2009 World Figure Skating Ladies Championships
ISU Competitive Season Wraps Up With the Women's Competition
Apr 24, 2009
This year's world championships was held in Los Angeles and called (for American audiences) by 5-time World Champions Michelle Kwan and Dick Button, along with Scott Hamilton and Sandra Besic.
March 23-29, 2009, each of the top ladies presented programs that made for a great competition.
Gold Medal: Korea’s Yu-Na Kim had elegant musicality and huge, flying jumps repeated an incredible short program. Coached by former Canadian champion skater Brian Orser, she earned a short program world record. If she can stay healthy and undistracted by her skyrocketing fame during the off-season, she may just be the golden girl again next year. Kim enchanted the audience again, from her opening triple flip triple toe that flew across the ice, past a triple Lutz, double double combo, through beautiful choreography that nearly every other skater can learn from. She flubbed up one of her triples, but the audience forgave her and began clapping to her music. 207.71 total means she’s the first woman ever to break the 200 mark at the World Championships.
Silver Medal: Canada’s Joannie Rochette was in 2nd after the short program and was hoping her performance would be enough to assure her a spot on her country’s team for Vancouver. While she placed 3rd in the long program, her combined score was enough for 2nd place overall. This 23-year-old has 7 World’s under her belt and was vying for her first medal here. Her emerald dress complemented passionate choreography and a moderately-clean performance. She didn’t push the triple jump combinations and doubled one of her jumps, but her exhausting footwork was fast, intricate, and musically expressive. It was nice to see a split-leap enhance artistic expression again, but s triple Salchow at the end of her program was slow, like her final spin. Her 191.29 total made her the first Canadian woman to medal here since 1988 – although she was over 16 points behind Kim’s total.
Bronze Medal: Japan’s Miki Ando, the 2007 World Champion, put her required double Axel in combo with a triple toe loop to start the program. Not surprisingly, since she landed her first triple Salchow only two years after she started skating, Ando knocked out clean jumps to the point of complete exhaustion, and her spins showed it; they were in slow motion at times. She was thrilled with her solid program, but we’ll expect to see better choreography at the Olympics – or how about ANY choreography next year. She placed 4th in the short program and 2nd in the free skate, earning a 190.38 total.
4th Place: Japan’s Mao Asada, the defending World Champion, landed two nice triple Axels in the warm-up, but that’s not surprising since she’s the first lady to ever have landed two of them in a competition program. Her first one was right in front of the judges and clean, but she fell on her second. A triple flip, double loop, double loop combo was clean but not quite enough to make up the points she’s behind Kim. Finally, we saw an interesting spiral sequence that was beautiful and used as an entrance into three more clean jump passes. Her aubergine lace dress dramatically matched her music, the Masquerade Waltz. It wasn’t perfectly skated, and she fell from 3rd in the short program to 4th in the long program and overall with a respectable 188.09 total.
5th Place: America’s Rachael Flatt’s 1st trip to the World Championships this year gained her more experience on the international skating scene and showcased her solid figure skating technique. This 2008 World Junior Champion opened up her first triple triple combo, but gave a solid performance otherwise, landing two triple Lutz (one in combo) before showing good flexibility in her spiral sequence. Her most difficult jumps, including a triple flip, double double combo, came in clean at the very end of the program. A side-by-side comparison of this 16-year-old next to the rest of the world’s leading ladies leaves little doubt that the US will be competing for a medal at next year’s Winter Olympics. The judges took their time trying to find reasons to downgrade her jumps, but her total was 172.41, reflecting a jump from 7th place in the short program to 5th place in the free skate.
Final Standings Continued in Part Two: 2009 ISU Worlds Women’s Skating
