SENIOR LADIES
Wagner breathes a sigh of relief after learning that she held on to win her second consecutive U.S. title, as coaches Phillip Mills and John Nicks congratulate her.
A game-changing final After a gray and subfreezing week in Oma-
ha, the ladies final was the hottest ticket in town. Many who attended the short program on Turs- day returned to pull for the young upstart whose talents failed her so publicly just two days before. As Gold took the ice for her free skate, skat- ing 13th and far from the leaders, the largest au- dience of the week seemed to collectively hold its breath. Tis time, she would not disappoint. Skating without apology, Gold opened with
a huge triple Lutz-triple toe as the crowd roared its support. When she followed with a double Axel-triple toe, it was clear there was magic in the air. “After my triple flip, I only had one more jump and a spin left,” Gold said. “I turned to the crowd and they all clapped, and that’s when I was like, ‘I’m done. I have one jump left.’ Tat’s when I really started to think that this is real, this is happening, this is literally my dream come true.” Gold finished with seven clean jumps for a mind-numbing 132.49 points, the second-best free skate score in U.S. Championships history. (Sasha Cohen posted a 134.03 free skate score in 2006.) Her total score of 186.57 sent a surge of energy rippling through the arena. And there were still seven skaters left. Samantha Cesario had the unenviable task
of skating next. When her Black Swan music be- gan, people were still talking about Gold. To her credit, Cesario skated a relatively clean program to finish in eighth place with 170.15 points. One by one, the leading ladies took the
Ashley Wagner grabs the short program lead with her compelling “Red Violin” program.
Gao meant that with Gold seemingly out of the running, the ladies competition still held much drama. But lurking on an unofficial practice ice the day after her self-proclaimed “horrific” short pro- gram was Gold. Only this time, away from all the attention, the outwardly confident Gold had inner struggles. “It was a little shaky getting out there,” she said of her off-day practice. “I wasn’t in the best frame of mind. I was really upset at myself. But as
14 MARCH 2013
I started skating, I started thinking, ‘Tis is OK. I can do this. It’s just the short program. You know, I’m kind of down [in standings] from medaling, but that doesn’t mean anything in terms of what I can put out in the long program.’
“I just kept skating, and I had to just take it one step at a time: ‘Tis is the jump that I’m doing in the practice. I’m not doing the program right now, so it doesn’t matter.’” Somewhere, on that practice ice, the teen from Glen Ellyn, Ill., regained her strength.
ice. And program after program, Gold’s lead re- mained unchallenged. When it came down to the final three — Zawadzki, Wagner, Nagasu — the arena crowd and a live NBC audience were afraid to blink. Zawadzki, skating to “Rhapsody in Blue,”
came out strong, but when her triple flip turned into a double, a chink in her armor was exposed. A fall on her second triple Lutz resulted in a free skate score of 114.32 (for a total 179.63), a per- sonal best. But it put her nowhere near Gold, who was asked by NBC to wait backstage with a camera trained on her to gauge her reaction. As Zawadzki left the kiss and cry, Wag- ner was standing nearby on the boards getting last-second words from coach John Nicks. “Go get ’em, Ash!” Zawadzki shouted.
PHOTOS BY JAY ADEFF
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84