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Post by Admin on Jan 6, 2018 19:28:14 GMT
A star is born! @bradie_tennell earned the highest U.S. Figure Skating Championships short program score ever recorded! #WinterOlympics #BestOfUS Bradie Tennell won her first U.S. women's figure skating championship Friday night, using her remarkable consistency to produce a flawless performance that is all but certain to earn her a berth on the US. team for the Pyeongchang Olympics. The three women who will compete in the singles event at next month's Winter Games were to be told Friday night, but the public announcement is scheduled to be held until 5 a.m. on Saturday during the "Today" show. Tennell, of Carpentersville, Ill., skated to "A Dream is a Wish your heart makes," landing every jump and performing precise spins that won the hearts of the audience at SAP Center. Her final total of 219.51 gave her a resounding victory over Mirai Nagasu of Arcardia, who finished with 213.84 points after a mesmerizing program that left her in tears of joy. Nagasu made the 2010 Olympic team but was passed over in 2014. However, her ability to land a triple axel jump — which few women in the world can do — gives her a unique edge this time around.
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Post by Admin on Jan 7, 2018 19:26:05 GMT
On a night that devolved quickly into pre-Olympic chaos, the surest of American figure skating things — a skateboarding, guitar-playing, highflying teenager named Nathan Chen — withstood the drama that drew in those around him as he seized his second straight U.S. Figure Skating Championship. He finished his season undefeated in competition, with all first-place finishes. With a total score of 315.23, 40 points higher than his closest competitor, Chen erased all doubt about his status as the best medal hope American men’s figure skating has had since Evan Lysacek won in 2010. But the rest of the field left heaps of doubt, as past U.S. champions and Olympic hopefuls Adam Rippon and Jason Brown encountered stunning struggles at the worst possible moment. They left room for unexpected contender Ross Miner to seize the silver medal — and left U.S. Figure Skating’s selection committee to sort through the rubble of what became a shocking night in San Jose. hat committee will announce the Olympic team Sunday morning, but it has set a precedent of selecting the top three finishers at nationals. Given the way things ended Saturday evening, with Miner on the podium as a far less decorated international skater than those who stumbled around him, that precedent may change this time. Vincent Zhou took the bronze medal with a strong performance, laden with five quads like only he and Chen can. He was not perfect, but now has a strong case for one of the other two Olympic spots. But that third spot will be complicated. Miner, 26, was not expected to break into the top tier of Chen, Zhou, Rippon and Brown and bust onto the podium here, though he has won three medals at nationals in his career. He does not have the international track record.
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Post by Admin on Jan 8, 2018 19:23:00 GMT
With an entertaining and seductive performance that could practically have melted the ice, Hubbell and partner Donohue pulled off an ice dancing spoiler to close the U.S. Figure Skating Championships on Sunday. The team beat out two-time defending champion sibling tandem Maia and Alex Shibutani with a score of 197.12, edging the Shibutanis’ 196.93. The final U.S. #WinterOlympics Figure Skating Team nomination announcement... See you in Korea, #TeamUSA! Long afterward, an emotional Hubbell patted her red cheeks as a sign of just how much this means. She and Donohue, each 26, are headed to their first Olympics. Later Sunday, a federation committee put both duos and the team of Madison Chock and Evan Bates on the roster for South Korea. U.S. Figure Skating announces dance teams for worlds, Four Continents and junior worlds... “Before the free dance, Zach and I made an agreement that despite any marks, our win tonight would be to be present and not be distracted by the audience and all of their amazing support and just keep it in our control,” Hubbell said, fighting tears. “So as soon as the music finished, we realized we already won in our mind, so that was kind of our moment to let in everything and thank the audience for their support.” Striking in dark evening-wear costumes, Hubbell and Donohue skated to the bluesy “Across the Sky” in which their lifts were both lovely and sultry for a 118.02 score. They came into the free dance in second place after the short program Friday.
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Post by Admin on Jan 9, 2018 19:24:34 GMT
It's safe to say the 2018 U.S. Figure Skating Championships went down in their typically controversial, stressful, and -- for some -- infuriating way. But enough about Nathan Chen's costume reveal! Congratulations to all who made the podium, and further compliments to those skaters and teams who now comprise the 2018 U.S. Olympic team. LADIES GOLD -- Ashley Wagner (FS) Truly the dress of the competition, and befittingly somber its beauty, Wagner's costume perfectly fit her routine without being overtly related to the music. (In truth, it's based on a dress Emma Stone wore last year to the Golden Globes, where she won the Best Actress award for her performance in La La Land, the music to which Wagner skated to). Alas, Ashley did not get her fairy tale ending, but she looked all parts the star that she is in this dress. SILVER -- Starr Andrews (SP) Starr skating to Beyoncé's "Fever" while wearing a bedazzled red cat suit is the kind of thing Whitney Houston was talking about when she sang "I believe the children are our future." Bold, eye-catching, and deeply unique, I am very excited to see what's next for Ms. Andrews. BRONZE -- Ashley Wagner (SP) Frankly, I think this is the ladies costume of the season, but it certainly was not the costume of the night. This is the perfect kind of dress for publicity shots for the Olympics -- certainly the U.S. used plenty of images of it to advertise nationals this year -- and the Phoenix-rising-from-the-ashes quality of it perfectly suits Ashley's powerful presence on the ice. PEWTER -- Mirai Nagasu (SP) If there's a silver lining to the drama from these U.S. championships, it's that Mirai finally got her second chance at the Olympics -- and looked glorious doing so. While I love her long program get up, I think there's something commanding and defiant about the color and beading placement of her short program dress.
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Post by Admin on Jan 11, 2018 19:11:22 GMT
While she does not have the explosive aerial capabilities of Nagasu, she has been the steadiest American jumper of the past few months, hardly falling in competition — hardly falling at all, and therefore maximizing technical points, even as she requires more polish in the nuanced aspects of performance-based scores.
Nagasu and Wagner represented the United States on the same junior world team “eons ago,” Wagner said, and both began their Olympic level careers at the same U.S. nationals, in 2008, which Nagasu won, while Wagner finished third.
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