Olympic Recap: Ladies' Long Program

Sorry this post is a little late, but I wasn't able to see the ladies freeskate as quickly as I had originally intended. I'm sure it's a bit anticlimactic since I'm sure everyone knows the results (how could you miss them?), but I'll share some of my thoughts all the same.

First off, kudos to Shizuka Arakawa. Japan's been having a rough Olympics in Torino, and Arakawa has pretty much turned it around. Japan leaves Torino with one medal, but it's a big one - the gold in the Games' marquee event. Arakawa also owns the distinction of being Japan's first gold medalist in Olympic figure skating. (Midori Ito was Japan's last great skater, who earned bronze at the 1992 Albertville Games and is famous for being the first woman to land a triple axel in competition.) Arakawa will certainly receive a hero's welcome when she returns to Japan. Apparently the country is rolling out golden doughnuts for the occasion.

In a field rife with errors, Arakawa had one of the few clean skates. Though she wasn't perfect - she did pop one triple into a double - she was solid where it counted and never lost her artistry or flow. Technically speaking, it was a bit cautious, but it was enough. Arakawa displayed a maturity and elegance that most of her rivals lacked. She was far and away the best skater of the night, which was reflected in her nearly eight point margin of victory.

A lot of the media focus has been on Sasha Cohen and how she let the gold slip through her fingers. True, she was leading after the short program (by the slimmest of margins), and was America's best hope to continue a 3-Games streak of winning the event. Sasha's hopes of Olympic gold were dashed after falls on her first two jumping passes. Considering those substantial errors, she's lucky to have placed second. But while she did get some help from the rest of the field, she earned her silver by bouncing back from her program's rocky start to end strongly. As her coach told Sasha as she left the ice, "you didn't start the program, but you finished it." She looked shaky on warmup, and after two big mistakes it would be easy to let the program get away. But she fought back, nailing every element for the rest of her skate. Even her artistry and choreography did not seem affected. While it's unfortunate that she wasn't able to skate cleanly throughout and hopefully take gold, the greater tragedy is that Sasha Cohen was again unable to put together two clean programs in one competition. This is a demon she's been wrestling with for some time, and one she'll have to conquer if she wants to stay at the top of the ladies' field.

Irina Slutskaya was the last to skate in the ladies' long program. Since she was in second place by only .03 in the short and Sasha had made key errors, it looked like Irina's gold to lose. And unfortunately, lost it she did. Irina turned in a somewhat disappointing performance and finished with bronze. Her jumps looked off; her landings weren't as solid as they've been in the past and it looked like she had to fight more than usual. Though she opened her program without much difficulty, Slutskaya suffered costly falls and errors during her jumping passes in the second half of her program. Her program also lacked artistry and spark. When the judges marks came back, Sasha's spins, footwork, and artistry were enough to keep Sasha ahead of the Russian veteran.

Fumie Suguri, who placed fourth, also turned in a strong program. But with a lower level of difficulty and less artistic expression, she was unable to capitalize on the shortcomings of Cohen and Slutskaya. Joannie Rochette of Canada skated well, and even got the second highest technical marks of the night. And while lyrical and enjoyable to watch, her artistic scores were not high enough to get her to the podium; she finished fifth. Americans Kimmie Meissner and Emily Hughes placed sixth and seventh respectively. Full results here, long program marks here, and detailed results here.

The Joy of Skating award goes to Silvia Fontana. Although she finished 22nd overall, she was a pleasure to watch and really seemed to be enjoying herself on the ice. She wasn't expected to medal, so she probably did not experience some of the same pressures as the other skaters, but she got to end her Olympic career by skating well in front of her home crowd.
Runner up: Emily Hughes. Emily also came out and skated a great program and really seemed to enjoy every moment out there. Michelle Kwan's withdrawal from Torino made Emily an unexpected Olympian, and every time you see her she just looks thrilled to be a part of it. We'll probably see more of her in the years to come.

The scoring system doesn't seem to be having the same effect in the ladies' event as it has in other places. While the pairs and dancers seem to be pushed to execute harder elements and the men have exhibited greater creativity and more transitions between moves, the women are still doing mostly triple-doubles and are still telegraphing their jumps. After the Nagano Games in 1998, it looked like triple-triple combinations were going to become the new standard in the sport; the triple axel was certainly not materializing as some had expected. And while there are still rumblings about who will be the next woman to incorporate the triple axel or even a quad (Miki Ando did attempt one this time around), there hasn't been a big push to up the level of difficulty.

I think part of this may be due to how the new scoring system rewards putting difficult elements in the second half of the program (those elements skated after the half point mark get a 10% scoring bonus); maybe skaters are holding back some difficulty in the beginning of their programs so that they can try more in the second half. But I'm puzzled as to why there isn't more connecting footwork in the skating between elements. Many of the competitors are still doing basic stroking between jumps and spins. The top skaters - particularly this Olympic's medalists - are the exception, for the most part. And maybe it will be somthing that comes in time. But I don't know why the men seem to be ahead on this one.

Scoring aside, it's been another surprising Olympic free skate for the women. For the fourth times in as many Olympics, it's been something of a surprise finish in ladies' figure skating. In 1994, Oksana Baiul stole the spotlight from the Nancy and Tonya debacle. In 1998, Tara Lipinski leapfrogged Michele Kwan to capture the gold. The 2002 games saw Sarah Hughes skate the program of her life to surpass Kwan and Slutskaya. And this year, when everyone was expecing a showdown bewtween Cohen and Slutskaya, Arakawa bested them both. In one freeskate, Arakawa ended the U.S.'s golden streak in the event and denied Russia an unprecedented figure skating golden sweep. It just goes to show that you never know how things will end up until everyone's skated.