From: loosemore-sandra Date: Sat, 14 Dec 1996 02:54:30 -0500 (EST) To: skatefans-l@UDel.Edu, rec.sport.skating.ice.figure-news@babyblue.cs.YALE.EDU Subject: Friday's Pacific Coasts report Sender: owner-skatefans-l@UDel.Edu Here's what's happening so far on Sandra's "trip to Bountiful".... I haven't been taking any detailed notes on the novice events, but I must say a word here about Naomi Nari Nam, who won novice ladies. She's a tiny little thing, but she is the most amazing spinner. I have never seen anyone else blur a *sitspin* before, but she can do it. She also does this amazing layback spin with about four variations in position, including one where she pulls her free leg up next to her ear! Her jumps are not quite up to the level of her spins -- I didn't see her doing any triples, and her jumps were not particularly high. For the junior ladies, the winner was Elizabeth O'Donnell, who skated strong, clean programs in both the short and long. She has a triple toe and a triple salchow. I think that by far the best skater in this group is Cohen Duncan -- she has wonderful flow and musicality and has a powerful, adult look about her skating -- but she was having tons of trouble with her triples in her long program, getting very tilted in the air and falling out of them. I saw her landing a great triple loop combination in the warmup, though. She wound up in second place. J.J. Matthews was third. She landed a triple flip but made other mistakes and her presentation seems superficial and immature. I missed the junior men's final because I was off skating myself across town at the Cottonwood Heights rink. Justin Dillon won handily but I don't know how well he skated. In the short program my impression was that this was not a really strong group of men. I haven't seen any of the junior dance yet so I can't comment on that at all. Junior pairs have done their short, and no surprises, the Stieglers are in front. They're doing the same program as last year, and both landed their double lutzes. Yes, it's true that Irina Rodnina is coaching them here instead of Peter Oppegard. Unconfirmed gossip is that there's a dispute over money. And now, what you've all been waiting for.... the senior men's short. Yes, Michael Chack won, and yes, he skated a clean program with a triple axel/ double toe combination. He had a really nasty time with that triple axel in warmup, though. When I talked to him afterwards he said that when it was his turn to skate he was able to focus and just trust in his body to do it right -- he said this was the 5th clean short program in a row that he's skated in the past week. Anyway, he said he feels a lot more comfortable about doing his long program than the short, and is just glad to get the short over with. For those who want all the gory details: the program is to music by Richard Strauss, he's wearing black pants and a shirt that's purple on the bottom fading to white on top, and the judges went up as high as a 5.7 on his presentation marks. He's made a few changes in the program since I first saw it last summer -- e.g., he's back to doing a change sit instead of a change camel, and is doing different footwork into the triple lutz instead of the back spiral and rockers he used to do. Trifun Zivanovic also skated a nice clean program with a triple axel/ double toe -- his cheesy "Star Wars" program from last year. He certainly continues to improve every time I see him skate, and he was the obvious crowd favorite here. John Baldwin skated his "Lone Ranger" program, but couldn't hang onto his triple axel, and wound up third. Jere Michael had a lousy program in terms of jumps -- only a single axel, triple lutz/double loop, and a fall on a triple loop -- but oh, did he sell his program, hamming it up to the hilt, and that was enough to put him in fourth ahead of Johnnie Bevan, who went for a triple axel combination and couldn't land it. Senior ladies also had their short programs tonight, and no huge surprises, Angela Nikodinov is in front. She looks more adult than last year but her program and presentation were a little lacking. She did a triple flip combination and I believe she was attempting a triple lutz out of footwork, but fell on it. If I'm remembering correctly, Jacqie Turner is in second, also with a triple flip combination, but with only a double for her solo jump. Serena Phillips did a triple lutz with a badly cheated landing into a double loop, and a triple flip with a landing that looked two-footed to me, and wound up in third. I think fourth place went to Diane Halber. Senior pairs are over with and again, no surprises, Stiegler & Zimmerman won in a blow-out. They attempted triple toes in the short, but John fell on his. (I *did* see both of them landing them cleanly in practice, however.) In the long, they were back to double toes. Very few people at this event were at Skate America and since they've only shown a few brief clips of their program on TV, this was the first time most people here had seen it, and there was a lot of buzz about it. Also notable in the pairs were the one couple who didn't qualify for nationals, Erin Elbe and Brent Echols. He is a much better physical match for her than Jeffrey Weiss was -- they even have matching ponytails! -- and they have amazingly good unison for a new team. Unfortunately, they really need to work on their pair skills, as they had some very scary falls. I don't think he is up to her level of skill and his lack of experience shows, but with time they ought to be able to move up. A few random notes from the rink.... There's a huge California contingent here at the event. I thought it was a little funny when a brief snow squall blew through earlier this evening and all of these California people went out to gawk at the snow because it was such a novelty for them. There's also a surprisingly large Alaskan contingent, but I'm sure they see plenty of snow at home. :-) Since I'm more familiar with what's going on on the east coast, it's kind of interesting to see what regional differences are with the west coast competitors. One thing I noticed is that the west coast ladies (especially the novices and juniors) tend to go for costumes that have more excessively garish sequins and beading than what I've seen at New Englands or Easterns in the past couple of years. They also seem to go for more excessive makeup here. On the positive side, I saw many fewer ugly layback spins here than at New Englands. Also on the costume front... One of the novice ladies was wearing something that looked exactly like Chen Lu's burgundy dress from last season. And one of the junior pairs were wearing costumes that were ripped off from Punsalan & Swallow's famous race-car program. For comic relief, we were treated to one of the junior ladies pulling down her wedgie with a flourish in the middle of her program. I've only run into one other net-person here! This seems very strange since there's usually such a big crowd of netters at east coast events. That's about it for now. I'll post another update after Saturday's events. -Sandra From: loosemore-sandra Date: Sun, 15 Dec 1996 01:38:53 -0500 (EST) To: skatefans-l@UDel.Edu, rec.sport.skating.ice.figure-news@babyblue.cs.YALE.EDU Subject: Saturday's report from Pacific Coasts Sender: owner-skatefans-l@UDel.Edu Saturday at Pacific Coasts started out with the junior dance final. The winners were Crystal Beckerdite & Raphael Kelling, who I thought took a bit of a risk by skating to slow waltz music for the entire program. Tiffany Hyden & Jonathan Magalnick finished second with a Fred & Ginger kind of program -- they're both very tall for skaters and make a very striking couple. I was surprised that the third-place couple, Mollie Klurfeld & Martin Sivorinovsky, didn't place higher; they did a gypsy dance, "Two Guitars". I guess it's proof that I still don't know exactly what the dance judges look for. Next up was the novice pairs final, won by Jessica Waldstein & Everett Weiss. Everett sure is versatile -- he's our current national senior figures champion, and will also be going to nationals again this year to compete as a junior man in freeskating. Good for him! Then it was time for senior dance. Only three couples competing here, and two of them are really from the east coast! Kuchiki & Smull have taken the year off, I hear, and Buhl & Dibella were no-shows here. Anyway, Felita Carr & Alexei Komarov won with a Spanish-themed dance (Falla's "Ritual Fire Dance") in appropriately flamey costumes -- actually, I thought they were the best costumes of the whole competition. Second place went to Dawn Ponte & Paul Frey who skated to big-band music. The third-place couple, Beata Handra & Charles Sinek, IMHO, have absolutely no business going to nationals. They had a big gap in the middle of their original dance, and about all they did for their free dance was slowly stroke a few laps around the rink while their music played. Yes, here is a couple who qualified for nationals without a program. The judges gave them 3.0's for going around the rink. Uh, right. :-P After a break, the competition resumed with the junior pairs. Once again, a triumph for Peter Oppegard's choreography; the Stieglers did their new "Peer Gynt" program, and it was spectacular. Tiffany and Johnny are much improved in terms of their technical skills, too -- they're blindingly fast and much more powerful throughout all of their elements. The second-place pair, Rebecca Erb and Joel Vinson, were also very good with a similarly fast and intense program to "Night on Bald Mountain". Senior ladies were up next. Sara Robertson was first up in the final flight. She's a very tall skater who bears more than a passing resemblance to Nancy Kerrigan, but less of a jumper. She skated to "Les Miz" in a program that emphasized how flexible and long-legged she is. Serena Phillips skated to some classical music I didn't recognize. She did a pretty good job, landing a clean triple lutz/double loop and triple flip. Her marks were in the 5.1-5.3 range. Jacqie Turner landed a triple flip/double toe and not much else; she's using the Rachmaninoff 2nd piano concerto. Diane Halber skated to "Caravan" wearing a red and orange outfit with the heinous nude fabric midriff; the only triple I have for her in my notes is a triple toe/double toe combination, but her presentation was pretty good. Finally, Angela Nikodinov came out and showed that she was in a class by herself, landing triple lutz, flip, loop, salchow, another flip, and toe loop. One thing I noticed is that she has really great carriage -- I kept trying to think who she reminded me of, and I finally realized it was Dorothy Hamill. The judges gave her ~5.6's in both marks. I think she's got a good shot to make top 6 at nationals this year. Finally.... senior men, the last event of the competition. The first skater was Glenn Armstrong, who surely knew that he was this event's designated loser, but who managed to skate a fairly interesting program anyway. He used some hillbilly-type blues music and filled his program with a lot of Beacom-eseque moves; connecting elements that played around with edges, and some unusual spins. One of the real battles here centered around who would get the fourth spot to nationals, and it wound up going to Jere Michael. He skated to some vaguely middle-eastern music that he later told me was from a ballet called "Arabian Nights", with the slow section from the movie "Ben Hur". Costume rules or no, he was wearing purple tights. (It seems like purple is now considered *the* color to wear for any kind of middle-eastern program, for both ladies and men.) Anyway, if Glenn's program was Beacom-esque, Jere's was definitely Wylie-esque -- dramatic choreography, great lines and extensions, very sensitive to his music. Jump-wise, Jere had a bit of an off-night, falling on his triple flip and two-footing his first lutz and popping the second. (He does not have a triple axel.) So it was up to Johnnie Bevan, who gave away his trip to Nashville when he fell hard on his triple axel and then fell again on a flying sitspin. I think Johnnie is a stronger jumper than Jere, but has very pedestrian choreography and presentation, and the mistakes he made were enough to put him behind Jere. I wonder: is this the first time that one of the triple axel boys has failed to qualify for nationals? Up next was John Baldwin, skating to "Mission Impossible". He went for two triple axels, landed the first one and fell on the second, had another fall and a couple of two-footed jumps. He has pretty good speed and a good presence on the ice, but I thought his choreography was a little lacking, with too many crossovers and not enough connecting elements. Judges gave him marks in the low 5's. So then it's the battle for first place. Michael Chack was up first. He's wearing that black tux-type costume that he used at last year's Jimmy Fund show, and his program is to music by Patrick Doyle for "Frankenstein" and "Much Ado About Nothing". Triple lutz/triple toe, couldn't quite hold the triple axel and had to take a step out, loop, flip, double axel, flying camel, one-foot axel/triple sal/double toe... he's smiling now... another double axel, triple toe, death drop, back spiral into triple lutz... he's smiling again! travelling camel/sitspin combination and he's done. Michael's step-out on the axel left the door open for Trifun Zivanovic, but it slammed shut again when Trifun fell hard on his own axel. He's doing some kind of Russian-influenced classical program (I couldn't quite place his music), skated with a great deal of flair and in a Toller-esque style, to continue my earlier thread. The whole program was a little sloppy, but he had some great footwork and connecting elements in there. I must say, I really like this boy. I'm glad to see that he's got some good choreography and seems to be finding a style that suits him. I talked to Michael after the competition. He was really happy with the way he skated and said it was a real boost to his confidence going in to nationals. Neither he nor Frank Carroll consider the step-out on his axel to be a miss since he rotated the jump, didn't pop it and didn't fall. Between now and nationals, they're going to add the second triple axel and work on consistency. Michael said he has two shows coming up between now and Nationals: he's doing the Christmas show at Ice Castle Dec 21-22, and on Jan 13 he'll be doing an AIDS benefit in San Francisco. A couple other notes... I swear I saw Elizabeth Manley or her double sitting a few rows in front of me during the men's final. And afterwards in the lobby, there's a guy with long blond hair -- yup, it's Jozef Sabovcik. What's more, after everyone had cleared out of the rink, there's Jozef out there with his skates on! I watched him doing some jumps while I was waiting for Michael to finish getting his picture taken and paperwork filled out. This was also when I talked to Jere Michael; he seems like a really nice kid and was obviously pleased that someone was taking an interest in what he was doing. I also had a chance to talk to Peter Oppegard earlier in the day and tell him I think he's a genius. :-) Finally, Rory Flack Burghart was also around the entire week doing coaching, as was Scott Wendland (Jenni Meno's former partner). All in all, a good competition. I'm looking forward to Nashville. -Sandra