The Olympic skating season so far: Injuries and Russian women (and more Russian women. And more. . .)

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The Olympic skating season so far: Injuries and Russian women (and more Russian women. And more. . .)

A baker’s dozen of takeaways halfway through the Grand Prix season – and just under three months from the start of the 2022 Winter Olympics:

1. The injury list added two big names in the last week: Yuzuru Hanyu of Japan, the two-time reigning OIympic champion, and reigning world bronze medalist Alexandra Trusova of Russia, who won Skate America, both have withdrawn from this week’s NHK Trophy with foot injuries, meaning neither can qualify for the Grand Prix Final Dec. 9-12 in Osaka, Japan.

Others previously on the “disabled list”: Japan’s Rika Kihira, the 2018 Grand Prix Final winner and reigning national champion, withdrew from both her scheduled Grand Prix events, as did reigning U.S. champion Bradie Tennell.

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Self-sufficient Nathan Chen an easy winner at Skate Canada

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Self-sufficient Nathan Chen an easy winner at Skate Canada

Nathan Chen has gotten used to training without his coach nearby, having done it during his freshman and sophomore years at Yale while Rafael Arutunian was 3,000 miles away in California.

But Saturday’s free skate at Skate Canada in Vancouver was the first time he had competed without Arutunian at his side in a significant competition during the 10 years they have worked together. With Chen on leave from Yale since May 2020, he and Arutunian had been together virtually every day since.

“He trains all of us to be pretty self-sufficient,” Chen said. “So whether he is there or not, we kind of know what we need to do.”

Chen said his winning performance was “not particularly” affected because Arutunian had to watch from the stands rather than the boards after the coach’s accreditation had been revoked for his inadvertent violation of Covid-19 protocols related to the bubble at the event.

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For Nathan Chen, what happened in Vegas stayed in Vegas

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For Nathan Chen, what happened in Vegas stayed in Vegas

Twenty-eight seconds into his short program at Skate America in Las Vegas a week ago, Nathan Chen found himself with his rear end on the ice.

It wasn’t the first time Chen had fallen in a competition, of course. It actually had happened in his previous individual competition, the 2021 World Championships. And it was on the same opening short program jump, a quadruple lutz, putting him third going into a free skate he easily won to take a third straight world title.

Yet the fall at Skate America last week clearly affected him more. Chen botched his third jumping pass and wound up with his worst short program score since the 2018 Olympics. The desultory free skate (four clean quads notwithstanding) that followed left him third overall, with his lowest total score in 22 international events dating to autumn 2016 and also his first loss since those 2018 Olympics.

That is why Chen chose to go right back to the quad lutz rather than pick an easier jump to open Friday’s short program at Skate Canada in Vancouver.


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Quad Queen Trusova does just one but still easily rules at Skate America

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Quad Queen Trusova does just one but still easily rules at Skate America

It must have felt like a day off for Aleksandra Trusova.

The 17-year-old Quad Queen from Russia was a runaway winner Sunday at Skate America in Las Vegas despite limiting herself to just one free skate quadruple jump, a lutz, because of an unspecified foot injury.

“It was like a day of rest,” Trusova said. “We wanted to skate here with three quads but couldn’t. With the injury, I lost a lot of practice time.”

It was the first time Trusova has attempted fewer than three quads at international competition in 11 events dating to the fall of 2018. She did five clean quads in a national event last month.

The third Grand Prix triumph of Trusova’s career came with a total of 232.37 points, more than 15 ahead of compatriot Daria Usacheva, 15, who was making her senior Grand Prix debut.

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For Japanese pair, Skate America silver medal is a joyous (and rare) surprise

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For Japanese pair, Skate America silver medal is a joyous (and rare) surprise

In the 32 years since the redoubtable Midori Ito became Japan’s first world figure skating champion, her country has become one of the most decorated in the sport.

All the greatest success has been in singles, climaxed by Yuzuru Hanyu’s consecutive Olympic gold medals in 2014 and 2018.

That background is why the silver medalists were the story in the Skate America pairs’ event Saturday night in Las Vegas.

With their second personal best score in two days, skating with an exuberance and joy that delighted the crowd, Riku Miura and Ryuichi Kihara became the first Japanese team to win a medal on the Grand Prix circuit in 10 years, equaling the silver won by Narumi Takahashi and Mervin Tran at the NHK Trophy in 2011.

“We weren’t really hoping or aiming for a medal,” Miura said. “We just wanted to show what we were doing in training. We’re obviously surprised we came in second.”

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