Cat's Lair 2002 Nationals Diary

Jan. 6-13, 2002

Cover Page

Day 1: 6-Jan-2002

• Novice Men Short (08-Jan-2002 03:01 AM)
• Novice Ladies Short (09-Jan-2002 10:18 PM)
• Novice Pairs Short (22-Jan-2002 01:11 AM)

2002 Sr. Ladies Free Skate

Ye Bin Mok

Skated to music called Wild Doves and wore a gray costume. She has amazing extension in her spins, and a very gentle, graceful quality to her skating. She did a triple lutz with great height, then she popped something. She did a triple salchow, a triple loop, and a triple/double combination. She landed a double axel, but then lost the landing edge and fell. She did another triple jump and fell on a triple salchow. Ninth in the free and tenth overall.

Patricia Mansfield

Skated to a medley of Braveheart and Lord of the Dance, wore a white dress with a green shirt. The last time Patricia skated at Nationals was the last Nationals I did NOT attend, 1995. Somehow despite what must have been a lot of discouraging expierences she kept plugging away, and working hard. And here she is back at Nationals after 7 years. I really admire her determination and spirit. She does a very cool layback spiral, she is kind of laying backwards in a spiral, I hope our pics of it come out so you can see what I am talking about. She did a single axel, then stepped out of a double axel. She did double loop then fell out of a triple salchow. She has very good speed and fast spins. She did two double jumps then a two footed a triple. But she kept on plugging away and ending with a triple/double combination and another triple. See what I mean about determination. Fifteenth in the free and sixteenth overall.

Molly Beth Quigley

Molly has always been pretty but she has grown into a strikingly gorgeous young woman. She has what I believe Joey on Friends would call a "great rack." Unfortunately while curves are a nice thing in a love interest in Friends it plays havoc with jumps. She wore pink and skated to Harvest Home Suite. She started out with a waxel, then did a triple loop and two footed a triple lutz. She did a very nice flying sit spin. She did a triple/double combination with a few extra turns between the jumps. She has a pretty layback spin and she moves very gracefully and very much to the music. She did a triple salchow/double toe combination, but fell out of the triple sal. She has very pretty spin positions and a great smile. She really looked as if she were enjoying herself out there and that made her program a lot of fun to watch. Fourteenth in the free and overall.

Stacey Pensgen

She wore blue and skated to Dr. Zhivago. She did a double lutz/double toe combination, another double jump and a double axel. She did a triple jump another triple jump , a double jump and a double lutz. It was only a double but it was off of an outside edge. She has a beautiful slide spiral. She was seventeenth in the free and seventeenth overall.

Joan Cristobal

Oh my goodness I have been watching her skate since she was about 11 or 12 in local competitions. Way back when she impressed me. And now here she is at her first senior nationals, that is so great. She wore purple and skated to Rachmaninoff's Third Piano Concerto. She did a triple salchow, a double jump that she two footed. She did a double/double combination, another double jump and a triple salchow/double toe combination. She did a double axel and another double jump. A very graceful skater I am afraid all those doubles cost her. She was thirteenth in the free and overall.

Christina Gordon

I haven't seen Christina since my very first Nationals when she was a novice skater. Again I am very impressed at her for continuing on skating despite a lot of disappointments. She wore red and skated to Indian Temple Ballet. She did a double lutz, fell out of a triple jump. She did a double jump, a double axel and then popped something. She has pretty spirals which are very fast. She did a double axel/double toe combination. She fell on a triple jump and popped something. Sixteenth in the free and fifteenth overall.

Alissia Czisny

Skated to Paganini. She stepped out of a triple lutz and fell on a triple salchow. She then did a triple jump and a flying sit spin. She has great extension and really stretches out when she flies into that spin. She did a Charlotte into a popped loop. She has a wonderful spiral. She popped another jump and did a layback/Bielman combination spin. She two footed a double axel and did a double lutz. She did great Russian splits, very high and very, very extended. She had a fabulous combination spin, great extension, positions and speed. She was definitely one of the best spinners in the competition, she might have been the best. She is also very graceful and musical. Eleventh in the free and eleventh overall.

Amber Corwin

Skated to After Hours. I thought she was seriously robbed, she should have been much higher in the short and in the free they punished her for something that was not her fault. She did a triple toe/triple toe combination, but fell on her first triple lutz. She did a triple loop/double toe and another triple jump. She did an Arabian split in her footwork sequence. Then at the exact moment she was digging her toe in for the second triple lutz, her music stopped. She fell and a few seconds later her music came back on. But clearly that sudden silence distracted her when she needed to concentrate on her skating. So she went over to the referee and got to do a reskate starting with that second triple lutz. As her music started and she headed into that lutz I thought, wow now there is even more pressure on her to land it. But she held up under the pressure and landed that lutz fine. She went on to do triple salchow and a double axel. So that is six clean triples, including the only triple/triple in the competition and she got tech marks of low 5's and two 4.9. Wow that is highway robbery! As always she had great musicality and presentation, really making a connection with the audience. But the judges royally rooked her. Eighth in the free and eighth overall.

Beatrisia Liang

Little Bibi skated to the music of Cirque De Soleil. That music really doesn't suit her, being far too overpowering for such a graceful, little skater. She did a triple lutz/double toe and a triple/triple with a fall on the second triple. She had good height on her flying sit spin. She did another triple jump and fell on a triple loop. She did a triple salchow/double toe combination and popped another jump. She did a well extended split jump into a triple jump and fell on a double axel. I think a much better choice of music for sweet little Bibi will be found in the next paragraph. Tenth in the free and ninth overall.

Sara Wheat

She skated to Coppellia!!!! Yeah, hurray! My all time favorite ballet and unlike other ballets the music is hardly ever used. I hope Sara will start something and that Coppellia will become as overused as Don Quixote. She started out with a triple loop, she did a double lutz and fell on another triple. She started some other jump but never got off the ground with it. She did a very lovely Ina Baur into a nice spread eagle. She fell on another triple, did a successful triple jump and a double axel. The skategods cursed her because she skated to music I love. I am sorry Sara it is all my fault. Twelfth in the free and twelfth overall.

Andrea Gardiner

She wore blue and skated to Invitation To Dance. She did a triple/double combination and a double axel. She had a bit of a wild landing leg on her triple lutz/double toe combination, but it was still clean. She landed a triple loop. She did a flying camel into a very pretty camel spin. She did a triple salchow, a double jump another triple jump and then stepped out of another triple jump. She had a big grin on her face throughout the program and really skated with a lot of captivating energy. She got a partial standing ovation and when I looked over at the ABC booth Terry Gannon was clapping for her. Seventh in the free and seventh overall.

Final Flight

As I look back at all these great skates that couldn't get anywhere near the podium it just makes me so sad. We have SO many great lady skaters in this country that girls like Andrea and Amber get sadly neglected, when in any other country they would be National Champion. It makes for a great lady's event at Nationals. But makes a lot of great skaters get very neglected.

Which brings us to the final flight. I didn't take notes because I knew you were all watching along with me on TV. Needless to say I was literally jumping for joy after Michelle's skate. Michelle started out a tad on the cautious side, but that program really built and she went faster and faster as it went on. During the final footwork sequence I think she was quite literally flying over the ice. Though it was a great skate, it was not as good as Philadelphia. And I am glad. I will go to my grave saying that the only reason Michelle did not get gold in Nagano was because of how well she skated in Philadelphia. In Nagano Michelle was not competing against Tara but against her own image of magical perfection in Philadelphia. I think if Michelle had skipped Nationals in 98 and skated the exact same program in Nagano that she did, she would have won the gold medal. But the judges wanted her to be as magical in Nagano as she had been in Philly and when she wasn't, they decided to top their stupid decision of 94 and create an olympic champion even more over-rated than Oksansa.

So in LA Michelle saved something for Salt Lake City and that is a great plan.

I felt badly for Angela I really wanted her to get her shot at the Olympics. And given that she finished fifth at last worlds I think she deserved it. But she did not skate her best in LA and a lot of other ladies did. Between Sasha and Sarah I would have to say it is a flip of the coin. They are really evenly matched and who ends up on top may just depend on which one of them can avoid injuries.

And I certainly wouldn't let Jennifer Kirk out of the mix. She has really worked hard and her jumps are noticeably higher and her speed is better. She was lacking the spark that lit up her skating in the past. But I certainly can understand that. I can not imagine how she has managed to keep on skating at this level after losing her mother. I certainly wouldn't be surprised to see her beat Sasha and Sarah to the top of the podium.

Ann Patrice's skating is quite beautiful and fast. She too is definitely a possible future National Champion.

I hope that the pressure and hype of the Olympics doesn't crumble our skaters. I hope that media hype can be kept as far away from Michelle as possible. Mostly I hope the skating world finally gives it's most coveted prize to it's most deserving star.

Michelle Kwan -- A thing of beauty is a Joy forever.

Copyright © 2002, Antoinette M. Aubert