Wasn’t COI held on same day as JO? I am wondering if the “softening” was due, in part, to fatigue after performing a difficult technical program. He may have removed some of the nuances just to take it easy as part of his recovery process. I don’t know. Just guessing.
Not sure, I mean the adrenaline would probably trump any fatigue, at least for those few minutes that he's out there performing, I would think?
And the softening, that some of us seem to have observed, doesn't equal limp and weak or showing less nuance, quite the contrary.
Actually, finding the right amount of tension so you can move softly without looking too slack or too forceful, requires focus and strength too.
Anyway, to me the little changes that I noticed (maybe imagined those, who knows
) looked intentional, like the way he loosened up his hands and didn't make a fist so often. You can also see that in his last spin, when he goes into the (male) donut variation, he first forms a fist, out of habit maybe (?), and then he quickly opens it up again.
I also felt that he held a few edges or positions a little bit longer. Which I believe doesn't come natural to him, because he's always struck me as someone who has very 'restless feet' on the ice and likes to move quickly (it's the reason many don't like his skating, because it looks too choppy to them). And also, the music is kinda restless too, so he has to keep up with it.
But we'll see at Skate America what the (current) competition version of La Boheme looks like. With the competition pressure and having to fit in more difficult jumping passes, he might rush the program more.
But I certainly hope fatigue, coupled with jetlag, was the reason for the popped 3A.
:dev2:
I liked that he has softened up in places but I also still liked the old steps better. Besides the euler/hop (I loved that move
) that 1111bm mentioned, I thought it had more of the intensity that matched the music and I liked the contrast between his more angular approach and the smoothness of the chanson - it almost felt intentionally designed. But this is still good.
Yeah, I enjoyed the more passionate approach in his old step sequence too, and those jumps gave a stronger feeling of abandon. I wonder why out of the 4 hops in his step sequence, he took 2 out? Was he struggling with time constraints? He could at least add the Euler/fallen leaf variation (it's like a mix between the two) back in right after the twizzle, even without the loop.
I liked the hop, too, but most likely he'll skate it for SOI so he might add it back for the shows.
Unlikely I think. Once simplified, he tends to stay with that version, at least it was that way with Nemesis and Caravan.
)
