State of the 2016 NHK Trophy: Previews/Predictions (ALL disciplines)

It’s Thanksgiving here in the States, so I’m going to make this relatively short and sweet because I’ve got a meal for 13 people to oversee/complete!

Here’s the link with all the streaming/broadcast info provided by IFS magazine…

And the events, in order of occurrence…

PAIRS:

GOLD: Du/Rad

SILVER:  Peng/Jin

BRONZE: Wang/Wang

DARK HORSE: Kayne/O’Shea

It’s another small pairs field at NHK; only 7 teams will compete. But the reigning World Champs (Du/Rad) are among them, and I think will easily defeat their closest competition (Peng/Jin, in my estimation) unless they skate super sloppy. Americans Kayne/O’Shea are my Dark Horse pick, but in this case it’s more like “best possibility to win 4^th” because I don’t think they can reach the Chinese teams in terms of content.

LADIES:

GOLD: Anna Pogorilaya (RUS)

SILVER:  Satoko Miyahara (JPN)

BRONZE: Wakaba Higuchi (JPN)

DARK HORSE: Alaine Chartrand (CAN)

Another tough ladies field awaits us… but I think Pogo’s still got the upper hand here. Miyahara’s got the skating I prefer, but her tiny jumps are coming under increasing scrutiny and I don’t expect that to change here. Higuchi (impressive with a bronze in Paris a few weeks ago) seems very capable of claiming the remaining NHK medal… but as always this season I’m keeping an eye on the powerful Canadian skater du jour and this time it’s Chartrand.

Mirai Nagasu and Karen Chen are the U.S. reps; both should finish within the top 6. What actually happens might be something else entirely…

MEN

GOLD: Yuzuru Hanyu (JPN)

SILVER:  Nathan Chen (USA)

BRONZE: Jason Brown (USA)

DARK HORSE: Aleksei Bychenko (ISR)

With Hanyu skating relatively healthy (as far as I know), I don’t see how he does anything but win NHK for what would be the third time. His closest competition in the jumps department will be recent record-setter Chen; assuming he can hold it together a little better in the FS this time, his first GP medal may be imminent. Brown’s technique and artistry (and possible quad) put him in good standing to medal here as well. Bychenko is my dark horse because I spent a fair portion of SkCAN (his previous GP event, where he ended up winning his first-ever medal) wondering Why didn’t I make him my dark horse?? (I’m kinda weird that way.)  

DANCE:

GOLD: Papadakis/Cizeron (FRA)

SILVER:  Virtue/Moir (CAN)

BRONZE: Cappellini/Lanotte (ITA)

DARK HORSE: Sinitsina/Katsalapov (RUS)

Ah, THIS is where it could get really interesting. It’s the first GP of the season (or ever?) pitting the reigning French powerhouse against the once and future Canadian powerhouse. Virtue/Moir almost lost SkCAN to Chock/Bates on the relative weaknesses of their FD. My guess is that, rather than change up what they’re doing yet, they’re waiting to see how they measure up to Papa/Ciz before making adjustments (with Worlds in mind). Papz/Ciz outscored V/M in Paris so barring disaster, I think they’ll take NHK too.

The U.S. is represented this time by Cannuscio/McManus (aka CanMan) and Hawayek/Baker (don’t have a good nickname for them yet). Mid-pack is my guess for both of them.

This is the last GP event before the FINALS in a couple short weeks, so let’s enjoy it! See you on Twitter… and back here next week (with results/analysis on this one coming after results/analysis for Cup of China). 

2016 Trophee de France Post-Mortem: 2 more U.S. Medals & Medvedeva's FS: a Closer Look

Again, apologies for the delay but here is around 1000 words worth of Trophee de France in review…

LADIES:  Reigning World Champ Evgenia Medvedeva won by more than 20 points, despite falling on an element (either a 3Flip or 3Lutz) in the free skate, so that might give you an idea of just how dominant she continues to be in her sophomore year on the senior circuit… if you weren’t sure, that is. Speaking of Med’s FS—aka the 9/11 “tribute”—I’ve heard several different opinions (and I posted a survey about it on Twitter a few weeks ago). Some are intrigued by the choice; most are troubled by it, and a few are downright offended. My take is mixed: 1) given the prickly current state of affairs between the U.S. and Russia, I’m not sure a Russian skater depicting someone enduring one of America’s darkest days is going to be an easy sell anytime soon. 2) I don’t know how much Evgenia knew about 9/11 going into this season, nor do I know how much input she had (vs. her coach and choreographer) in doing this program in the first place. In short—she just turned 17, and I don’t think I can hold a 17 year-old young woman fully accountable for decisions like this. Having said all that… 3) The biggest problem I have with the program—aside from the infamous “phone call” at the end of the piece and the (dreaded) voiceover material that plays during her footwork sequence—is the fact that it IS a 17 year-old (from ANY country) doing this program.  When Julia Lipnitskaia did the Schindler’s List program, part of why it worked was because she was believable as The Girl in the Red Coat. But asking a teenager to take on the role of a grown woman, and all the emotions that might come with a horrific 9/11 realization? I think that’s asking too much. Even of an athlete as exceptional as Medvedeva.

OK, sermon over. What else happened at this Paris event a couple weeks ago?

With the ladies…

+  We discovered France’s Laurine Lecavelier, who was down in 31^st at 2016 Worlds but finished a surprising 6^th here (after 11^th and 12^th place finishes the past 2 years). We also discovered that while you CAN wear a convertible costume for your free skate… it doesn’t mean you SHOULD… for Lecavelier skated her Grease FS squeaky clean until she turned from Sweet Sandy to Slutty Sandy (the part skated to “You’re the One that I Want”). Maybe that was the idea? That only Sweet Sandy= squeaky clean? Nah, probably not.

+  And unfortunately we also witnessed some new lows for two accomplished skaters: USA’s Gracie Gold toughed out her post-Worlds issues, came in 8^th (her lowest finish in five years on the GP circuit)…and Japan’s Mao Asada toughed out what we’ve since learned are continuing knee issues (she apparently didn’t want to talk about it much with the press, for fear it would sound like she was making excuses) to do mostly double jumps en route to 9^th place… her lowest finish in—GASP—11 years on the circuit. With no GP Final in sight for these two, hopefully both will have the time they clearly need to prep for their respective Nationals (late December for Asada; late January for Gold).

MEN:  I know the big news was either back-to-back GP wins for Javier Fernandez—who is gunning for his first-ever GP Final title—or the halfway-to-spectacular GP debut of USA’s Nathan Chen (record-breaking quad-riffic SP; somewhat subpar FS that killed his podium chances). But for some of you (and me for sure), I’ve heard the most exciting thing to come out of the Paris men’s event was back-to-back clean programs from Adam Rippon that included his first fully-rotated and landed quad in competition. I think Adam’s hard-fought-and-won National title infused him with the same sort of confidence we’re now seeing in World Bronze Medalist Anna Pogorilaya—that “you ain’t seen nothin’ yet” vibe that, in Adam’s case, has so far resulted in his most exciting programs—and best finishes—to date. And there are a LOT of great programs in his scrapbook. Whether he adds the GP Final to his accomplishments depends entirely on NHK results this coming weekend; Yuzuru Hanyu and Jason Brown are the two most likely to advance if they finish on the podium—but something tells me Adam will continue to do well either way.

DANCE: Reigning World Champs Gabriella Papadakis/Guillaume Cizeron made their GP debut on home ice and it was every bit as splendid as you might expect, earning them the highest marks (both in SD and FD) of any GP debut this season. USA’s Madison Hubbell/Zachary Donohue took a distant 2^nd (nearly 20 points behind); both Hub/Don and Canada’s Piper Gilles/Paul Poirier were able to gain some ground over Russia’s Elena Ilinykh /Ruslan Zhiganshin when a non-element fall on Elena’s part kept their FD score from improving on their SkAM FD score.

PAIRS: Aliona Savchenko/Bruno Massot made like Javier and earned back-to-back golds (here and the previous week at Rostelecom). Unlike Javi, they took an injury in the process—Aliona strained ligaments in her ankle with their attempt at a throw 3axel—and last I heard they’d already planned to skip the GP Final to rehab it properly.

But again, the real story of the pairs event for me was another team entirely… France’s own Vanessa James/Morgan Cipres finally won their first GP medal in 6 years on the circuit! (OK, technically they won their first medal at this event a year ago, but as you probably recall the event was rewarded on SP only due to the terrorist attacks in Paris causing the rest of the competition to be cancelled. Methinks this time around was slightly more rewarding.)

State of the 2016 Cup of China: ALL predictions!

Since Cup of China runs overnight/early morning for U.S. audiences, I’m posting predictions for all four disciplines at once this time.

Here is that (hopefully helpful) ISU link I like to post…

I plan to join the Twitterverse starting with men’s SP at 6:05AM Friday!  

DANCE…

GOLD: Shibutanis (USA)

SILVER: Weaver/Poje (CAN)

BRONZE: Stepanova/Bukin (RUS)

DARK HORSE: Sinitsina/Katsalapov (RUS)

The Shibs drew first to skate in the SD, while Wea/Po and Sinit/Kat are the final two teams. All things being equal, that might cause the Shibs to score closer to 70 and Wea/Po to score 73— which are the “opposites” of their previous GP SD scores this season (Shibs had 73.04; Wea/Po had 69.81). However it turns out, I still think the U.S. Champs will beat out the Canadian Champs in the end of this one. After that, and the battle for which Russian team will get to the podium—I’ve got S/K as the Dark Horse because I haven’t seen them at all yet this season— the placement of the rest of the field is pretty incidental to me. (But if Cannuscio/McManus of the U.S. can secure a top 5 finish that would be pretty sweet.)

LADIES…

GOLD: Elena Radionova (RUS)

SILVER: Ashley Wagner (USA)

BRONZE: Kaetlyn Osmond (CAN)

DARK HORSE: Elizaveta Tuktamysheva (RUS) or Mai Mihara (JPN)

Lots of interesting names in this field, which is why I’m allowing myself two dark horse options. Although I prefer Wag’s skating to Radio’s, and think she’s quite capable of the victory here, I’m going with Radio… by the point spread of a 3Lutz/3Toe to a 3Flip/3Toe and a few over-the-top emotional deliveries. If Osmond can keep her mega-powered jumps under control, I think a medal is easily within her grasp. But if not, be on the lookout for Tuktamysheva or Mihara. If both of them falter? Eyes to Courtney Hicks or home country fave Li Zijun, both of which did very respectably at Rostelecom a couple weeks ago.

MEN…

GOLD: Patrick Chan (CAN)

SILVER: Jin Boyang  (CHN)

BRONZE: Sergei Voronov (RUS)

DARK HORSE: Alexander Petrov (RUS)

So there’s Chan for the win, and, um… gee, let’s see, who else?

Well… you’ve got Max Aaron and Michal Brezina, but both of them have unreliable quad salchows of late. You’ve got teenagers Daniel Samohin and Alexander Petrov, and they’re exactly that—(undercooked, inconsistent) teenagers. You’ve got Jin… another teenager, but this one’s out to prove he doesn’t understand this “sophomore slump” thing everyone’s been talking about since SkAM. And finally, you’ve got Voronov, who’s been skating remarkably clean this season. But he can’t possibly keep that up… can he?

PAIRS…

GOLD: Yu/Zhang (CHN)

SILVER: Peng/Jin (CHN)

BRONZE: Wang/Wang (CHN)

DARK HORSE: Ilyuschina/Moscovitch (RUS)

A Chinese sweep? Yep, I think it’s quite possible. We already know Yu/Zhang are pretty good, and Wang/Wang won two medals on the GP circuit a couple seasons ago. Peng/Jin are the flipside of that change-partners thing with Yu/Zhang, except P/J make their debut here.

If I’m wrong about this potential sweep, the first one I’ve got in line to upset the applecart is Ilyu/Mosco… but they’ll have to skate a lot cleaner than they did at Skate Canada in order to do so. 

2016 Rostelecom Cup Post-Mortem: 2 More U.S. Medals and a Ladies' Podium Sweep Goes Awry

I know this is turning up almost two weeks after Rostelecom took place, but between prep for an interview I recorded with The Skating Lesson last week (!) and more than a little anxiety/distraction following the elections (!!), I’ve fallen behind. But I’m a No-GP Event-Review-Left-Behind kind of girl, so here we go:

LADIES:

1)      It was one of the collectively cleanest sets of SPs I can ever remember seeing in a GP event. The only fall, as I recall, was a fluke-ish one just after the double axel in Elizabet Tursynbayeva’s program (and she happened to skate last)!

2)      And the free skates were going fairly well too… all the way until Julia Lipnitskaia did that waltz jump that made everyone watching say UH OH. You’ve probably seen what happened from there— another non-jump, followed by around three minutes and 15 seconds of a bewildered Julia drifting between coach Alexei Urmanov and the judges/referees while she/he/they tried to determine what would happen next. Which, ultimately, was Julia insisting on completing her program… gamely and in obvious pain (and a hard fall on a double axel surely didn’t help). Here’s all I really want to say about this: Please, ISU, make a rule that if a skater has to stop a program due to illness or injury, the program music will not be re-started unless and until the COACH (not the skater) gives the signal to do so.

As British Eurosport commentators said at the time (paraphrased) about her (apparently supported) decision to continue: “She’s 18. Alexei Urmonov is not. He should know better.” Indeed.

3)      So Lipnitskaia finished dead last, and USA’s Courtney Hicks (who had already done well enough to leapfrog two skaters to move from 6^th to a probably 4^th place finish) claimed bronze. As Hicks herself said via Twitter, it wasn’t the way she wanted to end up on the podium. But the good news is that she skated quite well in both phases of the event (yes she was 6^th after the SP but it was due to extremely tough competition, not any major errors on her part). And Hicks received two GP assignments—she’ll be at Cup of China—so while the competition there promises to be quite tight as well, she’ll get a second chance at the GP podium (unlike Mariah Bell, who despite her excellent showing at SkAM was passed over for an NHK spot when Polina Edwards had to withdraw due to injury).

4)      And as for Anna Pogorilaya—who also did back-to-back clean programs and easily won the event—there’s something I said about her on Twitter that others seemed to agree with: It's like she won World bronze she said "wait! If I can get this after the season I've had, I can get gold" & got to work right away. Honest to goodness this is a night & day difference from this time last year (except last year she wasn’t even one of the three Russian women invited to compete).

MEN:

1)      While I’m proposing rules about coach-only music restarts, here’s another proposal: If a competitor is bleeding for any reason, cut their music. It’s rare (unless you’re pairs World Champ Meagan Duhamel, who has actually encountered this twice that I recall), but it does happen, sometimes in the form of a bloody nose as it did with Sweden’s Alexander Majorov at Rostelecom. Whatever triggered his—it seemed to start after he took a fall on his opening quad toe, though the fall didn’t look to affect his face in any way—it continued for the rest of the program, making for a long and uncomfortable 4 minutes as Majorov became clearly distracted and the rest of us became mindful of the possibility of bodily fluids on the ice. He did, however, manage to do most of his final footwork sequence while pinching his nose with one hand… does IJS have a component score for that??  

2)      Former U.S. men’s champ Max Aaron didn’t fare too badly in Moscow—rebounding from an 8^th place SP to finish 4^th in the FS and 5^th overall—but something that I found myself asking as he struggled through that Nessum Dorma short program was “Why do I feel like we’ve been looking at the same SP for Max since 2003?” Answer—because we’ve been looking at it since early 2015 (when he replaced “Footloose” with ND for Worlds), and nearly three years in SP Time feels like approximately 12 years in real time. Please, Coach Tom Z, give Max an SP reboot in time for Nationals!

3)      A fascinating story to keep watching, particularly if he makes it to Pyeongchang in 2018, is that of Israel’s Alexei Bychenko… simply stated, Rostelecom provided him one of the best competitions he’s ever had at this level (Personal Bests all over the place, and a Bronze medal to boot)… with the possible exception of Euros earlier this year, at which he earned silver. This from a man who didn’t even qualify for the FS at Worlds in his first two attempts (2012-13). This from a man who was 21^st at the Sochi Olympics, and last place at Skate America as recently as last year. This from a man who will be 29 years old in February! Let’s watch him at his other GP assignment (NHK) and see if he can stay consistent enough to be considered a serious threat to crack Worlds Top 10 this year.

Since this is coming so late, I’m again going to skip over the Pairs and Dance disciplines of 2016 Rostelecom… EXCEPT to say

1)      Savchenko/Massot won here, but Savchenko damaged ligaments in her ankle on a throw 3ax at Trophee de France (one week later). So despite a win in Paris as well, they’ve already opted out of the GP Finals for which they easily qualified.

2)      Both Bobrova/Soloviev and Chock/Bates qualified for the Final with respective gold and silver wins here. I picked C/B to win, but an egregious error on Bates’ part in the FD (with the twizzles) combined with remarkably higher scores all around for Bob/Solo (compared to SkAM). Weaver/Poje made their season GP debut here and got bronze; their 2^nd run at gold will pit them against the Shib Sibs at Cup of China.

Speaking of which… CoC predictions, which I’ll be posting late Thursday night so that everything’s up in time for the SPs. Those will begin with Short Dance at 2:30 AM (ET) in the wee small hours of Friday morning. 

State of the 2016 Trophee de France: Men and Ladies Predictions

OKAY… single skating time at Trophee de France!

MEN

GOLD:  Javier Fernandez (ESP)

SILVER: Nathan Chen (USA)

BRONZE: Adam Rippon (USA)

DARK HORSE: Takahito Mura (JPN) or Denis Ten (KAZ)

In this week’s quad battle, the most noteworthy soldiers are a veteran (25 year-old Fernandez) and a newcomer to the senior GP (17 year-old Chen). If nerves don’t get to Chen (have they ever?) AND he’s fully recovered from surgery (I assume yes if he’s here??), I think he’ll be a fine runner-up… so long as Javi doesn’t get sloppy.

Interesting times for Adam… Friday is his 27^th birthday I believe… and as he flew over to France for this event (during Election Day in the U.S. according to his Twitter feed), he surely was affected by the news that a man who is not held in high regard by the LGBTQ community (to say the least, and to say absolutely nothing of his moreso running mate) was just elected president. Will it be business as usual this weekend for our current U.S. champ? I hope so because his programs this season are marvelous in a whole different way than they were last year.

I have two DH’s here because Mura was a real study in hot & cold at his last event (great SP, forgettable FS) but the odds are in his favor at GP events I think… while Ten has gotta be everyone’s favorite GP wild card by now, right? So long as he’s not skating injured… I haven’t heard much about him lately. Anyone know?

And if ANY of the men I’ve mentioned falter, I hope Misha Ge can crack the top 5 at least. (But again, I think he’s battling injury…)

LADIES

GOLD:  Evgenia Medvedeva (RUS)

SILVER: Wakaba Higuchi (JPN)

BRONZE: Maria Sotskova (RUS)

DARK HORSE: Gabrielle Daleman (CAN)

I’m not a fan of her free skate at this point, as I’ve stated, but if she skates anywhere close to the way she did at SkCAN Medvedeva’s looking at yet another victory. Her closest competition, in my estimation, is Higuchi (who won Lombardia Trophy already this year and was 2^nd at Japan Nats) and Sotskova (who won Nepela Memorial already this year and was 5^th at Russian Nats).

I’ve no idea how Gracie Gold is doing a mere 3 weeks past SkAM’s reality check, but I think a top-5 finish at this point would be just fine.

Daleman I have for DH because she’s “got the goods”, if she can deliver them.

NOTE: Look for a belated Rostelecom Review over the weekend!

State of the 2016 Trophee de France: Pairs & Dance Predictions

As the 2016 Grand Prix of Figure Skating makes its way around the world, Trophee de France—the Competition Formerly Known as Trophee Eric Bompard—will get underway a few hours later in the day (on Eastern Time, anyway) than Rostelecom Cup did last week. 9:40AM ET is the start time; here’s an IFS link to all the rest you need to know…

  

Aaaand here we go with predictions!

GOLD:  Savchenko/Massot (GER)

SILVER: Zabijako/Enbert (RUS)

BRONZE: Tarasova/Morozov (RUS)

DARK HORSE: James/Cipres (FRA)

It might sound like a rerun of Rostelecom last week, but Sav/Mass are back and so are Zab/En. The difference is that I’m not underestimating the latter this week! As for Tara/Moro… elements aside, their SP is delightful (my daughter’s dance company utilized the same music last season so I’m quite familiar with it), but their FS leaves something to be desired. Upon hearing it at SkAM a few weeks ago, I thought it kind of sounded like the quasi-hip theme song to a 1970s family drama that I somehow never managed to see. So I looked it up, and… yikes, I wasn’t too far off (except for the TV part): the song Tara/Moro use is actually a pop ballad called “Music”, which was a #3 hit in the UK for an artist named John Miles back in 1976. So those of you overseas who’ve heard of it, or even remember it from your youth if you’re from my generation and are wondering what my deal is… I should tell you that “Music” apparently stalled out on the U.S. pop charts at #88, effectively keeping it from becoming a radio hit over here.

So! Now that you know more about this “Music” than you ever cared to… I’ll add that I can’t quite fathom using it no matter how familiar you are with it. It’s like reaching for a box of processed cheese when you’re trying to spice up a meal—it just doesn’t work.

Having said all that, I know they’ve got more consistent elements but I’d love to see James/Cipres nail their stuff this time and get a medal—on home soil, no less.

DANCE

GOLD:  Papadakis/Cizeron (FRA)

SILVER: Gilles/Poirier (CAN)

BRONZE: Hubbell/Donohue (USA)

DARK HORSE: Ilinykh/Zhiganshin (RUS)

I should start this by saying that of this field of 10 ice dancing teams, I’ve only heard of exactly half of them—and four of those five are listed above! I haven’t taken the time yet to see if the rest are young (read: recent JGP grads), or mediocre semi-veterans, or simply new to this level of competition… so, who knows, maybe another Papa/Ciz –esque star team will be born this weekend. But for now I’ll stick with those I know: reigning World Champs for gold, recent SkCAN medalists for silver (I’m already cheered by the thought of seeing Disco Paul again in the SD), and recent SkAM medalists for bronze.

I’m going to list the five lesser-known teams below; hopefully I’ll have something to add about at least a few of them when I recap this event:

(NOTE: Tobias/Tkachenko of ISR is the 5^th of the 5 “known” teams above)

Viktoria Kavaliova/Yurii Bieliaiev  BEL

Cortney Mansour/Michal Ceska  CZE

Lorenza Alessandrini/Pierre Souquet  FRA

Marie-Jade Lauriault/Romain Le Gac FRA

Oleksandra Nazarova/Maxim Niktin  UKR

Men’s and Ladies predictions will be posted sometime before the guys get underway at 12:40 PM Eastern—and for those planning to watch Adam Rippon—he drew 1^st to skate, so be on time!

State of the Cup of Russia: 2016 Rostelecom Cup Predictions (Ladies/Pairs)

Here’s what I’ve got in mind for the LADIES and PAIRS at Rostelecom…

LADIES…

GOLD: Anna Pogorilaya (RUS)

SILVER: Elena Radionova (RUS)

BRONZE: Yuka Matsuda (JPN)

DARK HORSE: Julia Lipnitskaya (RUS)

Had I known I’d be putting Pogo’s name at the top of this list a year ago, one hand would’ve grabbed the other as if to say Whaaat aaare youuu doiiing??? But this is not the same young woman we saw a year ago. This Pogo wins World Bronze Medals and doesn’t fling herself down onto the ice every other jump. This Pogo is skating more maturely, and carrying more confidence, and I had trouble recognizing at Japan Open earlier in the season… really!

Unless she IS the same one, and I’m gravely mistaken. Then the gold goes to Radionova. (Who I haven’t seen/heard about AT ALL lately, so I’ve no idea what to expect.)

I did see Lipnitskaya compete earlier in the season (she won silver at the Ondrej Nepela Memorial), but then she scratched from SkAM due to “a recurring injury”… which is why I’m making her the Dark Horse here rather than my pick from bronze. Instead, I’m predicting Matsuda, the 18 year-old from Japan, as an outside choice for stopping a Russian podium sweep.

The lone U.S. representation in Ladies is Courtney Hicks; I expect to see her finish around 5^th or 6^th.

GOLD:  Savchenko/Massot (GER)

SILVER: Seguin/Bilodeau (CAN)

BRONZE: Astakhova/Rogonov (RUS)

DARK HORSE: Marchei/Hotarek (ITA)

Gold? Easy. Silver? Easy. Anything else for this field of eight… three teams of which I’ve never even heard… is almost a coin toss. But I’ll put in the bronze slot the Russian team that finished 5^th at SkAM, and give Marchei/Hotarek the DH role—even though they were a surprising 8^th of 8 at that same SkAM event. In any case, Sav/Mass’s throw/twist moves are sure to be the highlight of the event, with Seg/Bilo’s adorability coming in a admirable second. (NOTE: there are no U.S. pairs teams at Rosteleom.)