Sisinka, would love to hear your take on the dancers
I was a bit dissapointed not to see whole FD, both M&K and S&B took almost ten seconds for a rest during program. Visibly they lack of physical condition.
I must point one thing – the lifts. Both Sasha Stepanova and Ksenia Monko are tall girls with beautiful and long legs. It is visible that they are far to Meryl’s body type. For such tall girls (no matter how small heights you can read in ISU) – it is very difficult to make such rotations and changements in positions like small dancers – Meryl, Chock, Coomes… Also it needs a lot of abilities for their male partners, for Kirill even more because while Sasha has still a thin teenage body, Ksenia is already a grown-up woman.
Everytime I see such kind of lifts done by tall and long-limbed girl, I realise how much unfair is the new ISU system to tall girls and their partners.
Stepanova & Bukin:
Edges in step sequences were better than in SD, I liked it.
Lifts looks well and they are difficult, spin was very nice also.
This time twizzles in sit position were moving slowly forward, so it was not a piruette. But looking at whole sequence from sideways – it has so little coverage of the ice that it once again leads me to think that new rules in Set of Twizzles were not to better – ice coverage is a very important thing and Sasha & Ivan sacrifice it thanks to difficult pose. And I really don’t know what to think about that last half turn on both foot in the first Set of Twizzles, in every other position it would be counted like a bad performing of the Set.
What I am not sure with is the last position in the combo lift – lying on the partners head or sitting on the partners shoulder or back is an illegal movement. Whether Technical specialist will be so generous to take this position like anything else, I don‘t know.
Transitions - once again too many splits – in both lifts plus some other split moments during transitions. Remember that split moments have nothing to do with real dance elements – deep edges…so every time Sasha does split – she and Ivan avoid to show some beautiful deep edge.
Once again transitions with hand-in-hand holds, big distance between the partners there thanks to upper body bent forward, only one very short waltz close hold in the beginning of the dance.
Music in second half of the program is very very fast (like Bobrova & Soloviev’s FD last season), but it is too fast for Sasha & Ivan (probably too fast for anyone). Why is first half of the circular step sequence supported with terribly fast music and second half with changement into slow music, well, but why the couple does not react to change of music rhythm and makes whole step sequence in one rhythm, the same dynamics of all moves and same speed – I don’t know.
What is the idea of the dance? Sasha described somewhere that it says the story of the song. So, I looked for the lyrics. But frankly I don’t see the story in gestures, I don’t see the loneliness in some moves. And while music starts to be fast and kids try to skate more furious…and then circular step sequence starts and Ivan starts to smile at Sasha while singer is singing: “Eleanor Rigby died in the church and was buried along with her name, nobody came…Father McKenzie wiping the dirt from his hands as he walks from the grave.“ This gives me the idea that kids are absolutely out of any loneliness story, they are just skating the choreography which was created to them.
In my personal opinion - overall Sasha & Ivan have very good technique, and if they would be eligible, they would be the best technicians in juniors this year. Also in presentation they would be in top juniors. But for senior stage, for me it is not enought. They have some nice moments in programs and they can skate technically well, but this is just skating and putting one element after the another, not dancing.
Monko & Khaliavin:
Big and dramatic dances suites them. Deep edges.
This time Kirill made a mistake in twizzles. During whole dance Ksenia’s upper body bent forward from time to time, sometimes it was a part of choreo, sometimes not, it needs to be corrected like in SD.
Transitions – it had skating in close position and in close holds, but it also included hand-in-hand holds. The couple was gliding showing typical Russian school in it.
I think that spin was not Level 4, they had three basic positions, but there is also a rule to have two basic positions performed simultaneously, which Ksenia & Kirill didn’t execute.
At the end of the music both Ksenia & Kirill, especially Ksenia, went so much into the music. I love when powerful music is expressed with powerful skating. I realise that dancing on 120% is dangerous because there is a much higher chance to make a mistake, but I keep expecting that real dancers will always make everything possible for expressing the music perfectly (not just concentrating on technique).
From interview I didn’t get an image that their FD would have some certain story. Kids told that their choreographer Sergei Petukhov (not sure whether he or Zhulin did this, or whether it was a team work, but Petukhov is a great choreographer who created many great programs for Denkova & Staviski or Domnina & Shabalin) was inspired by Roden’s sculptures, Ksenia & Kirill wanted their dance to create a feeling of something monumental, to show a contrast of slow and dynamic moves.
In my personal opinion first part of the dance would need more moments when contrast of slow and dynamic move is visible.
Althought today Sasha & Ivan had better Twizzles and spin, overall Ksenia & Kirill are far in from of them in terms of maturity, power of expression and presentation, their program is a compact dance plus they also have more difficult and “dance style“ choreography.
Yanovskaya & Mozgov:
Sergei was visibly in pain after the dance and I would say that it was visible during the dance as well. So my evaluation will be worse than if he would be healthy.
I really liked opening moves – Anna was great in it, this was probably the first time when she was more visible than Sergei.
Twizzles were very nice. Maybe I am blind, but I see more than 4 turns with Features from Group A and B in first Set of Twizzles, but I didn’t see even one Feature from Group C, so it would be Level 3 only.
Rumba opening moves – yes, Anna is the first Russian Junior dancer who makes real Rumba movements to Rumba music. In step sequence Rumba feeling disappeared thanks to almost now upper body movements during the steps. Sergei was visibly in pain during work in knees.
Unfortunately their Samba Pattern dance is the most weak in comparison with what I saw from other Russian Juniors who took Gold or Silver medal at first three Junior Grand Prix. First Pattern looked OK looking at edges, but overall looked wild in moves a little bit. In second Pattern - not good work of free leg, shaky skating, not finished positions.
In both Samba Patterns there were problems with keeping the rhythm precisely. And what is important for Technical Specialists, not every step was kept for certain number of beats. For example finishing steps for Key Points 3 are those two arcs with two inside edges firstly on left leg and then on the right leg – it must be kept for 2 beats…in both Patterns Anna & Sergei didn’t keep full 2 beats in music, especially doing inside edge on right leg. But once again, Sergei was in pain.
The couple will skate in 14 days at their opening Junior Grand Prix in Tallinn. Hopefully Sergei will recover fast and kids will avoid such mistakes in programs we will see at Junior competitions.
The spiral entry, the arm over the head, that fierce kick at the exit. She probably needs to rehearse her LP more, but such excite and joy in the end! Her arms are really beautiful. And I actually like the outfit--yeah, it's dark and gauzy, but at least it's not black and the silver makes it look more elegant. I say, keep this one and ditch the SP one.
I hope she doesnt recycle that program
). I think Lisa's FP will work good for her. Eastern music suits her, and i really see an improvement in her shape and jumps. I also like Alena's SP - nice and cheerful, it's good to see her in a program made not by Morozov.
