I’ve read this opinion from several different posters, that the matador/bull program was a miss. Honest question, what type of program/music would you suggest CB had used instead?
Given his increasing lack of upper body flexibility, which makes sense since he has been having back issues and he has been at Olympic level for 16 years at 36, I think they either needed to go back to where she, not the damn costume, was the focus, and the character or person he was striving for and intentionally enabling to shine, or to go in an unusual and surprising direction for them. If they were going to do Flamenco-lite, pick decent Flamenco lite music in the Nyah vein; otherwise there are many real and hybrid Flamenco pieces that would have worked better to showcase her. Their music sounded contrived.
Her movements needed to be crisp and clear and her lines unobscured for them to have physical impact, IMO. If they’d run out of gimmicky concepts like their previous ones, they, of all people, could have gone for big romantic sweep and drama in a more traditional style, possibly waltz-based, because they have emotional connection, something that FB/C don’t have, and a different kind than G/F and C/P, who skated before them, do, plus she can bring the
, while the other teams were going for equal, matchy-matchy, and temperamentally balanced. He could have done the trick they relied upon for years, where he did small, quick lifts around the outer curves, so that she didn’t have to skate them, and it would have been romantic and effective and made her look as sweeping and fast as he.
There was too much staccato stuff in the program — and there are many Flamenco styles that are not staccato, even if the timing and movement are sharp and precise, and the footwork is just a part of the program — and if you’re not that fast or technically precise on the blades, which has never been their calling card, it makes the movement look small.
The programs that were more open
moved. C/B played catch-up from behind the 8-ball with their programs for several years, and they came close this season, but another strategy is to start with the bones and embellish as the season goes on, which is more easily done in an open style.
I think the bottom line is that going for an OGM where your best hope is that FB/C make one giant visible mistake like Fear’s and drop out of real contention or not gel in the first place, is not a winning strategy. Picking material that showcases your strengths and hides your weaknesses as much as possible— you can’t skip twizzles — is, and their program was a mixed bag, especially at this stage in their career.
About FB/C winning with mistakes, this isn’t 6.0: it’s an additive system. They can gain points in one thing to make up for what they lose in another. It was very close, and Cizeron was extremely lucky that the severity of his twizzle slip wasn’t visible head on, or they likely would not have won, based on what the replay showed from behind.
It's 2018 all over again but in reverse.
