A golden trio from Canton

What do they put in the water in Canton, Michigan?!

Igor Spilband and Marina Zoueva must be getting requests to coach nearly every dance team in the world, but they've kept their team small and nurtured them well.

It was never in doubt that a Canton team would win gold in Moscow, but who that team would be was a mystery right until the final score was counted.

3rd from last to skate were World debutantes Maia and Alex Shibutani. These young siblings were a breath of fresh air to their Charlie Chaplin themed programme (Smile/Lets face the music and dance) they really did dance in a way that made you forget this is a sport of technical marks and split-second timings. However, the shock on their faces when their scores came up showed that they never in their wildest dreams expected to win a podium place, they pipped the french team Pechalat & Bourzat by just .15 overall but by over 4 points in the free dance. These two are 'the future'...

Next to skate were the olympic champions Tessa Virtue & Scott Moir. One word for their fiery samba free skate - WOW! They were innovative, powerful, fast and furious all the way through. Whilst this programme was new to the audience (at least everything from about 30second onwards), Tessa and Scott had been skating this programme and had complete confidence in it. and it showed. Cool calm and collected as the scores came up, they looked unbeatable.

Last on the ice, having no doubt heard the reception the canadians had got. Meryl Davis and Charlie White skated calmly to their starting position. They skated their tango free skate as faultlessly as they have all season. Fast, technical and with feeling. Igor Spilband was seen bouncing up and down in celebration as his third team of the last 10 minutes skated their socks off. It was going to come down to the wire.

The Eurosport commentators thought Tessa & Scott had it, I thought they did to.
We were both wrong, a first and very deserved world title for Meryl & Charlie to cap off an undefeated season. A good ending, it keeps the friendly rivalry alive between these two fabulous teams ready for next year.

What this does mean is that Marina and Igor will have a busy autumn, their teams will be competing at EVERY Grand Prix Event!

Would I wish anything more from these dancers for next season?
Maia & Alex - a bit more power
Meryl & Charlie - a bit more fire
Tessa and Scott - just more please :-D

What an end to a fabulous championships. Well done Moscow!

Ups and Downs of the Ladies Free Skate

I'm not quite sure what to think of the ladies event yet, but at least I had a chance to watch the last 2 groups live. So here is the event as I saw it. Be warned- Subjective opinions abound!

Kanako Murakami: This young thing is a talent and a joy to watch. She looked very ready in the rehearsals and was (according to the commentators) gutted to be in 10th after the short programme. Her free skate was full of energy and performed up to the crowd. She won't reach the podium this year, but bet she will in the future.

Mao Asada: This programme is beautiful and Mao's skating quality is virtuoso. Unfortunately her technical weaknesses caught up with her again, her triple axel was under-rotated as it has been much of the week, the 3Salchow deserted and she had a flukey entry into one of her spins. Thankfully she didn't look too disappointed in the kiss and cry. It wasn't to be for Mao this year. Would it have been different had the event been in Tokyo?

Mae-Berenice Miete: This young lady has risen quickly to be the leader for France. She deservedly won the qualifying round here. The jumps were a bit of a disaster in the free skate today but she has promise because she performs her programme well. Her interpretation seemed real and not simply regurgitated from memory. She's not ready yet but she has scope to improve.

Rachael Flatt: The first time we've seen the consistent Flatt have a disaster out on the ice in competition. The reasion is obvious. She has a stress fracture of her tibia and a foot injury which were playing on her mentally and physically. The question is, why was she sent out to compete in that state. She earned her spot back in January after narrowly beating Mirai Nagasu back at US nationals. But Mirai would likely have been much more competition ready and if things had been different, the USA might have their prized 3 spots back for next year. I feel for Flatt (particularly as she put off attending Stanford to focus on skating this year) but why have alternates and not use them?

Miki Ando: Skated her socks off. The technical content was all there and she put effort into her choreography. I may be biased and many will likely disagree with me, but she would win more fans if she put more real expression into her performance and threw it out to the audience. Her arm movements are pretty, but they still seem to be there for the sake of it and not because they add to the programme. That said, she says she came here to make the people of Japan smile and she has don that. She deserved her high marks and her win on the day today.

Alena Leonova: There have been many nay-sayers to this skater but all credit to her. She picked her theme and she SOLD IT. She will never be the most graceful skater with the best lines (just as her number 1 fan in Moscow, Irina Slutskaya never was) but she performed her programme the best of any skater today and who can blame her. It may be her last chance to skate a major championships in front of an adoring home crowd, with the strength of Russia's tiny teens coming up from the junior ranks. This (in my humble opinion) was the performance of the night.

Yu-Na Kim: is likely kicking herself right now. Her Homage to Korea programme is a piece of skating art and should be appreciated on its own merit. But the jumps that she has been hitting consistently all week let her down just enough to see gold slip from her fingers. One mistake and she still would have pipped Miki Ando, but two was too much to get away with. She popped the double toe on the end of combination, popped her nemesis flip jump and recieved a level 1 on one of her spins. Whether she was let down by a lack of training, a mental blip or something else we may never know. I hope we see this gorgeous programme and gorgeous skater back in competition again soon though.


Alissa Czisny: I thought for a second the Czisny of old was back in  the building. She fell on her first triple lutz and it could have all gone horribly wrong from there, but it didn't. Czisny should be very proud of her US and Grand Prix titles this season, and of the vast improvements she has made in consistency and artistry. We're not sure yet how much we'll see of her next season. But I certainly wouldn't be sad to see her back.

Carolina Kostner: She wasn't perfect, but that was the most consistent we've seen Carolina Kostner in a long long time. The people of Russia may never forgive her for pipping Alena Leonova to the bronze (I too would have Alena ahead, but what can you do?) Still, congratulations Carolina on a long-awaited return to form.

Ksenia Makarova: Russsia wanted a world medal, and they wanted it bad! Makarova is a lovely skater with great performance quality. But with her lack of technical difficulty (she doesn't do a lutz) she had to be perfect and she wasn't today. Her triple-triple was under-rotated and several other errors knocked her score down the pack. Keep at it though Ksenia, and keep working on that Lutz for the future!

So it's Ando, Kim and Kostner. Not how many expected this podium to look, but good news for Japan at last.

Oh dear Jenna, oh dear :-(

Olympic champions take the lead.

With the men's and pairs competitions complete, all eyes in Moscow turn to the ladies and the ice dancers. Again I have been without live coverage for most of the event so I will keep my coverage brief and speak only of what I know.

There has been much excitement about Korea's Queen Yu-Na returning to competition for the first time since Vancouver. Yu-Na Kim's new programmes and costumes have been kept almost as secret as Kate Middleton's wedding dress in the run-up to the championships. Kim delivered a steady but not spectacular programme to the music of Giselle. She stepped out of her planned combination jump on the 3Lutz but managed to add a double toe to her flip jump later in the programme. The programme was smooth and easy on the eyes but lacked the fire and performance of her previous 'Danse Macabre' and 'James Bond' short programmes. Many tweeters (no names) felt that she won the short programme based on reputation rather than performance, but there's very little not to like in this programme.

2nd place went to Miki Ando, who showed more effort in her performance to 'The Mission' than I've seen in the past (ie she looked up and performed directly to the audience, which helps!). Russia's Ksenia Makarova sits in third, hiping to emulate young team-mate Artur Gachinski and take home a medal from Moscow.

I can't really comment on the rest as I haven't watched them yet. Mao Asada is down in the rankings after her triple axel was downgraded, but not out of reach of a medal.  Also the US ladies are on track to earn 3 spots to next years championships (for the first time since 2007) which will please the folks at home.

In the Ice Dance, as ever it is the teams from Canton, Michigan leading the way. Virtue & Moir hold a slight lead over training mates Davis & White, but it could go either way in the free with the Americans having clocked up much more competition experience this season. It will be a deligt to finally see the 2nd half of the Canadians free skate though!

The crazy, tiny, bendy body of Yuko Kavaguti

As you may have guessed from my past postings and not-quite impartial coverage. I love this pair. They have a great commitment to their sport, a fierce desire to win, and the guts to try new things. Yuko is tiny, fragile looking (remember Sasha hugging her on the podium in Bern as she was shivvering from the cold in the arena!) but with nerves of steel. She was willing to give up her Japanese citizenship to persue an olympic dream.

It didn't quite work out for them in Vancouver 2010, or Moscow 2011. Yuko is still fighting her way back from a shoulder injury, but these two will not be happy with 4th place, and they'll be back fighting next year.

Germans Uncatchable

Coming into the free skate there was virtually nothing in it between the top two pairs, Pang & Tong of China and Savchenko & Szolkowy of Germany.

The Germans came out and skated their Pink Panther programme better than they have all year. It was up to Pang & Tong to skate their very best to catch them. Sadly from the first jumps it wasn't to be. He singled his first side-by-side double axel and put his hands down on the second. Gold was out of reach and silver was in the hands of the 2 Russian pairs still to go.

Young pair Bazarova & Larionov channelled a bit of Yagudin magic skating to the olympic champ's Man in the Iron Mask music from 2002. Like the Chinese, and like their Russian team-mates Kavaguti & Smirnov they skated a lovely artistic programme but had to count a fall. It was left to the final pair. Volosozhar & Trankov of Russia. The pair had both been on or close to the podium with previous partners but in their first season together put out a near-perfect skate and pipped the Olympic silver medallists, Pang & Tong to second place on the day. Russian pair skating looks as strong as ever on the road to Sochi 2014.

The Quad Kings Rule!

Congratulations to Patrick Chan, Canada's second world champion in 4 years. Also to silver medallist Takahiko Kozuka of Japan and bronze medallist, Russia's Artur Gachinski.

All 3 of these young talents are young (Chan is 20, Kozuka 22 and Gachinski just 17!) and will have their sights set on medalling again in Russia at the Sochi olympics.

Disappointment for reigning champ Daisuke Takahashi who had to stop his programme mid-way through when his blade broke away from his skate boot on a quad attempt. ISU president Ottavio Cinquanta was caught on camera having a little laugh at Takahashi's expense - miming them screwing the skater's blade back onto his boot. Tres Harsh!

Also some controversy, I didn't believe it until I saw it. France's Florent Amodio came out and intentionally played the 'exhibition' version of his free skate music, complete with Black Eyed Peas and Michael Jackson vocals, and didn't even get a penalty for it! Perhaps the judges were so shocked they didn't know how to react! He should at least have got a point pemalty like Brian Joubert did for his short programme in 2008 (and that didn't even have words...)

Men's Final Results

Chantastic!

Patrick Chan blew away the field today in the men's short programme. The canadian's score set a new IJS record, beating that of Evgeni Plushenko from the 2010 Europeans. The best of the rest were the Japanese men followed by mini-Plushenko, Artur Gachinski of Russia who hit a clean 4T-3T combination.

What is eye opening is the generosity of the programme component scores for Chan's programme. While his skating skills and artistry have earned Patrick acclaim, it's the first time I've seen the judges give out anything near a 'perfect 10' in any area! Perhaps someone had a word in the judges ears that it's ok to reward the world's best skaters for being the world's best skaters.

Barring major falls/disaster. Patrick has his first world title partially sewn up. (I hope I don't eat my words.)
What do you think? Was Chan over-marked? Are you happy to see higher scores being rewarded?

Also in the pairs event, Olympic silver medallists Pang & Tong hold a narrow lead over pre-competition favourites Savchenko & Szolkowy.  The Russians are 3rd, 4th and 5th with (surprisingly) the most experienced team, Kavaguti & Smirnov behind after a freak fall from him on their combination spin. An impressive worlds debut from Japanese pair Takahashi & Tran, who sit in 6th (It feels as if they've been around for ages now but this is their senior worlds debut.)

Worlds Day 2: Prelims Results

The preliminary rounds wrapped up in Moscow today with France's Mae Berenice Miete leading the ladies qualifying. 26 Ladies competed, with only the top 12 joining the 18 direct entries in the short programme.

Notably low scores came from Estonia's Elena Glebova, who usually manages to put out pleasant programmes but is rarely spectacular. Also Korea's Min-Jeong Kwak just failed to make the cut. While I never expected her to challenge for a medal it's a shame to see her place so low. She seemed to bloom under the brief tutelage of Brian Orser but seems to have taken a step backwards with the return to Korea. Not for me to say though I guess.

In the ice dance, Canadians Kaitlyn Weaver & Andrew Poje took an easy lead. I was happy also to see Brits Louise Waldon & Owen Edwards (pictured above) making the cut. They stepped up at the last minute to fill big 'shoes' after the retirement of the Kerrs.

Competition proper begins tomorrow with the Men's and Pairs SP. Full Results Here.

Japan Reborn

From Universal Sports: The Japanese skaters at Worlds are wearing black ribbon on warmup jackets for the people of Japan who died in the earthquake and a patch with the message 'Rebirth Japan- we are always with you' for the country.

Good Luck to all the Japanese skaters, and best wishes to all their fans back home.

A familiar rivalry

Alongside the figure skating Worlds, another world title will be decided on ice this week.

The Women's IIHF Ice Hockey World Championships conclude today in Switzerland. As has been the case in every championships since the tournament was founded, the final will be between the USA and Canada. 

Canada have the advantage of being the reigning olympic champions from Vancouver and definitely have the lead on World titles, but USA have won the last 2 - setting up a close competition as ever
.

1990 - Canada
1992 - Canada
1994 - Canada
1997 - Canada
1999 - Canada
2000 - Canada
2001 - Canada
2004 - Canada
2005 - USA
2007 - Canada
2008 - USA
2009 - USA
2011 -??

The bronze medal will be decided between Russia and Finland. 

Results and competition report from Wikipedia.

Worlds - Men's Qualifying Round

The 2011 World Championships is officially underway!

To be honest I was pretty surprised to see Japan's Takahiko Kozuka in the qualifying round, given he was 4th at Four Continents and 10th at Worlds last year. He won this round with ease and should place very well in the main competition starting Wednesday.

Special mentions to young talents Joey Russell of Canada, who stepped up as an alternate after the withdrawal of Shawn Sawyer, and also to Misha Ge of Uzbekistan who, coached by Frank Carroll, is making his senior worlds debut. Ge (pronounced like the letter G) finished an impressive 12th at this years 4 Continents.

Comiserations to those who just missed out, including Austalia's Mark Webster and GB's David Richardson. I do wonder at the state of GB skating without even John and Sinead Kerr to lead the way.

A quote from icenetwork's Lynne Rutherford on Twitter - Skaters are coming off the ice saying it is extremely hot, making it difficult to sustain energy. Bern was too cold - now Moscow is too hot. Yu-Na Kim also said after her practice yesterday that the ice felt softer than she was used to, and the arena won't even be full yet! I hope this doesn't affect the level of performances in the later competition.

Champions defend at Japan Nationals

The 2011 Japanese gymnastics championships in Tokyo mark the beginning of the road to recovery for Japansese athletes. (See my article from earlier this week).

Last years champions, Koko Tsurumi & Kohei Uchimura defended their titles in style, cementing their status nationally and making a statement about the readiness of the deep japanese teams to challenge at the upcoming world championships, hopefully in Tokyo.

Uchimura, the 2009 and 2010 World all around champion posted the highest score recorded under the current scoring system in the first round of competition. It was also great to see Tsurumi perform upto standard, she had a difficult worlds in Rotterdam and could not live upto the promise she showed in 2009 in London.

The consistency of high scores in both the male and female results though are perhaps the greatest testament to the resilience and quality of the Japanese gymnasts. Compete to the same level in October and they should have no trouble qualifying teams to the Olympics.
Full Results - International Gymnast

Flash-back...

Just for interest, here's a look back at the last time the World Figure Skating Championships were held in Moscow, 2005.

• The 'new' scoring system was still very new, 2005 was the first Worlds without a perfect 6.
• This was the last time we saw Michelle Kwan in competition. 
• 2005 also had qualifying rounds. All singles skaters competed in one of two qualifying groups and their qualifying score counted (a little bit) to the final result.  These were done away with for the 2007 worlds but now appear to be back again in 2011 as a way of weeding out the lower ranked skaters and producing a smaller field for the main competition. 
• In the ladies - Irina Slutskaya swept the competition, winning the qualifying short, and free programmes. Silver went to the error-prone Sasha Cohen and bronze to the youngster Carolina Kostner. 
• Michelle Kwan was 4th and off the podium for the first time since 1994! Eventual 2006 Olympic Champ Shizuka Arakawa finished in 9th place.
• In the men's event there were 3 first-time medallists.l, Stephane Lambiel, Jeffrey Buttle and Evan Lysacek, with Johnny Weir just outside in 4th. 
• Eventual 2006 Olympic Champ Evgeni Pluchenko was 1st in his qualifying group but finished 5th in the short programme and withdrew due to injury.
• Russian pair Totmianina & Marinin won their second consecutive world title, ahead of team-mates Petrova & Tikhonov, back in the time when Russian pairs were completely dominent. The chinese power house was on the way up, with Zhang & Zhang 3rd and Pang & Tong 4th.
• The Ice Dance Podium was the only one to completely match that of the 2006 olympics.
  1. Navka & Kostomarov (RUS) , 2.Belbin & Agosto (USA), 3. Grushina & Goncharov (UKR)
• Competitors in 2005 who are still in the mix in 2011 include;
  Ladies - Miki Ando (6th in 2005), Cynthia Phaneuf (20th), Jenna McCorkell (22nd) & Elena Glebova (17th in qualifying group),
  Mens- Brian Joubert (6th, ), Kevin Van Der Perren (8th), Daisuke Takahashi (15th),
  Pairs - Pang & Tong (4th), Savchenko & Svolkowy (6th),
  and Dance - Pechalat & Bourzat (19th)

Here are the full starting orders and results from 2005 and 2011 

Yu-Na is BACK!

Olympic Champ Yu-Na Kim took to the ice for practice yesterday in Moscow, and if her run through of her Giselle short programme is anything to go by, she means business.

Shame the only records she has left to break are her own, and that may take some doing.

The quality of the video isn't great, but I'm sure her competition performances will be available in sparkling HD within minutes given the anticipation of her return!

Competition begins today with the Men's preliminary round.

Don't forget !

You've got today and tomorrow to book tickets to London 2012. (If you're in the UK that is)

Applications close at 11.59 Tuesday evening.

I've applied for mid-range tickets to the Men's and Women's trampoline and cheap as chips ones to the opening and closing ceremonies and the football prelims in Coventry.

I had a long debate with myself about tickets to the gymnastics, but figured that
a) I'm a medical student and quite unlikely to be able to get time off in the week
b) I'm a medical student and can't afford top-price tickets to make it worthwhile, the top of the O2 arena is a LONG way up and you'll actually feel a lot closer to the action watching it at home, sad but true :-(

That said, I am planning to attend the test event in the olympic arena prior to the olympics where tickets will be a lot more reasonable.  

Best of luck to anyone else booking tickets and I hope you get your first choice of events.

Olivier Brajon - Capturing the moment.

A friend of mine who is also a keen fan and photographer of figure skating posted this link to French photographer Oliver Brajon. Brajon has posted some beautiful black and white portraits of figure skaters, both posed and snapshots. Well worth a look!

A chance of greatness for GB Ice Hockey

A break from gymnastics and figure skating, just for once :-)

Great Britain's ice hockey players should already be proud of their performance so far in the IIHF World Championships. With one game to go they have 3 wins and one closely fought loss on the board. But everything depends on their last game against Poland tomorrow. Beyone a win and a medal, they have the chance to vastly raise the standing of GB in the world of winter sports.

Due to the scale of a global hockey tournament, the event is split into divisions. The 'Elite' competition, involving the top 16 ranked teams in the world begins on April 29th in Slovakia. GB competed this week in Division 1 (the next tier of teams) in Kiev, Ukraine. There are also divisions 2 and 3 below that. Countries can be promoted or relegated between divisions based on their performance in the previous year's championships.

GB is competing in group B of the division 1 World Championships. So far they have beaten Ukraine 5-3, Lost to Kazakhstan 2-1, Beaten Estonia 7-0 and Lithuania 5-2. A win in their final game against Poland on Saturday will guarantee them a medal, either silver or gold depending on how current leaders Kazakhtan fair in their final game aganst Ukraine.

Whilst it's a long shot, a win for GB would mean a promotion to the Elite competition next year, along with the likes of Canada, USA and Russia. It would be the first time GB have qualified to the worlds top flight in nearly 20 years.

Coach of the GB team (and my home team, Coventry Blaze), Paul Thompson says
"We are prepared, ready and excited.

"These days don't come along all that often and could maybe even change the path of ice hockey in our country."

UPDATE

The GB boys did everything they could, beating Poland 3-2 in their last game to wrap up a medal. They then had to watch as Kazakhstan narrowly beat Ukraine in overtime to take top spot. Sadly that means no promotion of GB to the big leagues this year. :'-(

Interestingly, Kazakhstan were actually relegated from the elite division of the IIHF to division 1 last year after a poor performance. They seem to be the yo-yo team, having won a promotion back up again this year.

I'm sure the likes of Canada and Russia are breathing a sigh of relief they won't have to take on Paul Thompson's boys just yet!

Next year GB! Congratulations on the silver!

Japanese Gymnastics - Moving Forward.

As we look to the relocated Figure Skating Worlds this week, my thoughts (and many others I'm sure) are still with the people of Japan as life tries to return to 'normal' 6 weeks after the disasterous earthquake. Today I bought a copy of the British ice skating magazine iSkate and this was the cover - no glamourous sports photography, just a solemn reminder of the reason Worlds is late this year.

But in the world of gymnastics, the Japanese are very keen for things to continue as planned!

The Japanese Gymnastics Championships championships take place this week in Tokyo's Yoyogi National Gymnasium (the site of what would have been the Skating Worlds). International Gymnast magazine has an interesting article on gymnast Rie Tanaka and on the general outlook of the Japanese gymnastics community. This week the organising commitee put out an international plea for the 2011 World Gymnastics Championships to go ahead as planned, In Toky this October.

This quote from the president of the Japanese Olympic Commitee, cited in the IG article.
"As you may already know the metropolitan government of Tokyo has not been affected from the earthquake, nor the tsunami,Hence, it is very important for Japan to actually host a premier international event to uplift the [devastated] people, especially the young children."

I whole heartedly agree with these comments, high profile sporting events have a great opportunity to build unity and national pride. How good would it be for these gymnasts to compete in front of a home crowd and come back from all the adversity this year to earn a ticket to the 2012 Olympics?

Photo - The Japanese ladies gymnastics team that won silver at the 2010 Asian Games (Daylife)

Ready for Worlds

The World Championships that looked like it might never happen is due to kick off Monday in Moscow. Skaters are gathering in Russia to compete for their own country and in support of the people of Japan.

Icenetwork has interviewed many of the US skaters and also Olympic champs Virtue & Moir. Many feel that late is better than never and for some the delay of the championships has given them valuable extra training/ recovery time. V&M claim they feel ready and recovered from the injury that forced them to withdraw from Four Continents back in February.

Check back for more news as the week goes on. Happy Easter Everyone!

Bronze in Berlin --> Gold in Glasgow

Apologies for the blogging silence since part way through Europeans. I've not been earning by blogging stripes very well recently!

Full Twist has been offering up great coverage of the Glasgow World Cup this weekend. Like the American cup this was an all-around competition based on rankings from the Rotterdam worlds. And like the American cup, this led to a rather small and rather weak field.

Many of the athletes had hot-footed it to Glasgow straight from the Europeans last weekend. The non-European exceptions being American cup champion Jonathan Horton and Venezuela's Jessica Lopez. 

In the Men's event Daniel Purvis of GB was the cleanest competitor and took gold ahead of European champ Philip Boy after Boy sat down his double-front vault. Even better news for GB was that 2009 World AA silver medallist Daniel Keatings making his return to competition after an ACL tear last year. As keatings was competing as a wild card his scores were not counted in the official rankings, but he would have finished a very respectable 4th. USA's Jonathan Horton was nowhere near the form that won him the American Cup, making errors on 3 apparatus and finishing 7th.

In the women's competition too there were errors from most, but Amelia Racea of Romania held out to win the event ahead of Jessica Lopez and romanian teammate Raluca Haidu, who looks significantly matured (and a bit taller!) than when we saw her in Rotterdam. The GB girls Hannah Whelan and Jennifer Pinches both had a messy outing and will have to put this one down to experience, finishing 5th and 8th. Many of the GB girls are headed to Mexico now for a training camp in the sun.