Figure Skating in Harlem or Dancing with the Stars?

The annual Figure Skating in Harlem event took place on April 5th - here's what Ice Network had to say about it:

It's an annual event where stars and fans meet, greet and skate under the stars (hopefully no rain this year) at Wollman Rink in New York's Central Park. This year, Figure Skating in Harlem (FSH), an organization that provides innovative ice skating and educational programming for girls ages 6-18 from the Harlem community, will honor three women who share a commitment to kids.

From the skating world, FSH has chosen Kristi Yamaguchi, who founded the Always Dream Foundation around the same time FSH came into being. On Jan. 16, the foundation celebrated the official opening of the Always Dream Play Park in Yamaguchi's hometown of Freemont, Calif. It's a place where physically challenged and able-bodied kids can play side by side.

And it seems the Stars on Ice tour bus took a pit stop in Central Park, because a lot of familiar faces pitched up to support FSH:






Also present from the skating world was Dorothy Hamill, Charlie White, Mirai Nagasu, Ben Agosto and Sasha Cohen. Donald Trump, Tamara Tunie and Christopher Meloni also attended the benefit due to their work with the cause.

One FSH regular who wasn't able to attend was Evan Lysacek, due to his commitments to Dancing with the Stars. He topped the leaderboard this week with his Quickstep:



But one person who isn't too interested in Evan's footwork? Johnny Weir, NY Mag is reporting:

"Evan is fine as a person. We've been competitors for years and years and years and that's kinda the forefront to us being people to each other," Weir said. "I think he worked very hard and he deserved that Olympic gold medal and he does a good job. He does his work. But as a person I don't really know him that well and we've never really made the effort to be nice to each other." But surely he must at least watch Lysacek on Dancing With the Stars? "No," Weir said. "And I won't."

Ouch! But who'd expect anything less from Johnny?

Post-Season Slump

Post-season slump is inevitable, especially after the Olympic season, so to combat this Ice Addiction is look back over the 2009-2010 season, and setting a sort of skating questionnaire, asking for some of your favourites over the season. Here are the questions:

Favourite Mens Short Program -
Favourite Mens Long Program -
Favourite Ladies Short Program -
Favourite Ladies Long Program -
Favourite Pairs Short Program -
Favourite Pairs Long Program -
Favourite OD -
Favourite FD -
Favourite Breakout Star of the Season -
Heartbreak of the Season -
Skater(s) You'd Most Like to See Saved From Their Imminent Retirement -
Skater You'd Never Like to See Again! -
Best Tweeter of the Season -

...and here are my answers! Remember, this is totally all for fun, and I've done my answers not on the best score of the season, or the most talented skaters, but on the performances and people I personally adore. I'm sure that there are some stars I've missed. Basically, answers from the heart and not the head!

Favourite Mens Short Program - Jeremy Abbott's "A Day in the Life" Choreographical masterpiece! Honourable Mentions: Weir, Takahashi, Rippon, Lambiel

Favourite Mens Long Program - This was a much stronger season for short programs, I thought. But Oda, Kozuka and Joubert all get mentions from me.

Favourite Ladies Short Program - Mirai Nagasu's "Pirates of the Caribbean"

Favourite Ladies Long Program - Joannie Rochette - "Sampson and Delilah" Honourable Mention - Yu-na Kim

Favourite Pairs Short Program - Evora and Ladwig's "Love Actually". Really embodied the Olympic spirit. Honourable Mention - Shen and Zhao, Denney and Barratt

Favourite Pairs Long Program - Pang and Tong's "Impossible Dream" Honourable Mentions - Savchenko and Szolkowy, Dube and Davison

Favourite OD - Virtue/Moir and Davis/White. How could you choose between the two?

Favourite FD - Again, I could never pick between V/M and D/W. Honourable Mentions - Cappellini/Lanotte

Breakout Star of the Season - Michal Brezina. I am so hoping he maximises his potential and becomes the star that he deserves to be!

Heartbreak of the Season - Joannie Rochette, of course. Honourable (or not so) Mentions - Tomas Verner and his disaster of a season, Novitski's retirement, Joubert and Abbott's Olympics

Skater(s) You'd Most Like to See Saved From Their Imminant Retirement - Belbin and Agosto - so, so fantastic. Honourable Mentions - Lambiel, Weir

Skater You'd Never Like to See Again! - Sorry, Plushy, but my votes for you!

Best Tweeter of the Season - Has to be Jeremy Abbott! He has been hilarious to follow all year. Honourable Mentions - The entire Team USA, they all seem to be on there!

...and there you have it! Answers in the comments please - I'd be interested to know how your opinions differ.

No more Weir

Despite his promises of being in Torino, Johnny Weir joins his teammates Lysacek and Belbin/Agosto in skipping Worlds. Not really a suprise, judging by how many TV appearances and interviews he's been doing; no time for training when you've got Oscar parties to go to. Adam Rippon takes his place - who else is excited to see the Rippon Lutz once more this season?

Over and out

So the last medal has been decided! Yu-na could not be a more deserving champion. What a performance! Between her and Mirai, Rachael, Mao's triple axels and of course Joannie, it was quite a competition. Thoughts and analysis potentially coming soon...and now just got the gala to look forward to!

Speaking of looking forward to (Worlds), Tanith Belbin and Ben Agosto have announced that they're joining Lysacek and skipping Torino. This means that the Olympics was probably Tanith and Ben's last competition; we'll miss them!

Vancouver 2010; over halfway through!

So mens and pairs medals have been given out (my comments on which will come in a giant round-up post after all the events are over)but there is still a drama bubbling between Plushenko and Lysacek. Here are a few articles about Lysacek, Plushenko and the aftermath:

IOC President says Plushenko's behavior only an expression of disappointment - Philip Hersh, Chicago Tribune

The night they killed figure skating - Elvis Stojko, Yahoo! Sports

Timothy Goebel responds to Elvis Stojko’s Rant - Timothy Goebel/Jocelyn Jane Cox, Current Skate of Mind

How Evan Lysacek got ready to win gold - Emma Rosenblum, NY Mag

Lysacek waves off criticism from Russian Federation - Amy Rosewater, Ice Network

Plus the compulsory dance happened last night. Whilst I still wish it had been the Golden Waltz instead, I still loved it! Full results are here. I'm going to call who I want to win right now, and get it out there; Virtue and Moir. Here's hoping! However, thought any of the top teams would be deserving of it after watching those CDs; Davis/White, Belbin/Agosto and of course Domnina/Shabalin really brought it! Original dance is tonight - check out Twitter for updates, live as they happen.

The Tango Romantica for Dummies

Another post to feed on that Olympic fever; some comparisons of the compulsories! I haven't got every top team on here (Belbin and Agosto haven't competeted the Tango Romantica yet, for example) but there's enough that you can watch and make a comparison. Ignoring the possibility of disasters, who do you think will take gold after the CDs?

Important Things to Remember; What the ISU Communication on judging the Tango Romantica Says

Skating Skills
Ice coverage without visible pushing; cleanness and sureness of steps; strongly curved well rounded lobes; lobe to lobe transitions well controlled; controlled body weight changes; light knee action; clean, tight, crisp footwork.

Performance
Perfect vertical and horizontal unison; good carriage and style; controlled body action;nicely matched free legs; balance in performance between partners.

Interpretation
Expression of the typical changes between the soft and strong character of the rhythm, relationship between partners reflecting the lyrical mood of this Tango. Well-defined and strong edges should be skated with a lot of character using good knee action, tight ,clean footwork with matching free leg movements. For good presentation and interpretation the body style and movements should reflect Tango rhythm.

Timing
Very precise and crisp timing, exact beat value for each step, sometimes syncopated to bring out the Tango character.

Here are some of the key players in the medal race performing their Tango Romanticas this season.

Tessa Virtue/Scott Moir



Oksana Domnina/Maxim Shabalin



Meryl Davis/Charlie White




Federica Faiella/Massimo Scali




Anna Cappellini/Luca Lanotte




Jana Khokhlova/Sergei Novitski




Nathalie Pechalat/Fabian Bourzat




Isabelle Delobel/Olivier Schoenfelder (from the 2006 Europeans, embedding is disabled on this video, annoyingly!)

I've also decided, as a point of comparions, to add in some of the best performances of the Tango Romantica from the past few years as a point of comparison.

Jayne Torvill/Christopher Dean



Oksana Grishuk/Evengy Platov




Marina Anissina/Gwendal Peizerat



So there you have it; everything you need to know about the Tango Romantica! Hope it was helpful.

Bloggers - Being Respectful?

Aaron from Axels, Loops and Spins wrote a great post about the snarking and bashing that happens on a lot of figure skating forums. But what about it coming from actual bloggers themselves? Phil Hersh has long been attacked for his Chicago Tribune articles, but I felt this one really took the biscuit. He did a question and answer session (of questions he made up himself!) Notable quotations include:

"Czisny and Kostner would clean so much of the ice with their bottoms the resurfacing job would be much easier."

"Yuna Kim could stand still for four minutes, and she still would deserve higher component scores than Rochette at her best."

"There is everything to like about Belbin-Agosto and Davis-White as people and performers. And performers is the key thing, because that is all ice dance is about. It's all in the eye of the beholder -- great entertainment, archly camp at times, incredibly hard to do well...and no more a sport than ballet."

Now, I don't know about you, but as a blogger I would never say things like that about skaters. People might argue about how high Rochette's PCS scores are, but to say that about her is clearly not true, and Hersh knows that - in his attempts to make an entertaining, controversial blog post he is merely putting down skaters who do not deserve criticism like that. Bloggers are allowed to question, of course they are, that's our job. But flat out put skaters down? I think not.

Furthermore, I'm not a professional blogger; I get no money for this, I just do it for fun! But Hersh is EMPLOYED by the Chicago Tribune, as well as other publications to write about skating, and so has an obligation to write fairly and honestly, I feel. I hardly have to mention how his writing skills are not reflective of his professional blogging position; at one point he says Rochette got Level 2s "on all three of her four spins".

I should add, this is not a personal attack on Hersh. I don't mean this in an offensive way, as I am merely questioning his post and opinions. He has some good points in his post as well, and attempts to apologise to Jenny Kirk after criticising a very excellent post she made about Cohen's Grand Prix withdrawals (with limited success!)

Do you agree with what I'm saying about Hersh's post? Judging by the comments at the bottom of his article, many others are outraged/exasperated/amused at his post. Or do you think this post is just giving him a wider audience, and catering to his controversial style of blogging?

NHK Trophy - Final Results

So here's the full results from NHK Trophy, and my comments on each event.

Ladies

1 Miki ANDO JPN
162.55 2 2
2 Alena LEONOVA RUS
160.85 5 1
3 Ashley WAGNER USA
155.99 1 3
4 Yukari NAKANO JPN
152.35 3 5
5 Laura LEPISTO FIN
152.19 4 4
6 Cynthia PHANEUF CAN
142.03 7 6
7 Yan LIU CHN
126.49 6 10
8 Annette DYTRT GER
126.01 9 9
9 Oksana GOZEVA RUS
123.97 11 7
10 Shoko ISHIKAWA JPN
119.63 10 11
11 Becky BERESWILL USA
118.42 12 8
WD Sarah MEIER SUI
8

This event shows, to me, some of the weaknesses with the current judging system; how can a skater come second in both the short and long and win overall? I know why it happens, and that it makes sense, but still it confuses me! Anyway, that is what happened with Miki Ando at this event. Ladies have been so erratic and unpredictable over the past Grand Prix events, and I’m sure Skate America will be the same way, what with the supposed return of Sasha Cohen. Despite rumours, she has yet to withdraw. Leonova, despite some errors overall, seems to be cementing her place as one of these “one to watch for 2014” skaters.

Mens

1 Brian JOUBERT FRA
232.70 1 1
2 Johnny WEIR USA
217.70 3 3
3 Michal BREZINA CZE
217.48 6 2
4 Daisuke TAKAHASHI JPN
214.29 4 4
5 Jeremy ABBOTT USA
208.45 2 6
6 Adam RIPPON USA
197.61 8 5
7 Takahiko KOZUKA JPN
186.00 5 10
8 Artem BORODULIN RUS
181.62 7 9
9 Daisuke MURAKAMI JPN
181.04 9 8
10 Jeremy TEN CAN
178.87 12 7
11 Vaughn CHIPEUR CAN
176.36 10 12
12 Kristoffer BERNTSSON SWE
176.01 11 11

Speaking of ones to watch for 2014…for me, this event was all about Michal Brezina. Most people had never heard of him before this event, but he had the only clean long program of the whole event and performed his Gershwin routine really well. His jumps are also amazingly high. It was interesting to contrast his skate with Rippon, whose is definitely considered the other male skater with great things ahead. Unlike Trophee Eric Bompard, he didn’t do too well here, which was a shame. Similarly, Abbott had a bit of a disaster of a free skate; however, as he dryly noted in the Kiss and Cry, at least he didn’t peak too early in the season! The one American man who didn’t underperform was Johnny Weir, who had a great long program, save for the triple loop which didn’t get off the ground. He came into second place, which was great, after Joubert. Joubert skated last and so decided to play it safe after all the disasters of the previous skaters – he didn’t even do a triple-triple combination, but he nailed the quad toeloop, and narrowly missed a fall on the triple axel. Critics have been complaining about his short program win over Abbott, but I think Joubert’s overall win at this event was very much deserved. The other skater who has to be mentioned is Daisuke Takahashi, ending the reign of successful comebacks that we’ve seen so far in this Grand Prix season. He had a number of falls, and I worry that he isn’t properly recovered from those knee problems. His team mate Takahiko Kozuka also had a bit of a meltdown in the long program unfournately. This event probably had the strongest mens competition out of all the Grand Prixs, yet there were, arguably, some of the weakest performances.

Pairs

1 Qing PANG / Jian TONG CHN
199.65 2 1
2 Yuko KAVAGUTI / Alexander SMIRNOV RUS
193.05 1 2
3 Rena INOUE / John BALDWIN USA
158.78 4 3
4 Caydee DENNEY / Jeremy BARRETT USA
151.43 3 5
5 Mylene BRODEUR / John MATTATALL CAN
150.71 6 4
6 Ksenia KRASILNIKOVA / Konstantin BEZMATERNIKH RUS
137.49 5 6
7 Paige LAWRENCE / Rudi SWIEGERS CAN
130.77 7 7
8 Narumi TAKAHASHI / Mervin TRAN JPN
119.48 8 8

I didn’t get to see this event, but Yuko Kavaguti apparently had a horrible fall on the quad salchow, which meant they had to stop their program for a few minutes. This led to a 3 point deduction, putting them in second behind Pang and Tong. Inoue and Baldwin also had a fall on the throw triple axel, but still managed to pick up a bronze medal, which is a real achievement, though it’s a shame about the triple axel; it blew me away in Paris when she landed it!

Dance

1 Meryl DAVIS / Charlie WHITE USA
201.97 1 1 1
2 Sinead KERR / John KERR GBR
177.73 2 2 2
3 Vanessa CRONE / Paul POIRIER CAN
165.89 4 3 3
4 Ekaterina BOBROVA / Dmitri SOLOVIEV RUS
160.01 3 6 4
5 Xintong HUANG / Xun ZHENG CHN
154.90 6 5 5
6 Anna ZADOROZHNIUK / Sergei VERBILLO UKR
154.61 5 4 6
7 Cathy REED / Chris REED JPN
147.53 7 7 8
8 Allie HANN-MCCURDY / Michael CORENO CAN
145.32 9 8 7
9 Lucie MYSLIVECKOVA / Matej NOVAK CZE
142.33 8 9 9
10 Jane SUMMERSETT / Todd GILLES USA
130.24 10 10 10

…and Ice Dance continues its reign as the most predictable discipline in terms of results. Davis and White looked markedly improved from Rostelecom Cup, and they got a standing ovation for their free dance. Their lifts are really innovative, as are Belbin/Agosto’s and Virtue/Moir’s, which is going to make the Olympics SO exciting! The Kerrs also deserve a mention for getting their first silver medal at a Grand Prix, though they seem to be struggling technically, compared to some of the other couples; they were 10 points off their personal best and were pretty close to Crone and Poirier, which isn’t good news for them in what is almost definitely their last season. Crone and Poirier, however, did great; their free dance, some of which is set to Bohemian Rhapsody, really is a masterpiece. Now that event’s over we’re looking to Skate America; I can’t believe the penultimate Grand Prix is almost upon us! Expect a post of what to expect at the event coming soon.

Belbin and Agosto's Music

They published their music on their website:

2009-2010 Season
Compulsory Dance:Golden Waltz and Tango Romantica

Original Dance: Moldavian Folk Dance

Free Dance: Ave Maria (Caccini:Sumi Jo), Stabat Mater (Rossini)

Thoughts? I'm a fan of this version of Ave Maria (listen to it here) and I think Tanith and Ben can do a good job, judging by their Tosca piece last season. I listened to Stabat Mater on Youtube and thought it was really nice, though obviously it depends which section they use. This music seems to say "It's our time for the OGM" and personally I think they can do it!

For those of you who haven't been on Belbin and Agosto's website, I would say it's the best website of any senior figure skaters, so definitely have a look.

Alternative Careers For Skaters

Occasionally I think - what would certain skaters have excelled at if they hadn't been skaters? Some instantly spring to mind - for example, I think Kimmie Meissner's sweet personality would make for her being a great junior school teacher, weirdly.

The one career that many skaters would be great at is modelling, and a prime example of that is Tanith Belbin. She recently did a photo shoot with the fashion photographer Seth Sabal (who has shot models such as Miranda Kerr, better known as Orlando Bloom's girlfriend), and the rest of the pictures are up on her website here. The photos are fantastic, and she looks really gorgeous - the photos are very striking. Tanith actually Tweeted about the shoot:

pics from spring shoot up on our site.Don't be alarmed!I think they photoshopped about 20lbs off me!

Anyhow, she looks great. Follow Tanith on Twitter here and me here.

Music Clash

...is a new regular post I'm going to be doing. The concept is simple; I'll post two (or more) very different programs but with the same music, and you leave a comment to which you prefer.

Today, I'm talking about the Amelie soundtrack; personally, I believe the music to be just gorgeous.Many skaters have performed to the music, but I've just chosen two. Who skated to it better; Tanith Belbin and Ben Agosto or Sarah Meier?

My personal preference is for Meier; the delicate nature of the music perfectly suits her gentle and graceful style. I also felt the music reflected her personality somewhat better than it did for Belbin and Agosto; however, make up your own mind below.

Apologies and Updates

Apologies for the lack of recent updates; however much I try to ignore it, sometimes I am forced to give school priority over skating. In a few short weeks it'll all be over and I'll be back to giving you daily postings, even if there isn't any news because it's the off season. Speaking of which, the last competition of the season, the World Team Trophy, is about half way through, with both the mens and ice dance medals being decided.

In the mens division, the Worlds pretty much played out again as Brian Joubert took the lead over Evan Lysacek in the short, but Evan narrowly beat his in the long program. Patrick Chan didn't perform quite up to par, falling on the triple axel, yet still got very large scores. The final results looked as such:

1 Evan LYSACEK USA 238.56 2 1
2 Brian JOUBERT FRA 237.09 1 3
3 Nobunari ODA JPN 229.25 3 4
4 Patrick CHAN CAN 217.98 9 2
5 Jeremy ABBOTT USA 205.05 5 5
6 Vaughn CHIPEUR CAN 198.91 6 6
7 Sergei VORONOV RUS 196.70 4 8
8 Takahiko KOZUKA JPN 190.93 10 7
9 Jialiang WU CHN 183.86 8 10
10 Florent AMODIO FRA 182.32 7 11
11 Chao YANG CHN 177.94 11 9
12 Konstantin MENSHOV RUS 165.21 12 12

Here's hoping Kozuka and Abbott can pull it all together for next season; often it's all too easy to buckle under pressure, and if said pressure is taken off Jeremy next season then I'm sure he will perform a lot better than he has done in recent events.

In other events...in the ice dance, Belbin and Agosto win, with Virtue and Moir in second and a suprised Pechalat/Bourzat leagfrogging over a lacklustre Khokhlova/Novitski. Ever since their fantastic win at Worlds, they haven't quite managed to top that performance, which is a real shame as they have such talent and originality.

After the ladies SP, Mao Asada is in first with 13 points over Joannie Rochette, who double-footed a lutz in her usually stellar short program. Miki Ando is in third with exactly the same score as Rochette (62.08) with the two US ladies, Caroline Zhang and Rachael Flatt, in fourth and fifth respectively.
In pairs, Zhang/Zhang take first, with Kavaguti/Smirnov in second and the US newcomers Denney and Barrett in third. Dube and Davidson, the Canadians, are in fourth.

As for team standings currently:

1. United States of America
2. Canada
3. Japan
4. France
5. Russia
6. China

The pairs and ladies long programs are happening tomorrow; be sure to check in for the results. Alternatively, my Twitter account is updated far more regularly than the site, for obvious reasons, and can be subscribed to here.

In more celebrity-ish news, Nancy Kerrigan is going to be on I'm a Celebrity...Get Me Out Of Here!, whilst Johnny Weir's reality TV show, Be Good Johnny Weir, has been picked up by the Sundance Channel. If any skater would be entertaining enough to warrant a reality show, it's Johnny Weir, so I'm hopeful it'll make it's way to Youtube so the rest of the world can see Johnny in all his diva-ish glory. This'll obviously take a lot of the financial pressure that he must have on him, which cannot be a bad thing either.

Program of the Day

Program of the Day goes to Tanith Belbin and Benjamin Agosto, who have announced that they are fighting fit again and will be at the World Championships later this month.

Belbin and Agosto had to withdraw from this year's U.S. championships because he had a back injury. They petitioned for a place on the World team and were granted that wish with the provision that they prove their fitness before the competition, which begins March 22.

Belbin said by phone Friday the duo had performed for a panel of judges Thursday at their rink in Aston, Pa., and had no difficulties. She said they will perform again March 12 for a larger group that will include members of U.S. Figure Skating's international committee, and she's confident the final decision will affirm their readiness to compete at Staples Center.

I, for one, am absolutely delighted; it would have been awful for them to miss the Worlds, especially when they're being held in the US of A. Their free skate this season is also amazing, so I'm glad to get the opportunity to see it again, and see how they fare again the other contenders. Their free skate from last season's World Championships is today's POTD. Great interpretation of the music, and beautifully understated costumes. The opening lift is just incredible.