Yesterday was the pairs' free and ladies' qualifying. Tatmianina and Marinin of Russia took gold in pairs. Well, to start, I'd like to say congrats to Valerie Marcoux and Craig Buntin for a solid Worlds debut. Their free skate was quite strong, they had some glitches and the jumps and the twist, etc. but they skated with good energy and it was good to see. Great Spanish-inspired costume for Valerie, by the way. They finished in 9th.
I'm so proud of Langlois and Archetto. Patrice had ligament damage in his finger, and Anabelle was using brnad-new boots, but you couldn't tell. They skated their long program very well, hardly any mistakes. I love their Lawrence of Arabia music and choreography, I always love their programs. Great footwork towards the end. They were clearly robbed by the judges, I don't know what they were thinking, they got one 4.9 for presentation, ridiculous! I can't fathom how anyone sane could put Obertas and Slavnov ahead of L&A. O&S had bad choreogrpahy, no chemistry, bad music and costumes and there was no polish. I think even M&B should have been ahead of them. Oh well. What can you do. Next year hopefully we will have the code of points and this won't happen.
As for the other skates...Zagorska and Siudek were okay, not particularly inspiring, for a 6th place finish. Zhang and Zhang, who were 5th of China were quite good, I like them better than Pang and Tong, who won bronze. Petrova and Tikhonov never fail to put me to sleep with their lack of pizzaz, and I can't stand that ugly slouchy lift they do! But they got 4th. As I mentioned, Pang and Tong were 3rd, they are quite nice and musical, but again interesting judging...the 6.0 was too much. T&M won gold with a solid free skate. This is another team that I don't find particularly exciting, although I like them much better than P&T. Their music was nice, I believe it's the same as Plushenko's this year. It was a nice skate, but I don't think it was worthy of the 6.0 they got. But speaking of 6.0's, Shen and Zhao were the story of night. The came from 4th place in the short, to lay down a stunning free and rise up to take the silver. This team has completely transformed from the technically perfect but artistically challenged pair they once were. They are a true pair on the ice, and magical to watch. They showed what a real 6.0 is like, and got 10 for presentation. They deserved it. It's too bad they couldn't win, because that was the real gold medal skate. Oh well, congrats to T&M for gold.
Ladies qualifying...Sasha won her group, woo-hoo! Super pumped about that. Great to see her stepping it up. Shizuka Arakawa won the other group, which was also great to see. I love her Turandot music. Two surprises for me: Michelle Kwan stumbled in her skate, she popped one jump and fell on another. I guess it was because she hadn't skated much this year...but she was so incredible at US Nats! Oh well. She was 3rd in her group. But the shocker of the day for me was Grand Prix Champ Fumie Suguri...she is now tied for 15th! How did that happen??? I have no idea, they didn't show her...yikes. That's too bad, I had high hopes for her :(. For Canada, Joannie's tied for 9th and Jennifer tied for 11th. Overall a good start for Canada's ladies. And also, 16-year-old Miki Ando of Japan (who did a quad at Japanese Nats!) was 2nd in her group and is now tied for 3rd. Good stuff! Ladies' short is on Friday...*excited*... Men's free and OD goes today. Finally some ice dancing!
Meanwhile, in the BIG GAME (aren't they all big games now?) the Nuckers came out absolutely smokin' and hung on to beat LA 1-0. Great to see Cookie score in his first game on the BIg Line, and nice to see Malik jump up and get an assist. Dan Cloutier had a big effort in his first game back since injury, especially in the 3rd period. Kudos to May Day and Keaner for setting the physical tone in the 1st. It was an overall gritty and workmanlike effort by the boys, great to see! And Calgary beat Phoenix, and Dallas beat Edmonton in OT, grr....So the Nucks are still in 5th...and 3 points behind Colorado with 5 games left! Go Canucks Go!
Updated: Sunday, 28 March 2004 11:21 AM PST
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