Skate America: A Preview

Here are my brief thoughts on who I suspect will be a factor at Skate America this weekend.

Pairs: World Champions Savchenko and Szolkowy should have no problem winning here. The bigger question is who else will be on the medal stand. Zhang and Zhang were out last season after an odd injury so it's hard to say how well they'll skate, but they've been among the best in the world for years and certainly shouldn't be counted out. Moore-Towers and Moscovitch, Russians Bazarova and Larionov, and possibly
Hausch and Wendes will all be looking to medal here as well.

Ice dance: Davis and White are the clear favorites to win, with Pechalat and Bourzat being pretty much a lock for silver. Who will get the bronze medal is more of the mystery - I'm leaning towards it being one of the two Canadian teams competing here (Paul and Islam and Ralph and Hill).

Ladies: There's a lot of ladies here who could potentially medal, but I think that either Carolina Kostner or Alissa Czisny have the most potential to win this event. Joshi and Viktoria Helgesson, Haruka Imai, Elene Gedenishvili, and Ksenia Makarova could all also be in the hunt as well.

Men: World medalist Takahiko Kozuka has to be considered the frontrunner here, with Florent Amodio being the most likely skater to challenge him. Michal Brezina is anything but consistent but he's managed to squish into 4th at Worlds twice, so it's hard to count him out. Last year's surprise medalist Armin Mahbanoozadeh will be looking to repeat here, with teammate and U.S. silver medalist Richard Dornbush will be competing at his first senior Grand Prix ever. Daisuke Murakami and Denis Ten are each a bit of a question mark, but if either go clean and others struggle, I could see one of them medaling.

4 Continents Pairs Freeskate & Overall Results

1. Qing Pang & Jian Tong TE 61.23 PCS 66.81;FS 128.04 = 199.45 Total (CHN)
2.Meagan Duhamel & Eric Radford TE 66.55 PCS 55.32 ;FS 121.87 = 181.79 Total (CAN)
3.Paige Lawrence & Rudi Swiegers TE 58.20 PCS 53.53.55 ;FS 111.75 = 171.73 Total (CAN)
4.Caitlin Yankowskas & John Coughlin TE 57.16 PCS 54.56 ;FS 111.72 = 166.97 Total (USA)
5.Kirsten Moore-Towers & Dylan Moscovitch TE 58.93 PCS 53.88 -1.00 ;FS 111.81 = 166.22 Total (CAN)
6.Amanda Evora & Mark Ladwig TE 53.57 PCS 53.50 -2.00 ;FS 105.07 =  Total 157.30 (USA)
7.Narumi Takahashi & Mervin Tran TE 52.56 PCS 51.82 -2.00 ;FS 102.38 = 152.63 Total (JPN)
8.Mary Beth Marley & Rockne Brubaker TE 51.35 PCS 47.51 ;FS 98.86 = 144.46 Total (USA)
9.Huibo Dong & Yiming Wu TE 47.38 PCS 41.31 ;FS 88.69 = 135.10 Total (CHN)
10. Yue Zhang & Lei Wang TE 45.63 PCS 42.69 ;FS 88.32 = 138.93 Total (CHN)

Detailed Freeskate Results
Protocols

4 Continents Pairs Short Results

1. Qing Pang & Jian Tong TE 39.29 PCS 33.12 - 1.00 = 71.41 Total (CHN)2. Paige Lawrence & Rudi Swiegers TE 34.21 PCS 25.77  = 59.98 Total (CAN)
3. Meagan Duhamel & Eric Radford TE 35.38 PCS 25.54 -1.00  = 59.92 Total (CAN)
4.Caitlin Yankowskas & John Coughlin TE 29.02 PCS 26.23 = 55.25 Total (USA)
5.Kristen Moores-Towers & Dylan Moscovitch TE 28.12 PCS 26.29  = 54.41 Total (CAN)
6.Amanda Evora & Mark Ladwig TE 28.14 PCS 25.09 -1.00 = 52.23 Total (USA)
7.Yue Zhang & Lei Wang TE 28.93 PCS 21.68  = 50.61 Total (CHN)
8.Narumi Takahashi & Mervin Tran TE 26.77  PCS 25.48 -2.00 = 50.25 Total (JPN)
9.Huibo Dong & Yiming Wu TE 25.41 PCS 21.00 = 46.41 Total (CHN)
10. Mary Beth Marley & Rockne Brubaker TE 23.60 PCS 22.00 = 45.60 Total (USA)

Detailed Results
Protocol

Canadian Nationals Results

Do keep in mind that National Championships, especially Canada's, tend to have inflated scoring. That said, based off protocols and word of mouth, it sounds like some skaters really stepped up to the occasion and I am curious to see some of these performances when they surface on youtube.

Men
1. Patrick Chan 88.78 SP 197.07 FS = 285.85 Total
2. Shawn Sawyer 77.64 SP 151.45 FS = 229.09 Total
3. Joey Russell 69.41 SP 134.61 FS = 204.02 Total
4. Kevin Reynolds 61.76 SP 130.09 FS = 191.85 Total
5. Elladj Baldé 66.07 SP 124.09 FS = 190.16 Total
6. Liam Firus 60.66 SP 124.74 FS = 185.40 Total 


Ladies
1. Cynthia Phaneuf  60.77 SP 111.55 FS = 172.32 Total
2. Myriane Samson 49.75 SP 108.07 FS = 157.82 Total
3. Amelie Lacoste 50.86 SP 100.86 FS = 151.72 Total
4. Alexandra Najarro 52.12 SP 95.26 FS = 147.38 Total
5. Adriana DeSanctis 47.81 SP 96.42 FS = 144.23 Total
6. Jessica Dube 48.81 SP 82.09 FS = 130.90 Total

Pairs
1. Kirsten Moore-Towers/Dylan Moscovitch 64.73 SP 122.90 FS = 187.63 Total
2. Meagan Duhamel / Eric Radford 57.71 SP 113.63 FS = 171.34 Total
3. Paige Lawrence / Rudi Swiegers 59.38 SP 108.73 FS = 168.11 Total
4. Mylène Brodeur / John Mattatall 58.78 SP 104.34 FS = 163.12 Total
5. Kaleigh Hole / Adam Johnson 48.71 SP 92.15 FS = 140.86 Total
6. Brittany Jones / Kurtis Gaskell 48.36 SP 86.54 FS = 134.90 Total

Ice Dance  
1.Vanessa Crone / Paul Poirier 65.80 SD 98.41 FD = 164.21 Total
2. Kaitlyn Weaver / Andrew Poje 65.64 SD 97.54 FD = 163.18 Total
3. Alexandra Paul / Mitchell Islam 61.57 SD 92.33 FD = 153.90 Total
4. Kharis Ralph / Asher Hill 57.27 SD 86.30 FD = 143.57 Total
5. Tarrah Harvey / Keith Gagnon 55.34 SD 80.61 FD = 135.95 Total
6. Sarah Arnold / Justin Trojek 47.13 SD 78.59 FD = 125.72 Total


Full results & protocols