^^ Right. Gabby you are Wonder Woman, and you need to go get 'em lady! Because right now it looks to me like Wakaba Higuchi and Mai Mihara are stealing some thunder, no matter that politically-conflicted judges do not want to give Wakaba and Mai proper credit on PCS. Both ladies were unfairly slighted on PCS at Cup of China, especially in the sp.
Gabby was looking stronger and more confident in her sp than in her first outing this season, but I think it may have been Gabby's World medal rep that helped place her ahead of Wakaba in the sp. I thought Wakaba deserved first place in both segments. Wakaba looks like she's on a mission, even if the judges are trying their best not to fully reward her. Alina Zagitova should have been in 6th or 7th after the sp because she made a mistake on a jumping pass in a tough field of ladies where no other top lady made that kind of mistake. Unsurprisingly, Zagitova was held up because she and Medvedeva are perceived as 'special' and to be treated with kid gloves.
Osmond, IMO, is the class of the ladies field, especially in terms of her power, technique and well-rounded abilities. What Osmond needs is to ace her confidence in order to go out there and lay it down. It's just an OTT conceit that the Russian ladies are better than everybody else when they aren't. The Russian ladies are competitive and strong technically, but they DO NOT deserve PCS marks out the wazoo. Still, with the depth and high quality exhibited at CoC, I think every lady better start thinking in terms of giving themselves the best advantage they can by doing everything in their power to skate well in both programs. Of course that's what everyone hopes to do when they go out there. But the stakes are extremely high this season, and every competitor's mindset has to be strong if they want to win. And skaters only have control over their performances, not over judges' whims. That was a crock the way Zagitova was held up. Even Tukytamysheva skated better than Radionova and Zagitova in the sp. And of course Mihara was low-balled in both segments and should have comfortably won the bronze medal over Radionova.
Bottom line and wake-up call: Gabby's fp music did not build and therefore did not help her against the better paced and more crowd-pleasing, inspirational music the other top ladies had for their fps, especially Mihara and Wakaba. I think it should be obvious to Gabby and her team at this point that she needs to make some fixes to the fp. So add in the Wonder Woman track aptly suggested by
@poths, or follow the trend by going back to Gabby's last season tried and true fp music. When push comes to shove, Gabby's fp this season is not going to help her make the impact she needs to make in a field this hugely talented. It never pays to listen to the wrong criticism. For example, the nose-in-the-air coded critiques in some quarters about Gabby needing 'refinements.' Instead of Lori catering to that erroneous complaint about Gabby, I would have slammed some womanly fierceness and power along with stellar grace & boffo technique right back in their faces. Take note that's exactly what Wakaba is doing.
Hopefully she can keep it together for the freeskate!
I don't need you to agree with me either. You were the one who began the back-and-forth regarding Osmond by misinterpreting and exaggerating my initial commentary. Therefore, please acknowledge your misperceptions of my posts. It does pay to take it easy indeed and learn to be humble. There's no accounting for misunderstandings on an Internet forum.
