philip Glass free skate during Stockholm 2021 (yes, so underrated! I loved that program!) and how he was willing to push deep in the last half of the program and perform, but he acknowledges that he is biased because he's really good friends with Nathan.
