Chen dominates at U.S. Nationals

[gsk8]

If there were one sure bet at the 2018 U.S. National Figure Skating Championships, it was that Nathan Chen would claim the men’s title, which he did on Saturday in San Jose, Calif. Ross Miner and Vincent Zhou jumped from sixth and fifth place after the short program to the podium behind the defending champion to capture the silver and bronze, respectively.


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“I made a mistake on the Axel, but I’ll address that when I get home,” Chen said. “The quad Lutz I didn’t feel this week. I just wanted to put out a clean program, and the flip was better. I used this as a confidence booster for February and motivation for next month.”

 

[GGFan]

Regardless of my thoughts on the Vera costumes and the watering down of the free program choreography, I love that we have a great competitor as our top man. I think this might partly be my reaction against all the drama that Jeremy put me through (though his skating was amazing).

This is where I choose the sporting part of figure skating over the art. It is exhausting to watch ridiculously talented people who cannot put it together when it counts. Nathan has ice water in his veins and he never gets too high or too low. Very impressive.

 

[brightphoton]

Regardless of my thoughts on the Vera costumes and the watering down of the free program choreography, I love that we have a great competitor as our top man. I think this might partly be my reaction against all the drama that Jeremy put me through (though his skating was amazing).

This is where I choose the sporting part of figure skating over the art. It is exhausting to watch ridiculously talented people who cannot put it together when it counts. Nathan has ice water in his veins and he never gets too high or too low. Very impressive.

Yes, I agree, Nathan is our banner holder for Pyeongchang

but this needs to be said: fire Vera

 

[shine]

Good for him for landing 5 quads (since that's been his goal, though not necessarily to my liking), but I feel like so many little things that initially made the program special are gone. So many musical accents were either ignored or done mechanically. This is the type of program where the skater needs to be completely immersed in the music and mood for it to feel profound and come alive, but I feel Nathan kind of stopped performing in this program sometime after CoR and mainly just went through the motion every time I've seen him since. I've attributed that in the past to his not being in his best form technically which affected the rest of the program, but today even with the jumps being mostly clean the performance was still lacking. This makes me feel maybe he'll never skate this the way that that was initially envisioned. I know it probably sounds strange to say this since he just had his first 5-quad performance this season and it was mostly clean, but I can't say I'm not disappointed as a big fan.

 

[topaz emerald]

Good for him for landing 5 quads (since that's been his goal, though not necessarily to my liking), but I feel like so many little things that initially made the program special are gone. So many musical accents were either ignored or done mechanically. This is the type of program where the skater needs to be completely immersed in the music and mood for it to feel profound and come alive, but I feel Nathan kind of stopped performing in this program sometime after CoR and mainly just went through the motion every time I've seen him since. And I don't know if he'll ever skate the way that that was initially envisioned. I know it probably sounds strange to say this since he just had his first 5-quad performance this season and it was mostly clean, but I can't say I'm not disappointed.

those black outfits aren't complementing his performances either. I agree that he's lost that spark performance wise and I'm not sure why. Maybe he is conserving it all for the big day at olympics.

 

[GGFan]

Good for him for landing 5 quads (since that's been his goal, though not necessarily to my liking), but I feel like so many little things that initially made the program special are gone. So many musical accents were either ignored or done mechanically. This is the type of program where the skater needs to be completely immersed in the music and mood for it to feel profound and come alive, but I feel Nathan kind of stopped performing in this program sometime after CoR and mainly just went through the motion every time I've seen him since. And I don't know if he'll ever skate the way that that was initially envisioned. I know it probably sounds strange to say this since he just had his first 5-quad performance this season and it was mostly clean, but I can't say I'm not disappointed.

You already know I feel your pain!! You could see that the integrity of the program choreography was gone from the very beginning. I vividly remember him rehearsing that first move where he swings his arms out with Alex Wong again and again to get it right. It set the stage and showed he was completely committed to the music. Now it just looks meaningless. I was pissed at the footwork--I loved how musical and angular it was. Oh well . . .

 

[shine]

^The footwork was a good 5 seconds late to the music...

 

[Cherryy]

Why did Nathan not attempt any lutz jumps? I thought he did both 4Lz-3T and a solo 3Lz before and they always worked well for him. Is there any particular reason anyone knows of?

 

[Weathergal]

Why did Nathan not attempt any lutz jumps? I thought he did both 4Lz-3T and a solo 3Lz before and they always worked well for him. Is there any particular reason anyone knows of?

He said he just wasn't feeling the lutz so he substituted other jumps. I find it very impressive that his jump arsenal is so strong that he can just pull out "oh some other amazing quads," and substitute them pretty much seamlessly into his program.

 

[sheetz]

Good for him for landing 5 quads (since that's been his goal, though not necessarily to my liking), but I feel like so many little things that initially made the program special are gone. So many musical accents were either ignored or done mechanically. This is the type of program where the skater needs to be completely immersed in the music and mood for it to feel profound and come alive, but I feel Nathan kind of stopped performing in this program sometime after CoR and mainly just went through the motion every time I've seen him since. I've attributed that in the past to his not being in his best form technically which affected the rest of the program, but today even with the jumps being mostly clean the performance was still lacking. This makes me feel maybe he'll never skate this the way that that was initially envisioned. I know it probably sounds strange to say this since he just had his first 5-quad performance this season and it was mostly clean, but I can't say I'm not disappointed as a big fan.

I think there's the issue that he changes his layout every 2 weeks. You can't just randomly change your jumps without it affecting the choreography and flow of the program.

 

[Kelly]

Hope this link hasn't been posted yet.

http://web.icenetwork.com/news/2018/01/07/264376290

It explains a little bit why Nathan "watered down" his programs and about the lutz.

 

[moonvine]

those black outfits aren't complementing his performances either. I agree that he's lost that spark performance wise and I'm not sure why. Maybe he is conserving it all for the big day at olympics.

The commentators said he was very sick. Maybe that is why. Well, the lost spark, not the black outfits.

 

[Weathergal]

The commentators said he was very sick. Maybe that is why. Well, the lost spark, not the black outfits.

Yeah, I felt like he was doing what he had to do to get things done, and I don't mind that in an unkind way but rather that he was sick (apparently a LOT of people were ill during Nationals!) and fighting through it. I applaud him for how incredibly well he did under any circumstances, but especially so knowing he was sick.

Karen Chen also said she was sick, and I think Amber Glenn mentioned being sick as well.

 

[livetoskate]

I thought Nathan's new designer outfits looked fine, but I didn't mind the previous ones either. The FS costume looks to have nothing to do with the "Mao's Last Dancer Theme," though. At least he didn't come out wearing a silly looking thing with a snake around his neck, which I had been fearing.

 

[Arriba627]

It was all over the news how bad the flu was in the Bay Area. Seems like Nathan may have been plagued by that a bit. Lots of flu, coughing, etc. Not a fan of five quad programs myself. Still, Nathan is such a fighter. Gotta love his determination.

 

[Putina]

those black outfits aren't complementing his performances either. I agree that he's lost that spark performance wise and I'm not sure why. Maybe he is conserving it all for the big day at olympics.

That was my impression as well. He cannot afford injuries this close to the Olympics, and being a heavy favorite skating last he probably knew what he needed to do and did just that. (Then again I was surprised by his 5th quad..)

I agree with the criticism on Vera Wang costume. I could not shake off the imagery of a striped bass. Not flattering at all.