2012 WORLD JUNIOR CHAMPIONSHIPS
PEAK PERFORMANCE U.S. SKATERS MINE FOUR MEDALS IN MINSK by LYNN RUTHERFORD
M
insk, the capital city of Belarus, made U.S. skaters feel right at home at the 2012 World Junior Figure Skating Championships, and the Americans returned the favor with their best performances of the season. Te 18-member contingent grabbed four medals plus a fourth-place finish, helping to qualify the U.S. for three entries in each disci- pline at next season’s World Junior Champion- ships.
U.S. junior champion Gracie Gold arrived
in Minsk with great expectations but little expe- rience. Te 16-year-old impressed at the 2012 U.S. Championships, but international judges had seen her just once, awarding her gold at the Junior Grand Prix in Estonia last fall. Could she hold her own among the world’s best, including the explosive Russian team?
“I think I can compete with them, and
when we get to that, I'll think more about it,” the Chicago-based teen said at the U.S. Champion- ships.
When the time came, Gold more than held
her own, landing a triple flip-triple toe loop com- bination in her short to place second, about five points behind Russia’s Julia Lipnitskaia, the Ju- nior Grand Prix Final champion. Gold’s free skate to music from Te Mis-
sion and Te Untouchables film soundtracks was equally strong, opening with a triple Lutz-triple toe and double Axel-triple toe, followed by three superb spins and three more triples. She earned a personal-best 113.85 points and finished with
Gracie Gold
171.85 points to take silver. Lipnitskaia capped a perfect junior season with gold, and her team- mate, 2011 World Junior champion Adelina Sot- nikova, won bronze. “I didn’t skate my absolute best but it was
really good,” Gold said. “It was definitely the big- gest competition I’ve ever been to and the most difficult. All of the girls were really good skaters, especially the top five.” Gold is taking her senior tests soon and hopes to compete on the senior circuit this fall. “I’m so grateful I got the chance to go to
junior Worlds,” she said. “It would be cool to get a senior Grand Prix.” Christina Gao, fourth at junior Worlds last season, was fifth after the short and opened her free skate with a triple flip-triple toe but later stepped out of a triple loop and popped an in- tended triple Salchow into a single. She placed seventh with 151.09 points. “I am really proud of what I did today over-
all, even if I did not get the best result today,” the 17-year-old Gao said. “I am a bit upset that the two elements I work the hardest on did not work today, but I am sure my time will come.” After an 11th-place short, California’s Van- essa Lam opened her free with a combination of triple Lutz and two double loops but fell on a triple toe loop and double Axel. She placed 13th with 138.94 points. “It’s a bit frustrating to miss those two ele- ments, but I know what I have to work on when I get back home,” Lam said.
Jason Brown To no one’s surprise, the men’s event turned
into a rematch between the top three finishers at the Junior Grand Prix Final: Jason Brown of Chicago, Joshua Farris of Colorado Springs and China’s high-flying Han Yan. Tis time, the 15-year-old Yan hit a qua-
druple toe loop in his free skate to edge out his American rivals, with Farris winning silver and Brown taking bronze. Yan is the first Chinese man to win junior Worlds. After winning the short program with a
solid triple Axel and triple flip-triple toe, Farris opened his free skate to Rachmaninoff’s “Piano Concerto No. 2” with back-to-back triple Axels. His elegant program was marred only by a slight stumble on the landing of a triple Lutz-triple toe, and he earned 146.54 points, just 0.48 less than Yan.
“I am not going to lie, I think it was my
best program ever,” Farris, who placed 16th at the 2012 U.S. Championships, said. “My coach [Da- mon Allen] told me before I went out to make sure I bend my knees before [jump] take-off, and because I was really nervous, that helped.” Te 17-year-old, who trains alongside
World champion Patrick Chan under coach Christy Krall, hopes to add a quad toe to his pro- grams next season. “I know I need the quad, and more power, to be competitive on the international senior level,” he said. “Here, I wanted to concentrate on clean programs, which was very successful.” Unlike Yan and Farris, Brown does not yet
Joshua Farris
10 APRIL 2012
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