Michelle Kwan takes to the ice again

Michelle Kwan had been mentioning a comeback recently with little conviction, but this announcement will get people talking about it as a real possibility:

Five-time world champion Michelle Kwan will join Kim Yu-na at Ice All Stars 2009.

IB Sports, Kim's agency, announced Thursday that the American star figure skater has confirmed her participation in the ice show, scheduled to take place from Aug. 14 to 16 in Seoul.

It will be Kwan's first action since she quit the sport due to a hip injury in 2006.

All I have to say to this is...wow. This seems to be a literal message from Kwan that she is ready to get back on the ice and take on the best; I'll believe an actual competitive comeback when I see it but this seems like a logical starting point. Maybe she'll take that TBA spot at Skate America, maybe not. In my opinion, Kwan, as 9-time National champion, has "had her time"; her career was one of the most impressive of any skater in history, but I believe it will be difficult to her to keep up with the younger skaters, though inevitably Kwan has the dubious advantage of extensive experience on her side. However, I believe she should be pleased with her lot and give others, who have been solidly training and competing in the seasons up to these Olympics, their chance to shine.

I might not be pro a Kwan return but you can guarantee many other skating fans will. This is a show that fans will be stoked about, to say the least, - on internet forums many people seem to be prepared to fly from America just to see this, at obviously considerable expense!

Aside from Kwan's appearance, it's going to be a fanatastic show anyway:

American Evan Lysacek, Jeffrey Buttle of Canada and Switzerland's Stephane Lambiel, who have won each of the men's singles titles over the last four World Championships, will perform along with world silver medallist Joannie Rochette of Canada and Turin Olympic winner Shizuka Arakawa of Japan.

What are your thoughts? Comment below. Full article is available here.

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.

What Makes Your Favourites Your Favourites?

Somebody asked me the other day why I loved Brian Joubert with almost religious devotion. They argued that "There are better jumpers than him, far better spinners than him, skaters with better music choices, better artistic skills, better step sequences.." And so the list went on. So this made me begin to think; why do we (the obsessive skating fans) love our favourite skaters so much? Of course we initially chose it on their skating style and ability, but is there more to it than that?

For example, Brian Joubert, IMHO, is pretty attractive; does this affect my love of him, or would I be just as big a fan if he wasn't attractive at all. Is there some sense of patriotism? I love France, and have always have done, but I'm British, and so don't support Candice Didier, for example, in the same way I do Joubert.

After thinking it over, I came to the conclusion that it's the whole package, for want of a better cliche. Individually his skating style, the strength of his elements, his looks etc might not be perfect, but put it all together and in my eyes, he is.

I'm going to end this self-indulgent post by asking you who your favourites are and why. We'll be back to proper news posts tomorrow, I promise!

With Respect

....Program of the Day is what, in my opinion, was the best skating program set to the music of Michael Jackson. A number of skaters, including Emily Hughes and Ben Agosto have commented on his death on Twitter.

Rochette addresses Peru poverty

I think this has been slightly overlooked in the skating world and I'd like to draw attention to it - Joannie Rochette recently went to Peru for a week. She brought back some heart-wrenching stories:

Rochette said the one time she was overcome with emotion was when she met a single mother of three children who was so embarrassed by the state of her home that she didn't feel worthy of Rochette's visit.

"She took me in her arms and started to cry. That really touched me because that lady really wanted to make a good impression on me. Even if they don't have much, they give everything... It was hard to see this woman fighting through her life [to survive each day]," Rochette recalled.

The trip, as well as helping to draw attention to the issues that people in Peru have, helped Rochette get some perspective on her skating:

"There, just having food for their next meal is great and I complain when I fall on my triple Lutz, so just seeing that was really different," said Rochette, 23, who used one week of her planned three-week vacation from skating for the journey to Peru.

I think this was a fantastic thing for Rochette to do; in the build up to the Olympic season, it's easy to get wrapped up in your goals and your training. This trip obviously had positive effects for both Rochette and the communities she gives. As celebrities, albeit minor ones, go, skaters seem to be hugely altruistic.

Full article is avaliable here It also discusses her preparation for next season and her sponsors; was anyone else aware she was sponsored by Molson beer?! Alcohol and figure skating - doesn't seem like the most logical combination!

US Men - Update

Just a quick post to update you on Johnny Weir, Evan Lysacek and Jeremy Abbott.

EVan has a new journal up - it's pretty interesting, though littered with references to his many sponsors! You can read it here.

Johnny Weir has also posted a new jounral - his is longer and more personal, covering his emotions after his disaster at this year's Nationals all the way up until today. He also gives some hints about his music, which sounds...interesting to say the least! Read it here.

Jeremy Abbott has also released his music choices:

SP Music: A Day in the Life by The Beatles

LP Music: Jupiter from Gustav Holst's "The Planets Suite"

Also, on another note, Kristin Fraser and Igor Lukanin who represented Azerbaijan have retired, citing the impact on financial and physical pressure in skating.

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.

Skating vs School

There have been a number of skaters recently who had decided to sit out the upcoming season to devote themselves to their studies (Brittney Rizo, Katrina Hacker) as well as some who have prioritized skating over school (Emily Hughes). Many have, and continue, to manage both (Alissa Czisny). This poses a very interesting question - what should get priority? It's difficult to have a proper college experience if you're constantly training, and in the same way it's hard to train properly, especially when you get to National level or higher, if you're constantly having to catch up on assignments. So it's seems like a natural decision to take time off from school or work part-time/from home to get in the necessary amount of training. This technique has worked for a number of skaters; both Michelle Kwan and Sarah Hughes have recently achieved university degrees at 28 and 24 years old respectively.

However, does this all-to-simple conclusion actually hold a large number of drawbacks? By being at the rink whilst all their peers are at school, elite skaters are missing out on some valuable experiences, and some might say a proper childhood. Going to school is could be deemed too be necessary for them to have some sort of escape from the sport and to associate with people who aren't skaters.

Obviously it depends on a skaters' circumstances, but if you were an elite skater (or the parent of one) would you take the route of Hacker or Hughes? Personally I would be more inclined to do as Emily Hughes does; her attempts to balance skating and a full college course last season had very little success, and school will always be there in the future, whilst the probability of being a successful skater declines with age.

Image from people.com.

Hmmm...

You'll notice that since I've put the blog back up I haven't posted anything - this is because there has literally been no skating news! As soon as there is, you can guarantee you'll hear it here first. In the meantime, check out my Twitter:

www.twitter.com/kateletangerine

If you look down my friends' list, you'll find a huge number of elite skaters who twitter, including Tanith Belbin, Yu-Na Kim, Emily Hughes and Adam Rippon, so make sure you follow them, as some of their posts are fascinating.

I'm Back!

That's right, Ice Addiction's hiatus is over! And what skating news I've missed! I'm not going to cover it, as many of the other skating bloggers have covered all of the issues sufficiently, but I will be posting daily about all sorts of things, as skating doesn't stop in the off-season. First post coming up soon.

Good News and Bad News

The good news is that Sasha Cohen is returning to competitive figure skating! Check out Axels, Loops and Spins for the details.

The bad news is that this blog is going on a brief hiatus. With exams, I just can't post as often as I'd like to, but they'll be over in a month and we'll be back to daily updates. If you need to contact me in the meantime, email km-28@hotmail.com. Thanks!

Splitsville

At the end of every season, there's always some partnership break-ups, and this season is no exception. Firstly, Tiffany Vise and Derek Trent have ended their partnership;

After six years together, Tiffany Vise and Derek Trent have decided to end their competitive partnership.

Trent has chosen to retire from competition, while Vise has formed a new partnership with Don Baldwin. She will continue to train in Peoria, Ariz., under the tutelage of Jill Watson.

"We are thankful for the time and success we had as a team and will continue to support each other in the future," commented Trent. "We want to thank U.S. Figure Skating, our fans, coaches, families and friends for their wonderful support over the past years."

Also, somewhat more shocking, the French ice dance team Pernelle Carron and Matthieu Jost have ended their partnership, citing "incompatibilité d'humeur" or irreconcilable differences for the split. Carron has already found a new partner, Lloyd Jones, a young British skater whose previous partner, Danielle Bennett, skates at my rink! It's a small world in skating. Anyway, reports say that they almost broke up before Worlds; Matthieu is a father now and reported wants to concentrate on his family. Hopefully this will be a successful partnership; Jones has very little experience on the senior stage and so it'll be interesting to see how they fare next season.

Another skating baby....or two!

Within days of Isabelle Delobel announcing her pregnancy, it has come out that Tatiana Totmianina is pregnant with twins...and the father is Alexei Yagudin! Apparently they are engaged, and the babies are due to be born in around October/November. Congratulations to both of them!

In other news, the US has announced their Team Envelopes:

Team A
Ladies: Alissa Czisny, Rachael Flatt
Men: Jeremy Abbott, Evan Lysacek, Brandon Mroz, Johnny Weir
Pairs: Caydee Denney and Jeremy Barrett, Keauna McLaughlin and Rockne Brubaker
Dance: Tanith Belbin and Ben Agosto, Meryl Davis and Charlie White

Team B
Ladies: Becky Bereswill, Alexe Gilles, DeeDee Leng, Mirai Nagasu, Ashley Wagner, Caroline Zhang
Men: Ryan Bradley, Stephen Carriere, Richard Dornbush, Armin Mahbanoozadeh, Ross Miner, Adam Rippon
Pairs: Marissa Castelli and Simon Shnapir, Brooke Castile and Ben Okolski, Amanda Evora and Mark Ladwig, Rena Inoue and John Baldwin, Tracy Tanovich and Michael Chau
Dance: Madison Chock and Greg Zuerlein, Madison Hubbell and Keiffer Hubbell, Kim Navarro and Brent Bommentre, Emily Samuelson and Evan Bates, Maia Shibutani and Alex Shibutani

Team C and the rest of the press release can be read here.

Skating; going mainstream, one gossip blog at a time

Perez Hilton, the "Queen of All Media" whose infamous gossip site gets astronomical hits, just posted a version of Johnny Weir skating to Lady Gaga's "Pokerface". The program had previously been posted on both his site and this one, but it was a very low quality performance. Now, it is a much better quality video and really shows how great this program is. It's dramatic, dynamic and most of all a really fun routine. It's also great to see Johnny enjoying himself after what can only be described as a shocking and disappointing end to last season. It's not specified, but it's believed to be a performance from the current Festa on Ice show; as you'll see, the audience absolutely lap up the performance.

Weir making his way on to Perez Hilton's site with such a glowing review means good things for the sport; the more skating is publicised, the better the TV coverage will be, for example. This is what Perez posted:

It has finally been professionally filmed!!!
U.S. figure skater Johnny Weir just performed the most faboosh version of Lady GaGa's Poker Face at an ice show this past weekend.

The makeup! The outfit! The moves!

And he sold it.

Love. Love. Love!!!!!!

We know the Lady would approve.

Lysacek and the Lakers: Just a bunch of champions

Evan Lysacek will bve presenting the first ball at the LA Lakers game on Monday. It's fantastic that becoming world champion opens these doors for him.

Evan Lysacek and the Lakers practice in the same facility, the Toyota Center in El Segundo. They've won major titles as the result of their performances at Staples Center, where the Lakers won three NBA championships and Lysacek last month claimed the world figure skating championship.

So it makes sense for Lysacek, an Illinois native who has enthusiastically adopted Los Angeles as his home, to share the floor with the Lakers -- if only briefly -- before they resume their first-round playoff series against the Utah Jazz.

Lysacek will be introduced at the game Monday and will present the game ball for the opening tipoff, a well-deserved honor. It will also be a rare occasion when he's surrounded by athletes who are taller than he is: He's about 6 foot 1, extremely tall for a figure skater.