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Post by Admin on Aug 25, 2019 4:28:32 GMT
Fourteen-year-old Alysa Liu successfully landed a quadruple lutz, widely considered the hardest jump in figure skating, during the U.S. champion's long program at the Aurora Games on Saturday. Only a handful of women have landed quads in competition. Japan's Miki Ando was the first in 2002, landing a quad salchow at a Junior Grand Prix. Russia's Alexandra Trusova became the first woman to land the quad lutz during her free skate at a Junior Grand Prix last year. Trusova landed two quads at junior worlds in March; Liu was ineligible to compete because of her age. She was still 13 at the time, born six weeks too late to make the age limit. Liu is among eight skaters competing at the six-sport, all-women sports festival in Albany. She will make her junior international debut at the Junior Grand Prix in nearby Lake Placid next weekend.
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Post by Admin on Aug 25, 2019 20:32:08 GMT
With events such as tennis, gymnastics (tune in for the Parkour event, which has the youngsters hyped in Albany), figure skating, ice hockey, basketball and table tennis, the Aurora Games are like a multisport women's version of Laver Cup, the tennis tournament in Chicago that has garnered a lot of attention, as Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal have signed on to play.
Jerry Solomon, organizer of the New York event and husband to former figure skating champion Nancy Kerrigan, said the Aurora Games are an opportunity for women's sports to be front and center, not an addition to men's sports, and are designed for female athletes to be open, to talk to youngsters and to start dialogue.
"This event transcends sports -- this is much bigger than that," former UCLA gymnastics coach Valorie Kondos Field said.
A lot of the times important stories in America get swept under the rug, Aquilina said, unless a collective community continues to talk about difficult problems such as sexual assault and abuse.
"In America we have disposable clothes, disposable diapers and everything is disposable -- stories are disposable," she said. "We are on to the next thing. This cannot be a disposable story. Until there is actual resolution, we all need to keep talking about it.
"To me to go to this next level, I am not just on a bench, but having a larger platform to help resolve this. This isn't anything about me; it has to do with my children and your children, a safer world and community. We are all connected in this world."
In the next five days, the Aurora Games will see athletes such as Ohashi, figure skaters Ashley Wagner and Mirai Nagasu and tennis players Muguruza, Victoria Azarenka and Bianca Andreescu competing and conversing with young fans and upcoming athletes.
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Post by Admin on Aug 26, 2019 18:27:02 GMT
American viral sensation Katelyn Ohashi put the finishing touches on her gymnastics career with a dazzling performance at the Aurora Games in Albany, N.Y. on Wednesday night.
Ohashi delivered a perfect 10 on the floor exercise portion of the event, leading Team Americans to a 158.5-158.3 victory over Team World. It was her second perfect 10 of the year.
It was also the first professional competition for the 22-year-old Ohashi, who finished college with 11 perfect 10s. She helped UCLA win the 2018 NCAA team championship, when she was co-national champion in floor exercise. She graduated from UCLA in June, six months after one of her routines went viral with more than 57 million YouTube hits.
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