Skate America: Pairs' Thoughts?

[gsk8]

Germany's Hocke and Kunkel secure pairs' gold at Skate America

2023 Skate America: Pairs Germany’s Annika Hocke and Robert Kunkel secured the Pairs’ gold at 2023 Skate America today in Allen, Texas. Lia Pereira and Trennt Michaud of Canada and […]

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What are your thoughts on the Pairs event? Which programs do you like the most? What new teams are you excited about the most?

 

[4everchan]

I would have given the edge to Lia and Trennt... I guess we could consider them a new team since they haven't been on the GP circuit yet. The Germans have great throws and their twist is superior but I wasn't impressed with their LP as much as I liked their SP. Overall, I feel the P/M had the best event of the teams there. It's not a big deal getting silver but if they do not qualify to GPF because of that, sigh.
While I liked the Germans in the SP, I felt they lacked flair in the LP and as it is 4 minutes, I was bored really early on. They ran out of steam too at the end losing levels etc. I was looking at the scoring and considering ordinals, I found it interesting that in the old-fashioned 6.0 ordinals style of scoring, P/M would have won both the SP and LP. Yet, they finished just behind the Germans in both programs. Sounds like a couple judges really scored them lower than average compared to the Germans.

I don't think there is much to say about the rest of the teams. It was a very weak field with the absence here of the world champions. THe USA number 1 team (Liu-Nagy) is very very promising. Their twist is perhaps one of the best in the world. But until they can land SBS triples and throw triples... ( I think they landed only one triple - the triple throw salchow) in the entire competition, I won't get invested in them. I can see why they already gather many fans. They have a special energy and look. He is a wonderful pair skater and she is very at ease in the air. I wish them time. With the retirement of KF and the injury of CH, they are, with KO, on top of the food chain in USA pairs... and that may be too much pressure for them yet. If they had time to learn throws properly and work on their SBS triples, that would perhaps bear fruit. The good news for them is that they cannot have another GP (not eligible for the replacement list) so they do have time until Nationals.

The rest of the LP was disaster after disaster with teams having major scary mishaps on lifts and falls on jumps and throws. Not an event I will rewatch.

 

[cheerknithanson]

I'm so happy for Chelsea and Balazs. Like I mentioned a few times, I've been following Chelsea's career in a way since 2014, so I'm thrilled for her.

 

[TT_Fin]

I would have given the edge to Lia and Trennt... I guess we could consider them a new team since they haven't been on the GP circuit yet. The Germans have great throws and their twist is superior but I wasn't impressed with their LP as much as I liked their SP. Overall, I feel the P/M had the best event of the teams there. It's not a big deal getting silver but if they do not qualify to GPF because of that, sigh.
While I liked the Germans in the SP, I felt they lacked flair in the LP and as it is 4 minutes, I was bored really early on. They ran out of steam too at the end losing levels etc. I was looking at the scoring and considering ordinals, I found it interesting that in the old-fashioned 6.0 ordinals style of scoring, P/M would have won both the SP and LP. Yet, they finished just behind the Germans in both programs. Sounds like a couple judges really scored them lower than average compared to the Germans.

I don't think there is much to say about the rest of the teams. It was a very weak field with the absence here of the world champions. THe USA number 1 team (Liu-Nagy) is very very promising. Their twist is perhaps one of the best in the world. But until they can land SBS triples and throw triples... ( I think they landed only one triple - the triple throw salchow) in the entire competition, I won't get invested in them. I can see why they already gather many fans. They have a special energy and look. He is a wonderful pair skater and she is very at ease in the air. I wish them time. With the retirement of KF and the injury of CH, they are, with KO, on top of the food chain in USA pairs... and that may be too much pressure for them yet. If they had time to learn throws properly and work on their SBS triples, that would perhaps bear fruit. The good news for them is that they cannot have another GP (not eligible for the replacement list) so they do have time until Nationals.

The rest of the LP was disaster after disaster with teams having major scary mishaps on lifts and falls on jumps and throws. Not an event I will rewatch.

I stIll don't understand so much about the technics as you do, but about the rest, I could have written this. Pairs has been my favourite discipline but events like this may chance it.

 

[Jumping_Bean]

It's not a big deal getting silver but if they do not qualify to GPF because of that, sigh.

Their second event is very much not super competitive either so I don't think there's much danger of that happening. They probably won't beat Conti/Macii, but Kam/O'Shea should certainly be doable, they have better jumps and throws and are more consistent. With two silvers, they'd basically be guaranteed a GPF spot.

 

[SmileHappy34]

I like what I saw. Each team can improve,each shows great skating.

 

[slider11]

Good stuff! Still waiting for Plazas and Fernandez to have a clean program-such potential! Am a big fan of Lea and Trennt-as a new team they are making steady progress! Feel for the Germans and their financial struggle. Their performance was good but not memorable.

 

[rain]

I would have given the edge to Lia and Trennt... I guess we could consider them a new team since they haven't been on the GP circuit yet. The Germans have great throws and their twist is superior but I wasn't impressed with their LP as much as I liked their SP. Overall, I feel the P/M had the best event of the teams there. It's not a big deal getting silver but if they do not qualify to GPF because of that, sigh.
While I liked the Germans in the SP, I felt they lacked flair in the LP and as it is 4 minutes, I was bored really early on. They ran out of steam too at the end losing levels etc. I was looking at the scoring and considering ordinals, I found it interesting that in the old-fashioned 6.0 ordinals style of scoring, P/M would have won both the SP and LP. Yet, they finished just behind the Germans in both programs. Sounds like a couple judges really scored them lower than average compared to the Germans.

I would've given the edge to the Canadians on the strength of the SP. But the scoring was close and both teams made mistakes so....

 

[4everchan]

Their second event is very much not super competitive either so I don't think there's much danger of that happening. They probably won't beat Conti/Macii, but Kam/O'Shea should certainly be doable, they have better jumps and throws and are more consistent. With two silvers, they'd basically be guaranteed a GPF spot.

with two silvers, considering that NHK should have two seeded teams without a second assignment, yup. I guess even with a silver and a bronze it may work out... not that I want Lia and Trennt lower than silver

 

[Ivana]

It really hurts me to write this because pairs (and ice dance) were the two disciplines that made me fall in love with figure skating, but with the absence of Russians even the GP level is way down. Take away the top 3 from Worlds and you are at middle and low level pairs fast and that is what happened to SA pairs event with the absence of Miura/Kihira. Intentional double jumps and throws, so many issues with lifts, maybe my memory does not serve me anymore, but I can't remember a GP competition where three pairs had falls/aborted lifts in free skate.

Liu/Nagy really caught my eye, Plazas/Fernandez are interesting to watch when they hit which was not the case here. I was somehow disappointed with the lack of progress of Caldara/Maglio, the FS costume has to go, it's really causing them a lot of issues. Same for Hocke/Kunkel as for the progress, like they did not have a meltdown thankfully, but they had issues with stamina already last season and are still battling the same. The other teams just blend in together for me.

 

[lariko]

I fully expected P/M win, since they felt overall stronger than the German team, but H/K certainly have more experience. one element that I felt would have held up next to the Russians was L/N twist. The rest was better than last year, but a couple of teams, honestly, it felt dangerous for them to skate together in a pair competition. Basically, I just exhaled in relief when they didn't sustain a bad fall and injury.

 

[chuckm]

Liu / Nagy just teamed up in late summer, while Pereira / Michaud have been together for almost a year now.

 

[NanaPat]

Liu / Nagy just teamed up in late summer, while Pereira / Michaud have been together for almost a year now.

True. On the other hand, Liu has been doing pairs since 2010 while Pereira has been doing pairs for "almost a year now". Kam/O'Shea are more comparable in experience to Periera/Michaud than L/N are.

 

[throw_triple_flip]

Perreira and Michaud were great, but I think the Germans narrowly winning overall is correct as at the moment the quality of what they do is better than the other teams. Especially combined with the fact that none of the teams had clean skates.
The Canadians had skated clean they rightly would've won.

This time next year though, I think the other teams on the podium (and perhaps further down) could be exceeding the German team as they look that good after shorter period of time. Though I understand that H/K receive little funding and struggle financially (i read somewhere that when when he got injured they couldn't afford the appropriate physiotherapy). If their situation improves maybe their results would improve and keep them ahead.

 

[throw_triple_flip]

It really hurts me to write this because pairs (and ice dance) were the two disciplines that made me fall in love with figure skating, but with the absence of Russians even the GP level is way down. Take away the top 3 from Worlds and you are at middle and low level pairs fast and that is what happened to SA pairs event with the absence of Miura/Kihira. Intentional double jumps and throws, so many issues with lifts, maybe my memory does not serve me anymore, but I can't remember a GP competition where three pairs had falls/aborted lifts in free skate.

Liu/Nagy really caught my eye, Plazas/Fernandez are interesting to watch when they hit which was not the case here. I was somehow disappointed with the lack of progress of Caldara/Maglio, the FS costume has to go, it's really causing them a lot of issues. Same for Hocke/Kunkel as for the progress, like they did not have a meltdown thankfully, but they had issues with stamina already last season and are still battling the same. The other teams just blend in together for me.

I don't think you're being entirely fair. Russia has always been dominant in the sport but they also had advantages over skaters in other countries in the couple of years running up to the Beijing Olympics. During the pandemic teams in most other countries experienced considerably more disruption to their training compared to the Russian skaters. Many couldn't practice at all for a while because of covid regulations.

Also- I think you're misremembering things. During the 21/22 season there were lots of falls/errors in grand prix Pair competitions. Italy in particularly was really bad.
At 2021 Skate America the Japanese team (with a fall on a throw jump) beat the current Russian national champions. Tarasova and Morozov won it and they did not skate clean.
Sui and Han won the Olympics with an invalid jump pass and i don't think they had a clean free skate at all that season.
Mishina and Galliamov stood out that season because they didn't really make mistakes (until the Olympics).


We are now seeing a resurgence of the sport in a lot of other countries and the standard is rapidly improving.
I've also looked at the protocols for recent Russian grand prix competitions and the top teams have made some big errors (and of course, you can't compare domestic scores to international judging). When they come back to international competition things will be a lot tougher for them compared to a few years ago.
This is positive and makes me very excited for the sport.

 

[noskates]

I think the US is in a world of hurt with the pairs teams we saw in this competition.

 

[chuckm]

Plazas/Fernandez had a bad SP and a slightly better FS.

But the other two teams (Liu/Nagy, Martins/Bedard) had only very recently teamed up. All four are experienced pairs skaters, but a few months of training isn't enough time for them to gel. Yes, Martins/Bedard were a team as juniors many years ago, and had skated less successfully with other partners in recent years.

I think given time, L/N could be a real asset to US pairs skating.

 

[throw_triple_flip]

I think the US is in a world of hurt with the pairs teams we saw in this competition.

Why?

 

[2sk8]

Couple of clarifications (not saying they change the overall picture, but in the interests of accuracy). L/N announced their partnership in early May, and were skating together before that, long enough to be sure of the partnership. That's a bit longer than late summer. M/B were apart pretty much one season, when he moved to Irvine and she finished school.

My opinion - I'm more impressed with M/B and their potential. The unison of the prior time together really shows & their basics are solid. L/N - he's a much stronger skater & it shows.

 

[noskates]

You ask why.....well I have not seen Danny O' Shea and his partner so that may give "me/us" hope. I did not see any US pairs team that I thought could compete on an international level with the Japanese or the Chinese or several other countries. Their choreography is not very evolved, most have problems with the side-by-side jumps, and there isn't the cohesiveness of Knierem and Frazier. Granted there are new relationships out ther and this is just my opinion and feel free to disagree... or you can chalk this up to another building year! Hopefully there IS some potential out there.