Russian Couple Dominates Prelim Dance at Worlds

The winners of this round, Elena Ilinykh, who will turn 18 on April 25, and Nikita Katsalapov, 20, had to navigate this extra barrier even though they were silver medalists in this season’s Russian championships and earned the bronze medal in the recent European championships. That was because only two Russian couples were allowed direct entry to Wednesday’s  Short Dance. Which two of Russia’s three entries had to endure this ignominy was controlled by which two had the higher ISU world ranking, which is completely independent of the skaters’ national association.

In the Europeans in Sheffield, Ilinykh & Katsalapov had to recover from seventh place after the Short Dance because of a Level 1 for one sequence of the Rhumba. “That has never happened to us before,” said Ilinykh, who was born in Shevchenko in Kazahkstan. “We have been getting Level 4 (the maximum) so that was a shock. We have been working VERY hard to make sure that doesn’t happen again. Obviously that will be more important than the Preliminary. You never want to skate badly but this was more like a practice run-through. The points don’t carry forward. We knew after Europeans that we’d have to do it, and obviously on Thursday night when we do the Free again, we will be giving it everything. I expect we’ll be more nervous for Wednesday’s Short Dance.”

Performing to Thomas Spencer-Wortley singing  Ave Maria, they won the Preliminary with 92.40 points, 15.71 more than the Chinese duo, Xintong Huang and Xun Zheng, who, with 79.69, were virtually tied for second with Estonia’s Irina Shtork and Taavi Rank (79.17) and Britain’s Penny Coomes and Nick Buckland, who earned 79.09.

The Russians received Level 4 for three lifts and their twizzles, Level 3 for their circular steps and the combination spin, and Level 2 for their final two moves, the diagonal steps and their fourth lift. They were actually teamed up by Alexander Zhulin when they were really young and Zhulin was still working in the USA. Ilinykh said, “We quarreled all the time. We had no maturity and we had no patience with each other. We never got any real work done. Looking back, it’s sad how much time we wasted. But I think that taught us a good lesson.” They eventually teamed up again in 2008. They switched coaches in May 2011 to Nikolai Morosov.

The leading ten couples progress to the Short Dance on Wednesday evening. The ten join the 15 couples who were able to skip this round, due to their country’s placement in this event last year in Moscow.

Thirteen couples were eliminated. For some it was a very upsetting procedure. The top couple dumped into the trash can was the 11^th placed Gabriela Kubova & Dmitri Kiselev, representing the Czech Republic, who needed only 0.46 more to beat the Hungarians, Zsuzsanna Nagy & Mate Fejes, who were the last qualifiers. With just a further 0.04 they could have been the next to last qualifiers!!

The other discardees, in order of finish, are: Testa/Csolly, Slovakia; Lindholm/Kanervo. Finland; Zvorigina/Bernadowski, Poland; Elsener/Florent Roost, Switzerland; Agafonova/Ucar, Turkey; Peherkina/Jakusgin, Latvia; Bruhns/Van Natten, Mexico; Bugrov/Rogov, Israel; Mansour/Zhunusso, Kazakhstan; Silna/Kurakin, Austria; Christiakova/Lichev, Bulgaria; Valadzenkava/Vazkunov, Belarus.

The Chinese couple presented a Tango routine but admitted they could have skated better. Huang said, “I made a mistake on (their first element) the twizzles.” Zheng said, “We missed the Four Continents Championships because I was sick in the hospital with a stomach ailment, so we lost quite a bit of training time so we are happy with today’s result. Competing in the Preliminaries is a little tiring but maybe that was good practice for us.”

Although they were saddled with a -0.14 Grade of Execution, meaning that amount was taken off the base value of the move by the judges, they still received Level 3 for the twizzles from the Technical Panel. They gained the maximum Level 4 for both parts of their long lift and their two short lifts plus their spin. (Dancers can choose to perform one long lift and two short ones or four short lifts. Both options have the same collective base value.) Their circular steps were Level 3 and the diagonal steps Level 2. Many skaters felt the temperature was a little hot, a result of the beautiful weather outside.

The Estonians gave one of the best performances of their career to the music from “The Story of Mikhail Strogoff”. Shtork said they were pleased to earn a personal best and with gaining Level 4s for all but the two step sequences and the twizzles which were Level 3. Their GoEs ranged from +0.71 for their two first elements, the spin and their circular steps, down to +0.07 for their twizzles. Their element score was second best, only 0.22 behind the Russians.

Rand said, with a smile, “Now the real competition begins. We’ve done eight competitions this season because we have been competing at both junior and senior level. We’ve had two versions of each of our routines because there are changes of what we must do for each level. So it’s been quite hard but, of course, we are delighted to be here.”

The Britons presented an extremely entertaining Elvis Presley routine. But they came off the ice with Buckland having lost a hook from one boot and Coomes bleeding from a cut on her right hand between the first and second fingers. They said they were still on a high for taking fourth place in the Short Dance and sixth overall at Europeans. Although they received five Level 4s, their spin and the two footwork sequences were Level 2. Buckland said, “It’s fair that we had to do the Preliminary round because we finished only 16^th last year in Worlds. Besides, it’s good practice. We want to build on what we did today.”

In fifth place were Julia Zlobina and Alexei Sitnikov with 77.80, who represent Azebaijan although they were both born in Russia. She said, “It is our first world championships. It even feels a little scary. We were nervous and that came out in our dance. I had this little mistake on the twizzles. I found it was easier at the European championship. I don’t know why because that was also our first.” Sitnikov added, “Maybe  we are more nervous because we performed very well in Sheffield (where they finished tenth) so now there is a bigger responsibility on our shoulders. More is expected of us.”

Sara Hurtado and Adria Diaz from Spain, who now train in Canada with Marie-France Dubreuil and Patrice Lauzon in Montreal, were sixth with 76.26, ahead by 2.30 of Lorenza Alessandrini and Simone Vaturi of Italy, who now train in Detroit with Pasquale Camerlengo, Massimo Scali and Angelika Krylova. Both chose to skate to operatic music. The Spaniards performed to music from Tristin and Isolde while the Italians interpreted dramatic arias from Tosca.  While the Spaniards are in the second year at Worlds, having placed 23^rd in Moscow, this is the Italians first worlds. Alessandrini gushed, “The competition has not really started and already we’re getting requests for autographs.”

Also training at Detroit FSC are the Australians, Danielle O’Brien and Gregory Merriman, who are competing in their fifth world championship. They scored 71.37 for their Free set to In the Mood by Glenn Miller, Frank Sinatra singing Moonlight Serenade and Sing Sing Sing.

The other two qualifiers are: Representing Uzbekistan, Anna Nagornyuk, who was born in Moscow, and Viktor Kovalenko, born in Tashkent. They received 70.88. They are taking part in their first Worlds and performed to Henry Mancini playing the theme from the television show, Peter Gunn. Representing Hungary, Zsuzsanna Nagy and Mate Fejes. They scored 70.84.

The Uzbeks nearly didn’t get to skate. He explained, “Anna received her French visa on the 19th but I for some reason, I got it only this morning. We flew out of Moscow at 13.30 but we missed our connection in Munich. We thought we aren't going to make it, but we still hoped for it. We landed only at 18.30 in Nice. We were taken straight to the ice rink. We arrived with two couples to skate before us. Considering all this we are happy with the way we skated. We kept a cool head.”

 Nagorniuk added, “We changed in the car into our costumes and walked like this into the ice rink. We couldn't really warm up.”