2001

Grand Prix Final

Ladies Event

After her disappointing result at Skate Canada, it was essential that Michelle Kwan make a good showing at the Final.  A repeat of the results at Skate Canada, where she finished third behind Irina Slutskaya and Sarah Hughes would cement Slutskaya's position as favorite going into the Olympics and even call into question Kwan's ability to retain her National title.

Following Skate Canada, Kwan switched from her "East of Eden" short program to her celebrated 1998 Rachmaninov routine.  Her performance at the final was not nearly as lifeless as at Skate Canada, but must still be described at flat,  a far cry from her inspired performances during the 1998 season.  Her only technical problem in the routine was in her opening combination which was attempted too close to the wall.  The triple Lutz had a bad landing edge that came close to the wall and the double toe loop had an added looped edge.  In a 4-3 split she placed third, behind Maria Butyrskaya.

Kwan was followed in the skating by Sara Hughes who, since Skate Canada, has been under intense pressure.  Another victory over Kwan would greatly enhance her chances of taking away Kwan's National title, making this an extremely important competition for Hughes.

During the warmup, Hughes had been wearing a light blue dress, the same color as many of the other ladies in the group.  When it was her time to skate she was wearing a white dress and some speculated it was to stand out from the others, but later was explained as being due to a broken zipper.

Hughes gave a lovely performance of her routine but was bedeviled by three errors, the most serious of which was a fall on triple loop which was a quarter turn under-rotated.  In addition her flying camel did not fly, being little more than a hop, and her combination had the usual little flutz edge on the takeoff.  She managed to take fourth place on a 5-2 decision just ahead of Tatiana Malinina who nicely skated her short program with only one minor error.

Next to skate was Maria Butyrskaya, who had appendix surgery the last week of November.  She landed her triple flip and her combination cleanly but with little flow out of the jumps.  Her double Axel was poorly landed on the toe, however, and was not secure.  Her performance was tedious and boring but she still managed to edge out Kwan for second place on a 4-3 split.

Yoshie Onda, a young strong-jumping Japanese skater,  proved to be a bit out of her league at the final in overall skating.  She landed her triple Lutz - double toe loop combination and double Axel, but popped a triple flip to a single.   It is in her presentation, however, that her immaturity as a skater shows.   Her performance was weak and mechanical, with no sense of the music.

Last to skate was Irina Slutskaya who was the unambiguous winner of the short program.  She skated clean with all four jumps solid.  Her presentation was strong and confident and distinctly better than her effort at Skate Canada.  The only serious weakness to the program is the funky takeoff pattern and position she uses on her triple Lutz.

The free skating began with Tatiana Malinina.  She opened with a big triple Lutz and went on to complete four triple jumps and a double Axel.  She stepped out of a triple loop, however, omitted one of two planned triple Salchows and missed the only combination she attempted, performing a double Lutz with a two-footed double toe loop.  She was placed fifth by the panel on the losing end of a 4-3 split with Maria Butyrskaya.

Perhaps because it was her second performance of the day, but for whatever reason, the first free skate of the competition was not kind to Yoshie Onda.  As in the short program her performance was weak and mechanical, but worse yet many of her jumps were a bit off.  She stepped out of triple Lutz and went into the wall, omitting the subsequent planned toe loop.  She landed triple flip - double toe loop (with a cheated toe axel takeoff), triple loops with a poor landing edge, and a triple Lutz - double toe loop combination.  She then fell on triple flip and turned out of triple Salchow.  A final triple toe loop and two double Axels were all clean.  With but four triple jumps and a poor presentation she ended up placed last by all seven judges.

For the first free skate, Sarah Hughes reprised her "Turandot" routine.  She needed a good performance to pull back up into the medals and started off encouragingly with a clean double Axel - triple toe loop sequence.  On her subsequent attempt at the triple-triple, however, trouble set in.  Her triple Salchow was landed on a weak edge and she barely held on to it preventing the execution of the subsequent triple loop.  She fell on triple Lutz and then reached for the ice and put a hand down on a poorly landed triple flip.  Following with a nice layback spin, however, she was able to pull the program back together, landing a triple Lutz - double toe loop combination and a solo triple loop, ending up with a total of four triples.   She placed third with three third place marks and despite a fifth place mark from the Russian judge.

Maria Butyrskaya skated next, performing a routine that instead of being tedious and boring was instead boring and depressing.  All of her jumps were a little off and she landed but two clean triples.  How she managed to get three third place marks and be placed ahead of Malinina overall is inexplicable, except to say look at the judges who placed her third.

Butyrskaya opened with a two-footed triple flip landed with a break at the waist.   She followed with a double Lutz - double toe loop combination and a botched two-footed triple toe loop sequence into a double Salchow.  A solo triple Lutz was flutzed and a subsequent solo triple loop was clean.  Following some spirals she threw another botched sequence, this one a double toe loop - half loop - single Salchow atrocity.  A final double Axel was clean.

The errors made by Hughes and the dismal performance from Butyrskaya left Kwan in  position to move up, and despite two errors she was mostly up to the task.   Skating her "Song of the Black Swan" routine she managed five clean triples and a double Axel.  She fell on an opeing triple loop and then landed a triple toe loop - double toe loop combination.  Following a decent flying camel a planned triple-double combination ended up a double Lutz.  Next cam two spins and then a clean triple Salchow and a triple flip.  Later in the program footwork into a triple Lutz was improvised into a triple Lutz - double toe loop combination, but the toe loop had a toe Axel takeoff.  A solo triple toe loop was also tacked on prior to her closing deathdrop and spin.  As in the short program, her performance lacked passion and she did not attack the program.  Nonetheless it was a strong enough effort to earn unanimous second place marks.

Skating last again was Irina Slutskaya.  She skated her "Don Quixote" routine with good speed and energy, with a strong presentation.  She landed four clean triples and a double Axel.

Slutskaya opened with triple Lutz but omitted the double loop of the intended combination.  Next came a clean triple Salchow - double loop combination followed by a flying camel spin.  A planed triple Lutz next ended up a double Lutz - double toe loop combination and following another spin she put her hand down on a triple loop with a poor landing edge.  In the last third of the program she landed a triple flip, a double Axel and a triple toe loop.  She received unanimous first place marks for her effort.

Tatiana Malinina, who skated fairly well in the short program and first free skate, could not sustain her performance through the second free skate.   She landed three triple jumps and missed four others.  She landed her opening triple Lutz then put a hand down on triple flip.  A triple toe loop was landed by brute force and then she felon triple loop.  A triple Salchow - double toe loop combination was clean but after a combination spin and her spiral sequence she fell on a solo triple Salchow.  A subsequent double Axel was two footed and on a later triple-double combination she put a hand down on triple Lutz and singled a toe loop.   She dropped like a rock to last place in the free skate and last overall.

After a troublesome short program and some tense moments in the first free skate, Sarah Hughes came back even stronger in the second free skate.  It was a nice performance that was generally well skated except for the usual problem with her slightly cheated jumps.  Except for the addition of a second double Axel, her content in the second free skate is identical to the first, though in slightly different order.  Her first seven jumps are completely identical, but in the second free skate she landed all of them, unlike the day before, with the triple Salchow - triple loop only slightly cheated.   She landed a total of seven triple jumps and a double Axel to earned three second place marks and four third place marks to finish third for the free skate, winning the bronze medal.

Unlike Hughes who skated better as the competition progressed, Maria Butyrskaya got sloppier and sloppier. In the second free skate she landed three triple jumps, none of them really secure.  In the final the two free skates are required to be different programs with different music and different costumes.  Butyrskaya's two free skates were virtually identical with the exact same elements skated in nearly the exact same order with only the position of the layback spin and the spiral sequence in a slightly different place.

Butyrskaya landed her opening triple flip on the toe and then completed a triple Lutz - double toe loop combination with the toe loop landed on the toe.  Next she completed a triple toe loop - half loop - double Salchow sequence.  On a solo triple Lutz she fell and a triple loop was popped to a double.  A double Axel was grossly under-rotated by half a turn.  Her presentation was not nearly as dreadful as the day before but the "B" word is still the only one that comes to mind for this program.  She ended up placed fourth well behind the medalists.

For her second free skate Michelle Kwan performed her new "Scheherazade" routine.  It was a decent skate, improved over Skate Canada with a total of six triples and a double Axel landed.  The program still needs work, however, with the lack of height in her jumps a significant concern.

Kwan landed an opening triple loop and then a triple toe loop - double toe loop combination, with the second jump barely landed.   On the subsequent triple Lutz - double loop combination the loop was tiny and her flying camel, which followed, was also small.  A double Axel was then landed on the toe.  From this point the program improved in strength and solo triple flip, Salchow, and Lutz were all landed.

Kwan received three first place marks and four second place marks to finish second for the free skate and second overall.  It was a controversial decision, with Irina Slutskaya receiving four first place marks, three third place marks and no second place marks.  According to a reliable source, the judges' meeting after the event was extremely animated, with the three judges favoring Kwan reportedly adamant that the four Slutskaya judges were totally in error. In addition, looking at the ordinals for all three performances one gets a sense that "bock judging" was in full force at this event with the Russian, Ukrainian, Bulgarian, and German judges forming one group and the American, Canadian and Japanese judge another.  One also gets the sense from this that in a close competition in Salt Lake the decision in the ladies event could come down to politics and national bias.

In the second free skate, Irina Slutskaya once again closed the show.  Off-ice Slutskaya has had a ready smile and appears at ease, but she is under as much pressure as Kwan and gave a hint of this in the long interval during the marking of Kwan's peformance.  For what felt like several minutes Slutskaya intensely paced and stroked from one end of the ice to the other, executing several double jumps and giving every impression of a caged animal waiting to pounce.

Slutskaya skated her "Tosca" routine with good speed and with a strong artistic presentation that was unquestionably first rate, but she landed only four or five triples (depending if you count the triple flip) and made several sloppy errors.  Her second free skate was also another example of some skaters doing the exact same elements in both free skates in only a trivially different order.

On her opening triple Lutz - double toe loop a poor landing on the Lutz forced a loop edge in between.  A triple Salchow - double loop combination was clean but after a flying camel she popped a triple Lutz to a double.  Her solo triple loop was clean but she had a late step out of a triple flip.  She also had a very poor landing on a double Axel that was nearly a fall, but near the end of the program came back to land a triple toe loop.   As noted above, her first place finish was a controversial result.  Her presentation was stronger than Kwan's and she skated with more speed and with stronger jumps for the ones she landed, but she made so many errors and was so sloppy in so many places the result does seem questionable.

Short Program

First Free Skate

Second Free Skate