Hi all! Quick recap here for you!
LADIES RESULTS
1 Polina TSURSKAYA, RUS, 189.50
2 Mai MIHARA, JPN, 179.36
3 Vivian LE, USA, 176.30
4 Rin NITAYA, JPN, 150.35
5 Valeriya MIKHAILOVA, RUS, 141.32
POLINA TSURSKAYA, 189.50
This was my first time watching Polina, and I was not as impressed as I expected to be. People online made me think she would be super artistic, and, well…her skating comes off a little cold to me (particularly in the FS). She is, however, an insanely good jumper-that definitely lived up to the hype. Absolutely insane. Still, her presentation needs work, and she looks like yet another arm flailer. Oh, joy.
MAI MIHARA, 179.36
This was also my first time watching Mai, and she is just lovely! She’s a good jumper, too, but her strength is her polish. She skates very maturely for her age. I enjoyed her very much, and she also had lovely costumes.
VIVIAN LE, USA, 176.30
Vivian is the skater I was most looking forward to seeing in this event, and she did not disappoint. Though I thought she would get the silver, 3rd is no small accomplishment for your first JGP! Another lovely skater-and her Rippon 3lz-3t is PERFECTION.
RIN NITAYA, 150.53
Rin Nitaya may not have had the showing she was capable of, but she still stood out to me because of one thing: she has some of the most interesting combination spins I have ever seen! I loved that they weren’t the generic ones everybody does, and the timing was really unique-you’ll have to watch to see what I mean. Unfortunately, her FS was not available on YouTube at press time.
VALERIYA MIKHAILOVA, 141.42
Tied with Vivian, my favorite of the top 5 here. I loved the music she used, and her step sequence in the SP was GOALS. Just GOALS. She’s a decent jumper and very light and smooth over the ice. On a side note, needs better costumes.
Thoughts? Questions? Comments of any kind? I’d love to hear them!
Salchows and Swarovskis 
I’m confused about your review of Tsurskaya. She was the only one who I felt presented for the judges at a high level. She was in constant eye contact with them and had a smile on her face a large portion of both performances. Aside from the very end of her SP all her arm movements made sense and didn’t seem out of place to me. Can you explain what constitutes arm flailing and what about her presentation was off?
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Hi Daniel! Thanks for the comment!
I don’t know what it was, but she looked just a little bit cold to me. If she was expressive towards the judges, I get that, and that’s just as important as anything. But I didn’t feel like she was very connected with the audience. However, as I am not a skating judge, I may have missed something! Also, her arm movements did make sense, but they were a little too “windmill-esque” for my taste…again, just my opinion. I will have to re-watch her to see if I still think that after two viewings.
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