U.S. Ladies [#29]: Skating with Adjusted Vision

[Jammers]

Any word on Ting? It's been well over a year since her injury and she's still hurt? Does anyone have any news on her? I felt she was the one with the most potential of the younger girls but this will be two years not competing. I felt like her trajectory was going to make her a contender to make the Olympic team but now it seems like she's done for yet another season.

 

[kalle]

Any word on Ting? It's been well over a year since her injury and she's still hurt? Does anyone have any news on her? I felt she was the one with the most potential of the younger girls but this will be two years not competing. I felt like her trajectory was going to make her a contender to make the Olympic team but now it seems like she's done for yet another season.

I really miss Ting! She and Hannah brought my attention back to the US ladies. I hope Ting will be back next season if she remains injury free ?

 

[soogar]

Yup it was Bronze medalist Nancy who got the lions share of endorsements after Albertville and not Gold medalist Kristi. The media and US skating establishment went really hardcore for Nancy (remember it played a big role in Tonya's beef with the establishment and the eventual wack) who was considered the perfect All American girl compared to Kristi who was seen as too exotic.

I think what worked for Nancy was her manager now husband, Jerry Solomon. He already managed Ivan Lendl and had the tennis endorsement connections. Nancy had endorsements with both Rolex and Reebok, which I am certain came from Solomon's familiarity with those companies through tennis. She also had good looks and the good sense to let her coaches package her by getting her teeth fixed and wearing Vera Wang dresses. She was very working class and she didn't really sound refined in interviews, but she had a lot of common sense, and the right people to help her along. I think she was one of the luckiest skaters that ever lived. Two Olympic medals , one for a dreadful performance in Albertville, and getting whacked in the knee and was still able to heal and skate great at the Olympics. It wasn't something that she wanted, but she was very fortunate with the way things turned out.

Edited to bring it back to today, Bradie is the better skater but Mariah is so darn cute. I also think that Mariah is more open in her social media accounts. Bradie isn't the same way but for marketing and endorsement purposes, it helps to be like Mariah. I

 

[Vagabond]

No one is lucky to get whacked in the knee.

 

[soogar]

No one is lucky to get whacked in the knee.

I think she was very lucky that she was able to recover in time for the Olympics. I never saw the logic in the Harding camp whacking this nervous skater, but her value had increased exponentially because of it. She would have had an Olympic boost with her medal, but not the level of fame that followed after that.

 

[Lemonade20]

I think she was very lucky that she was able to recover in time for the Olympics. I never saw the logic in the Harding camp whacking this nervous skater, but her value had increased exponentially because of it. She would have had an Olympic boost with her medal, but not the level of fame that followed after that.

Agreed, Nancy should be thanking Tonya for bringing all this media attention on her. No one deserved to get hit like that, but it turned out just fine for her

 

[VGThuy]

She shouldn’t thank someone for giving her something she never asked for. It’s clear post-Olympics she was still dealing with the trauma of the situation and was also handling a media circus afterwards. I think people get twisted when they think Nancy should be thanking Tonya. They’re also saying they think Tonya was personally responsible for what happened which is funny because she herself tries so hard to convince people otherwise.

 

[skatingguy]

I think she was very lucky that she was able to recover in time for the Olympics. I never saw the logic in the Harding camp whacking this nervous skater, but her value had increased exponentially because of it. She would have had an Olympic boost with her medal, but not the level of fame that followed after that.

Agreed, Nancy should be thanking Tonya for bringing all this media attention on her. No one deserved to get hit like that, but it turned out just fine for her

A lot of skaters banked some serious dough following the 1994 Olympics. All the top skaters banked multi-millions, though some spent it faster than others, and many minor skaters did pretty well for themselves in the mid to late '90's.

 

[Lemonade20]

Exactly, it brought a lot of attention to figure skating

 

[annie720]

Any word on Ting? It's been well over a year since her injury and she's still hurt? Does anyone have any news on her? I felt she was the one with the most potential of the younger girls but this will be two years not competing. I felt like her trajectory was going to make her a contender to make the Olympic team but now it seems like she's done for yet another season.

Any chance she is thinking of skating for China?

 

[Natanielle825]

I thought Bradie's programs last year were stellar. Bradie is ranked #2 in the world, and Marian is ranked 14th.....call me silly, but..................

Personally I much preferred her programs from the previous year, I thought the dramatic SP music and the dramatic parts of the FS suited her well. And yes, while I've been a little discouraged by her jumps this season, she is more internationally relevant than Mariah. But idk where you get that #2 ranking - it isn't at all reflective of where she stands in the current world field. Idk if at this point she's so much farther ahead than Mariah that the US would be egregious in awarding Mariah the national title if she skates well.

 

[concorde]

Any word on Ting? It's been well over a year since her injury and she's still hurt? Does anyone have any news on her?

She was seen skating earlier this week.

 

[lurkz2]

Personally I much preferred her programs from the previous year, I thought the dramatic SP music and the dramatic parts of the FS suited her well. And yes, while I've been a little discouraged by her jumps this season, she is more internationally relevant than Mariah. But idk where you get that #2 ranking - it isn't at all reflective of where she stands in the current world field. Idk if at this point she's so much farther ahead than Mariah that the US would be egregious in awarding Mariah the national title if she skates well.

Bradie finished second because she had several comps where she did fairly well, competed at 4CC, and there was no Worlds so ppl who were banking on the points from Worlds couldn't make up ground. The opposite situation from Nathan who ended up with the #4 ranking.

 

[VALuvsMKwan]

Exactly, it brought a lot of attention to figure skating

So do you have a career for which you would be willing to be attacked physically and publicly? Asking for a friend.

 

[Marco]

If we forget the whack for a second - she approached 94 Olympics as a reigning Olympic medalist and 2 time World medalist, but one who was wildly inconsistent and funked 93 Worlds to fall off the podium when all the top guns retired and she only had to fight Bonaly and a newbie Baiul. Given her credentials she was always going to be a medal favorite for 1994 but did anyone really think she had the gold in her bag? In hindsight I felt 1994 was really up for grabs. Baiul was still new-ish and not that consistent, Chen wasn't consistent champion calibre (yet), Bonaly had the jumps but the judges didn't like her, Sato had everything but her lutz and flip were inconsistent, etc.

Perhaps the whack helped her focus on her skating the same way Cohen's 2 opening falls in 2006 helped her pull through the rest of her performance.

 

[Lemonade20]

I’m just saying the world paid attention because of the intense media attention brought on by that. Take a lemon and make lemonade out of it

 

[AJ Skatefan]

Nancy should have won. That is all.

 

[NAOTMAA]

If we forget the whack for a second - she approached 94 Olympics as a reigning Olympic medalist and 2 time World medalist, but one who was wildly inconsistent and funked 93 Worlds to fall off the podium when all the top guns retired and she only had to fight Bonaly and a newbie Baiul. Given her credentials she was always going to be a medal favorite for 1994 but did anyone really think she had the gold in her bag? In hindsight I felt 1994 was really up for grabs. Baiul was still new-ish and not that consistent, Chen wasn't consistent champion calibre (yet), Bonaly had the jumps but the judges didn't like her, Sato had everything but her lutz and flip were inconsistent, etc.

Perhaps the whack helped her focus on her skating the same way Cohen's 2 opening falls in 2006 helped her pull through the rest of her performance.

I've always thought despite the two falls it was one of her best performances. I thought she skated with more freedom after the two falls then she ever had before.

The usual Sasha free skate would start off strong, although somewhat cautious, and then half way through the nerves would take hold and she would start making mistakes. You were always holding your breath waiting for her to make the usual mistakes and it looked like she was waiting for them to happen too. The Olympics was different because the mistakes came right off the top. After that there was no reason to be cautious anymore because the mistakes already came and she was able to skate more freely.

 

[VGThuy]

Agreed. That’s why I watch her Olympic performances more than any others of her. There was a sense of freedom and abandon in both the SP and the LP after the two falls.

 

[UGG]

I see zero similarity between Sasha falling twice at the beginning of her Olympic LP vs Nancy not falling and skating the best LP if her life while overcoming a violent assault and all the psychological effects thereafter as well as the hounding of the media reminding her daily of the incident. They aren’t similar in any way. ?‍

 

[Sylvia]

Cross-posting this Fan Zone friendship article here & in the U.S. Pairs thread:

Texas Teammates Ashley Cain-Gribble, Timothy LeDuc and Amber Glenn Are Squad Goals - U.S. Figure Skating Fan Zone

Any skater will know that lifelong friendships are born at the rink. It is natural for friendships to blossom when you spend so many hours training together in the

usfigureskatingfanzone.com

Excerpt:

All these years later, Glenn continues to impress them with her jumping prowess. "At 21, a lot of people think that they won't learn anything new and that they won't reinvent themselves in their career. What Amber has been able to do, especially this past year, with adding a triple Axel and now she's practicing quad toes, we look at her and we see things are still possible," praises Cain-Gribble.

 

[SkateFanBerlin]

Agreed, Nancy should be thanking Tonya for bringing all this media attention on her. No one deserved to get hit like that, but it turned out just fine for her

Hardly

 

[olympic]

If we forget the whack for a second - she approached 94 Olympics as a reigning Olympic medalist and 2 time World medalist, but one who was wildly inconsistent and funked 93 Worlds to fall off the podium when all the top guns retired and she only had to fight Bonaly and a newbie Baiul. Given her credentials she was always going to be a medal favorite for 1994 but did anyone really think she had the gold in her bag? In hindsight I felt 1994 was really up for grabs. Baiul was still new-ish and not that consistent, Chen wasn't consistent champion calibre (yet), Bonaly had the jumps but the judges didn't like her, Sato had everything but her lutz and flip were inconsistent, etc.

Perhaps the whack helped her focus on her skating the same way Cohen's 2 opening falls in 2006 helped her pull through the rest of her performance.

Good Analysis. I do think she was a slight favorite going into 93 Worlds. I think her biggest competition based on past performances was going to be Bonaly and Lu. As you said, Bonaly was not well-liked by judges, but also Lu had not quite developed artistry, so it was reasonable to assume she could win if she could skate competently - But therein lies the rub. She was pretty mediocre in the LPs at 92 Olympics and Worlds. It was not going to be that easy to predict.

The 1st time I noticed Baiul was her silver at 93 Euros behind Bonaly and she fought for that spot with Marina Kiehlmann. But her orphan story and on-ice personality were made-for-TV, and when she performed cleanly at Worlds when Nancy did not, it snagged her the top prize. It was never going to Bonaly or Lu (at that point).

In 1994, Baiul was now in the conversation and Nancy had not really done anything to reinsert herself as a bigger threat over the past year (although her 1993 Piruetten performance was a big positive, it could be construed as a one-off). I think there was speculation that the whack was not going to really help her ... until she was actually on the ice in Lillehamer getting it done and in retrospect, it would appear the whack helped her refocus (I get the Nancy-Sasha analogy).

It's been rehashed a zillion times. Nancy wuz robbed in Lillihamer. I will go to my grave believing that. 5 triples / better spins / spiral / better stroking / coherent program and back v. 3 triples / lesser spins / unfocused program / bad costume. I wish Nancy hit a clean 3F at the beginning and it never would've been discussed.

 

[concorde]

USFS (not Nancy) was the one that really benefitted from "the whack."

 

[acraven]

There was a significant uptick in the price of All-Event tickets for Nationals after The Whack.

 

[NAOTMAA]

Well Nancy did say the wack did in a way give her a whole new motivation and reason to skate. A lot of people thought she wouldn't be able to skate again and she wanted to prove them all wrong. She was doing it for herself now and stopped thinking of everyone else. While she did still have pressure on her it wasn't the same as it was pre-wack. It was very different pressure and I think it was to Nancy's benefit.

 

[tony]

Well Nancy did say the wack did in a way give her a whole new motivation and reason to skate. A lot of people thought she wouldn't be able to skate again and she wanted to prove them all wrong. She was doing it for herself now and stopped thinking of everyone else. While she did still have pressure on her it wasn't the same as it was pre-wack. It was very different pressure and I think it was to Nancy's benefit.

Well, she sure didn’t think that for very long when she became the center of all attention and the news broke of her relationship with Solomon during one of the first pro events the next season. She did an interview with CBS/Scott or maybe it was Verne and she was super agitated the whole time. And then of course she had her ups and downs as a pro, but she got it all back together just in time for the scene to be completely shut down, at the 2000 Goodwill Games.

 

[concorde]

What ever happened to the Goodwill Games?

 

[Vagabond]

What ever happened to the Goodwill Games?

They were donated to Goodwill.

Don't look at me like that!

 

[Tinami Amori]

What ever happened to the Goodwill Games?

They took place only 6 times (5 summers, 1 winter) , had very low TV ratings, viewership was down, could not fill the advert spots, so Time-Warner (owners) cancelled them.