Lessons from figure skating team event: Quads rain, and Valieva makes a splash with hers

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Lessons from figure skating team event: Quads rain, and Valieva makes a splash with hers

This is what we learned from the 2022 Olympic team event that ended Monday with the result everyone expected, as the Russian Olympic Committee took gold, the U.S. silver and Japan bronze:

MEN’S SINGLES HAS POTENTIAL FOUR-WAY BATTLE FOR TITLE

Either Nathan Chen of the United States, who won the team short program, or Yuzuru Hanyu of Japan, who did not compete, still is likely to win gold.

But Shoma Uno (second in the team short) and Yuma Kagiyama (first in the free) of Japan both skated so well they could take full advantage if Chen and Hanyu make mistakes.

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With a likely Olympic team medal, Karen Chen can fill another gap in her career record

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With a likely Olympic team medal, Karen Chen can fill another gap in her career record

Karen Chen was talking before the U.S. Figure Skating Championships about filling a blank on her résumé.

“I told myself, `Karen, you don’t have a nationals silver medal yet,’” Chen said.

Coincidentally – and you will see the coincidence a few paragraphs from now – Chen noted that in answer to a question on a different topic.

It was the question of whether she hoped her performance at nationals would be good enough to earn her a spot in the Olympic team event. Chen did not get that opportunity at her first Olympics in 2018.

There was an element of not counting chickens in Chen’s response, of being more concerned about first assuring the place on the 2022 Olympic team.

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In speed skater Erin Jackson’s stunning success story, here are chapter and verse

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In speed skater Erin Jackson’s stunning success story, here are chapter and verse

There are so many compelling parts of Erin Jackson’s story it is hard to know which to begin with.

Do you start with Jackson being such a good inline skater she was a four-time world medalist named the U.S. Olympic Committee’s female roller athlete of the year three times?

Or her making the 2018 U.S. Olympic team in long track speed skating about five minutes after she shifted from wheels to blades?

(OK, it took her a little longer, but you get the idea.)

Or her being the first Black woman to make a U.S. Olympic team in long track?

Or her doing that despite coming to the 2018 Olympic trials without having met the qualifying time for the ensuing PyeongChang Winter Games.

Or her getting so many college degrees in so many subjects that Jackson jokingly (or not) thinks she should include “school” when asked to list her hobbies?

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The Olympic skating season so far: Injuries and Russian women (and more Russian women. And more. . .)

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The Olympic skating season so far: Injuries and Russian women (and more Russian women. And more. . .)

A baker’s dozen of takeaways halfway through the Grand Prix season – and just under three months from the start of the 2022 Winter Olympics:

1. The injury list added two big names in the last week: Yuzuru Hanyu of Japan, the two-time reigning OIympic champion, and reigning world bronze medalist Alexandra Trusova of Russia, who won Skate America, both have withdrawn from this week’s NHK Trophy with foot injuries, meaning neither can qualify for the Grand Prix Final Dec. 9-12 in Osaka, Japan.

Others previously on the “disabled list”: Japan’s Rika Kihira, the 2018 Grand Prix Final winner and reigning national champion, withdrew from both her scheduled Grand Prix events, as did reigning U.S. champion Bradie Tennell.

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Quad Queen Trusova does just one but still easily rules at Skate America

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Quad Queen Trusova does just one but still easily rules at Skate America

It must have felt like a day off for Aleksandra Trusova.

The 17-year-old Quad Queen from Russia was a runaway winner Sunday at Skate America in Las Vegas despite limiting herself to just one free skate quadruple jump, a lutz, because of an unspecified foot injury.

“It was like a day of rest,” Trusova said. “We wanted to skate here with three quads but couldn’t. With the injury, I lost a lot of practice time.”

It was the first time Trusova has attempted fewer than three quads at international competition in 11 events dating to the fall of 2018. She did five clean quads in a national event last month.

The third Grand Prix triumph of Trusova’s career came with a total of 232.37 points, more than 15 ahead of compatriot Daria Usacheva, 15, who was making her senior Grand Prix debut.

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