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MALally |
Tuesday, January 16 Reports |
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FranBuhman |
Tuesday Morning Practice Session Report | ||
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Todd had a short program practice session at the Fleet Center this morning, which began at 6:55 am, and it was definitely an occasion worth getting up for, for all of us <g>. After landing a nice triple axel and a couple of lutzes (thus proving with the latter that he's put the spiking incident well behind him), he set to work on the quad - thus demonstrating that at least as of now the idea of doing the quad in the short program has by no means been abandoned. He only had time to warm up the jump with a couple of triple toes before his sp music played and he had to stop to do a jumpless (and mostly spinless!) run through of his program (most of the guys this morning did jumpless run throughs), which in turn gave us a chance to really appreciate the choreography of this program. After that and in short order, he landed a solo quad, not pretty but clean. This was followed almost immediately by a beautifully done quad/double toe. He looked immensely pleased with himself right afterward and immediately looked at his watch, as did we. The time was exactly 7:24 am. Not bad for an "old guy" at the crack of dawn who'd obviously had very little sleep the night before. Yet another nice quad/double toe followed, before a couple of misfires (a solo triple toe, then a fully rotated quad that ended in a fall), but then he was right back on track, landing another quad/double toe just as the session ended. He did spent a short amount of time working on the entry to the flip/toe combination, all of which tells me they have not as yet made a definite decision to go for the quad. In all likelihood they are waiting to see how consistent the jump is as the week progresses and are prepared to fall back on the flip/toe if necessary. I must confess that I didn't get a chance to pay much attention to Tim Goebel, as he is in Todd's practice group, but I now have someone on tap who has promised to keep an eye on him for me in the future. Only three guys were absent from this morning's practice - all from Group A - Danny Claussen, Derrick Delmore and Michael Weiss. Todd's next practice session, a free skate session, is scheduled for 4:25 pm at the Fleet Center. Report to follow later. |
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MALally |
We can't have that! | ||
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Fran will post her report from the afternoon men's free skate practice session either later tonight or early tomorrow. But just to relieve the suspense the quads continued in the afternoon.
For the afternoon practice, Todd wore the brown shirt he wore for Who Let the Dogs Out at Improv-Ice. I was disappointed that our shuttle to the FleetCenter did not have a police escort, but we did get the escort on the return trip and we got to run some more red lights! Save the date -- Friday, October 5, 2001. The USFSA is going to hold a special tribute show to commerate the 1961 US Figure Skating Team at Madison Square Garden in NYC. There was a sign at a booth at the FleetCenter which included several names including Peggy Fleming, Scott Hamilton, Michelle Kwan, Nancy Kerrigan and TODD! There were other names, but I didn't get a chance to write them down, I'll look at the list again tomorrow. There was no information about tickets at this time, it was just a save the date type of announcement. Fran is going to confirm this event with Todd's agent. This is just a heads up so you can pencil it in your calendar. The January 2001 is of the USFSA Skating Magazine has Todd's Kids Question & Answer feature and one of the Q&A's is hysterical. << Q: Were you always a great spinner or did you have to work on it? What are your secrets to great spinning? TE: I wasn't always a great spinner, but after competing against Scott Davis, who had great spins, I knew I had to work on mine to get them faster. I don't normally give away my secrets about my spins because if I did my competitors could make their better, and we can't have that! >> No, we can't! |
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FranBuhman |
Tuesday Afternoon Free Skate Practice Session | ||
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Practice sessions were running a bit late this afternoon, so Todd's group did not actually take the ice until 4:40 pm, later than the scheduled 4:25 start time. When Todd first appeared for the warm-up, I was temporarily distracted with trying to identify the shirt he was wearing. I just knew I'd seen it somewhere before! Finally conceding defeat in the ID department, I asked Kyla if she could help me out and Kyla hastened to inform me what I was looking at was in fact the shirt that made its debut in the now infamous Who Let the Dogs Out program at the Improv. My problem, I realized, was that I failed to recognize it alone, in other words in isolation without the pants! By the time I'd solved this problem, Todd had landed a triple axel, a triple lutz and was working on the quad. The first attempt resulted in a triple, but the second attempt resulted in an absolute beauty! After this he took it relatively easy as he waited for his music to come up, and it was obvious because of this that we were to be treated to a complete run-through of the 13th Warrior program - what resulted was not perfect, but it sure was a pretty good start! Noteworthy was the fact that the run-through began with a nicely executed quad. He then went on to land a triple axel/double toe (rather than the 3A/3T he'd intended), a triple lutz, a triple flip/double toe (rather than the 3F/3T he'd intended), followed in due course by a second triple axel, then a triple loop and then - are you ready for this? - a horrible splat - on guess which jump? You got it! THE TRIPLE SAL! Knew that was coming, didn't you? <g>. After he'd managed to get to his feet and resume the program he finished nicely with a strong triple toe (thrown in of course because he'd missed the previous two attempts - if he gets those expect to see a double axel here instead, assuming of course he hits both triple axels <g>.) Total tally - six triples and a quad, not too shabby, but we know he can do better, and to prove it Richard had him practice the sal a couple of times, and then had him do a triple axel/triple toe and a triple flip/triple toe. Tim Goebel also did a complete runthrough that also consisted of six triples and a quad. He also doubled the toe of the intended 3A/3T combination, popped the solo quad sal and then fell on the quad toe. Later, in Group C, Matt Savoie didn't have a particularly good run-through. Danny Clausen and Derrick Delmore finally put in an appearance in their Group A, leaving Michael Weiss as the only man in the competition who has yet to put in an appearance on practice ice. Todd's next scheduled practice is another free skate practice, tomorrow afternoon at 1:05 pm, again in the Fleet Center. More reports from the frontline trenches to follow in due course. |
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