They look great!
Actually, their throws, twists, and jumps all looked good in shows, too. They were clearly keeping up their skill set, in case they decided to come back.
The gist:
It has been two months since S/Z have announced their comeback, let's take a look at their current conditions...
Accompanied by the romantic Adagio music, they are enacting their own love story. Stroking, throw jumps, lifts, spinning, it is hard for non-professionals to discern that they haven't competed for more than two years. Even the element that had worried coach Yao Bin, namely Zhao's solo jump, has a very high success rate right now...
Shen: Mmm, we feel pretty good right now. We concentrated on jumps for a month, and now last month we have been putting together the music, so far everything is going pretty smoothly. Also, it (the comeback) didn't turn out to be as difficult as we had thought it would be. It's going okay.
Yao Bin: Not bad, not bad. It's going better than expected. Over the last two years, we haven't really had a chance to see their technical abilities. They were performing abroad, but performing and competing are like two parallel tracks, although the same technique... So far, we feel pretty positive. The main thing is that they have confidence, self-confidence. They are doing the very best with their physical conditions.
After years of training and injuries, Shen and Zhao's aching, aging bodies need almost two hours of physical therapy/massages every evening after training. One challenge they face is how to avoid injuries.
Zhao: Later on, we'll probably re-encountered some old little injuries and sicknesses, like ankle this, ankle that...
There are still seven months left, whether S/Z can fulfill their Olympic dream is still an unknown, but we will not forget or ignore their effort and hard work.
Thank you! They look great!! It's as if no time had passed. That death spiral position is amazing - Xue Shen can pull it off, so many others would make it look awkward.
Ladies - which one of the two? and that bronze medal for ??? Pairs - Mistakes will lose the championship for any of the top 5.
