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A quad toe loop - triple toe loop combination was listed in the planned content, but Brezina executed a triple flip - triple toe loop instead. He explained, "We decided to go for a triple-triple and a triple Lutz right before I skated because my coaches were watching the competition. They decided we would go for a clean skate for the beginning of the season. I did a quad in my first short program of the season at Nebelhorn. There is no question that the quad isn’t going to be in the short program. My coaches decided we would go competition to competition. There is nothing that will hold for the entire season. I’m really good with that. I like the way they decided that.”
Changing the element required changing the setup in the program and he
explained, “It’s just a different jump. The only problem was that I
was kind of scared if I would fit with the curve there because the rink is
not so wide. It was the only thing that was scary because I almost hit the
board in practice when I was going for the triple flip. It’s actually
not so hard. Going from quad into triple is easier than going from triple
into quad. It wasn’t that much of a problem .” Brezina's elements were by far his greater strength, scoring five points higher in TES than in components, which were in the mid-sevens. All his elements were scored positive, though four judges went to -1 on his combination spin. Two, however, went to +2, so go figure. Second in the Short Program
was Takahiko Kazuka who skated a lively expressive program with
enthusiasm. His spins were called level 3 and four and were marks
highly by the judges, but all three jump elements were scored negative.
He was one of two skaters who attempted a quad, with his quad toe loop
called under-rotated. With a fall on that element, all the judges
went to -3 in the GoE. “I felt like I was going into the jump a
little left and I couldn’t correct so that made the jump shaky,”
he said. Kozuka's
teammate, Daisuke Murakami scored just 0.02 points behind Kozuka and
currently leis in third place. He was the only skater to successfully
complete a quad in the Short Program landing a clean quad Salchow - double
toe loop. “In the early part of the season, I wasn’t planning on
a quad in my short program," he said, " but my coach Frank
Carroll and I decided to put the quad. Today, I’m really happy that we
made that decision for the season and I hope to start building up as the
season goes along and putting a quad-triple in the short program.” Murakami also
landed a clean triple Axel. On triple Flip six judges went to -1 but
two also went to +1. His component marks averaged un the low sixes. Kevin van der Perrin and Richard Dornbush round out the four skaters essentially tied for second place, with 0.06 points separating them. Van der Perrin skated a cleaner program, but was slower overall and was slow in his spins, though he got the level 3s and 4s he was working for. Dornbush on the other hand skated with speed with good expression, but triple Axel was under-rotated and he had an edge call on triple flip. Said Dornbush,
“My triple Axel was a downgrade so I was disappointed in that. I think
that’s only about the third time I have ever been downgraded on a jump.
Other than that, I thought the program was great and I was really happy
with it. I think I got plus GOEs on everything else, except maybe the flip
that looks a little low. It was nice to skate well in front of a home
crowd, that felt good.”
The skaters in second through fifth place are essentially tied with 70.03
to 70.69 points. With such a small spread in points between them larges
changes in placemnt will be possible in the Free Skate. |
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Free Skating
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“I
didn’t do what I wanted to do," he said, "but as I said
earlier in the interview, I’m happy with the place, I’m not happy with
the way I skated, so that’s something I want to work on for the next
competition. On the next competition, I just want to prove to my coach
that the quad will be in the program no matter what because again today
was their decision to go without. For the next competition I just really
want to prove them that the jump will be there even if they say no.” Three
jump elements were scored negative, including a fall on triple Lutz, and
he did not attempt a quad. “Like yesterday, they were watching the
competition. I was skating last and they saw everyone. They wanted to go
for safe. I actually was kind of mad when they told me I couldn’t go for
it because I was ready," he said. "I’m not happy with
the end of the program because I changed the beginning so I couldn’t do
the jumps that I usually do at the end. The preparation for the jumps
wasn’t there. I think that’s why I missed it. I definitely want to
prove for the next competition that I’m going to go for the quad even if
my coaches are not ready. For next competition, I want to work on that and
prove that my free skate is set up like this and it will be like this.” Asked
if considered ignoring his coaches' instructions to not attempt the quad
he said, "I respect my coaches. They always know what’s best for
me. I tried that once. It didn’t work out. So I’m always listening to
what they say. I don’t want to fight with them at the end.” Brezina
is back after an injury and surgery last season. On the effect that
had on him he said, "After my surgery, it messes up your head. When
you have an injury at the beginning of the season that you have been
preparing for the whole summer and everything works well. Then you’re
told you need surgery otherwise you can’t skate the whole season, that
was something I was scared about. But then I got to our Olympic
physiotherapist. He helped me a lot and I think that’s why I did so well
at Worlds.” Kevin van der Perren won the Free Skate to move up to second overall with nearly clean jumps and a repsectable, if somewhat sluggish performance. He landed an excellent opening quad toe loop that recieve GoEs of 1s and 2s. But on the subsequent element he stepped out of a triple Axel. The remainder of his jumps were clean and he landed an impressive triple-triple-triple combination (3S+3T+3T). By the end of the program, however, he was running our of strength and his last two spins were in slow motion. Both of these were scored slightly negative, though they both were called level 3. On
his opening jump elements he said, "Most important for me at the
competition is to do the quad and the axel. This season the only thing
I’m really focused about is Europeans. I’m happy of how I skated,
I’m happy of how it came out even if I would have been fifth or sixth, I
still would have been happy.” Van der Perren is nearly 30 years of age and said he plans to retire at the end of this season. "I had a long think about it after Worlds if I was going to skate or not [this season]," he said. "In the end, I decided yes. I’m not bothering anybody in my country. I still love the sport. But this is definitely going to be the end. I’m going to be 30 years old and for a solo skater, that is late to still be competitive. I’m just taking it now step by step. If I’m in good shape, I will go. If not, I will not risk it. My first two competitions this season went well." Tahahiko Kozuka got stung by one of the quirks of the scoring system, by placing second in both the short and the long, but placing third overall. Formerly, when the short had half the importance of the long he would have placed second, but in the current system the short and long have equal importance which can lead to results such as this. About his
performance, in which he fell twice and had five jump elements scored
negative, he said, "About my performance today, of course I
made mistakes on the jumps but more than that, I was happy I was able to
get level four on my steps and my choreography score was quite high. Today
I really wanted to show I was having fun performing to the music that I
love. This was what I really wanted to show here and I think I was
successful with that. I did feel bad about the jumps but overall I think I
did what I could and I feel pretty satisfied.” American Ricky Dornbush was the best placing man with a fifth place finishing the short and sixth place finish in the long resulting in a fourth place finish overall. In this he was helped by Daisuke Murakami who fell from third in the short to tenth in the long, and Samuel Contesti who though fourth in the long was tenth in the short. Dornbush landed an opening quad toe loop that was scored slightly negative, with GoEs ranging from -1 to +1. Four other jump elements were also scored negative, including a fall on triple loop, a popped Axel and an edge call on triple flip. His performance was a well executed character driven routine to "A Fist Full of Dollars" and received the third highest component scores. About his quad he said, "That was definitely the best part of the program. After that I made a lot of little mistakes that I regret but it was the first competition of the season and it was good to get my feet under me and get the quad out there. I just need to work on the rest of the program. I think that’s probably the hardest part about doing the quad in the long program. You have to be able to do the entire program, not just that one element.” “The main difficulty so far has been the rest of the program after the quad," he said. "After I landed the quad, I put so much pressure on myself to do the rest of the jumps. I just let the program get away from me a little bit.” And regarding his triple Axel that was scored with GoEs of -2, with one -3, he said. "I think on the triple Axel, I was trying so hard to get it to my normal rotations since it was downgraded yesterday so I think I over-rotated it today and landed on the inside edge. That’s something I’ll definitely want to work on when I get back home.” Armin
Mahbanoozadeh also attempted a quad which was under-rotated and on which
he fell. Douglas Razzano did not attempt a quad in the Free Skate. Razzano
was skating on his birthday and related that "I was so pleased with
it [his free skate]. And to do it on my birthday just made it ten times
better. Especially after a disappointing short yesterday.” |
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2011 Skate America Men's Medalists
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