I thought at the time of her withdrawal from Skate America, that she would p!ss off a number of people at USFSA--mostly because she could have notified them a week ahead that she needed to deal with the infected foot and allow them a chance to pick someone else (and there were US ladies on the wait list who could have gone on short notice). But prior to that I thought Ashley made the following mistakes:
Strategic Mistake #1. Not getting a new short program.
Strategic Mistake #2: Not asking for a Challenger assignment, which would have given her another vehicle to get mileage on the new programs in addition to the GP series. Particularly important in the Olympic selection season.
Tactical Mistake #3: Not sticking with her new LaLa Land FS program but getting sidetracked going back to Moulin Rouge, essentially wasting time and spinning her wheels. I'm convinced that 2 GP + 1 Challenger outing would have given the new programs the badly-needed prior exposure leading up to Nationals, and opportunity to improve.
Tactical Mistake #4: Watering down all the most interesting choreography from the 2016 Hip Hip SP, and not replacing it with anything...much less anything worthy. This made it seem not only stale, but empty...and no amount of nice new dresses could get around that.
Possible Factor #5: I'm not sure that her appearance in the ESPN Body Issue endeared her to the USFSA--there are enough conservative elements in the organization (including judges) that might have taken offense.
She left the door open for the judges by biffing a key jump element in the SP and one in the FS. But I think there was a lot of shenanigans going on with the PCS on the top 4 ladies, and Ashley was held down in both SP and FS scoring of some of the components particularly performance and interpretation.
I feel for her. And IMO, they are crazy not to at least send Ashley to Worlds where more is on the line in terms of GP and 2019 Worlds spots for US ladies.
Great that Bradie and her coach know when and how to fend off USFS meddling. 
