Sunday, March 23 - Pairs Short Program Practice
The Pair from St. Petersburg
Group 3 was the first to take the ice.
Petrova and Tikhonov of Russia began with the unison stroking. The blades glide fast and legs moving in perfect sync. For their run-through, they did most of their short program except for the middle section. Elements achieved were the death spiral, spiral step sequence and double twist. In other parts of the practice session, they did a throw double jump, the double twist, star lift with the twist dismount and the combination spin: camel to sit change foot in sit.
Evgenia Shishkova and Vadim Naumov, the 1994 World champions, came from backstage and started talking to Tamara Moskvina. Vadim is the coach of the American pair, Kathryn Orscher and Garrett Lucash. Skaters, former skaters and coaches seem to be one big family with the way they all talk to each other.
Unfortunately, I didn't multitask enough to have notes for anyone else in this group and got no autographs from the others. We called Maria Petrova over to the autograph wall. I held down my pairs booklet with the cover photo of her and Alexei from the Europeans banquet that I had printed from online. She came over and reached for my booklet to sign first. She had a sweet smile. I was babbling something to her and trying to make sure both her and Alexei signed it, and she nodded to me. I couldn't find Alexei at first because he had started on the front row of the barricade signing autographs and was working his way around. He saw my booklet cover photo and said 'Nice picture' as he went on to sign it. I had wanted to see if I could get them to pose for a picture for me. But, Maria had already gone backstage, and Alexei said perhaps after they got changed.
Group 4 had full attendance today.
Anabelle Langlois and Patrice Archetto did a throw double. Then a double twist. They did side by side flying camels to sit spin, which was out of synch. They did the spiral step sequence.
Jacinthe Lariviere and Lenny Faustino skated to jazzy music. They did a throw double jump. The double twist. Then side by side double jumps with the partners out of sync on the timing of the jump landings.
Yuko Kawaguchi and Alexander Markuntsov of Japan were a team I was looking forward to seeing live. They are Tamara Moskvina's team and, to me, very promising. Yuko has a nice curly perm, a hairstyle that is becoming to her gentle face. They practiced the death spiral. They did a double twist that had a little trouble extending out on the glide of the exit. They did a lift.
Olga Boguslavska and Andrei Brovenko of Latvia did a double twist. They did a throw triple jump. The side by side spins were camels to sit change foot in the sit. The pair spin had good low positions, but was a bit slow.
After the group left the ice, I received the autographs of the spirited Anabelle Langlois and her partner, Patrice. I also got Lenny to sign next to where I had received Jacinthe's autograph the evening before. I liked to get the signature of the complete team in one place.
This was my first experience viewing Group 5.
Katerina Berankova and Otto Dlabola of the Czech Republic opened with a double twist. Their music has a heavy beat. They did a throw triple jump. They did a hand to hip lift where her legs change position in the air. They did a death spiral. Then a spiral step sequence. The ending pose is to the pulsating heartbeats in the music track.
Rena Inoue and John Baldwin, Jr. of the U.S.A. started with a double twist. They did side by side double jumps. They did a throw jump. They did a hand to hip lift. The side by side flying camels to sit spin had interesting positions at the end. They did a double spiral, which is a pair move I really like. They continued the spiral step sequence. The pair combination spin led into the final pose, which is Rena dipped backward over John's knee.
Kathryn Orscher and Garrett Lucash, also of the U.S.A., opened with a double twist. They did side by side jumps. The spiral step sequence was slow and had shaky positions and transitions. Then the death spiral. The combination spin had low positions.
Tiffany Scott and Philip Dulebohn complete the U.S. trio. They began with side by side triples. They did a hand to hip lift. They did a throw double jump. The double twist is not so smooth on the glide at the exit. Then the spiral step sequence. They did side by side spins. Then, the combination spin and death spiral. Good speed here, and they appear a little better live so far than on TV.
Lyla had gifts for Tiffany and Philip that she gave to Philip since Tiffany was backstage. He was very grateful and chatted with her for a bit.
Katerina and Otto came off the ice all smiles as they signed autographs. She is lovely in person and had a nice hairstyle: hair braided for a few inches in the front into an upsweep style.
I skipped Groups 1 and 2 of the pairs practice to go over and catch the end of the ice dance practice that was going on simultaneously at the Convention Center. It would also give me a nice break from sitting for so long in the same spot without getting up. I had not gotten up earlier that day for any breaks because I had anxiety about losing my spot seated next to the autograph wall. The few blocks walk would give me a reprieve from the monotony of sitting. As soon as I exited MCI Center and got to the corner of 'F' and 7th Street next to the Metro station opening, I walked right past Jeff Buttle who had just crossed the street. He must have been on the way to the Men free skate practice. He looked focused into where he was going. One block later, I was crossing the street in front of the McDonalds and saw a man who looked awfully like commentator Peter Carruthers. He was walking along the path toward the MCI Center. If it wasn't him, it was a close match.
Previous
Next
Reports
Home