Men's World Figure Skating Championships

Thursday night, Nick and I went to the Staples Center to watch the men's free skate at the World Figure Skating Championships. It was the first time that either of us have watched professional skating, so we weren't sure what to expect. We did know that the first group of skaters weren't ones that were the best of the best in the world, so when we showed up 25 minutes after the start of the competition, we weren't too upset that the first skater we saw the the 5th person on the list.

It took a while to find our seats because they weren't located in any section that was listed on signs. Our ticket said PR6, but every number we saw were in the hundreds (Section 101, 201, etc.). We finally asked a nearby attendant where our section was, and he told us to go to the nearby doors and show our ticket to the lady standing in front of it. We did so, and she opened the door for us and told us to walk upstairs and knock on the door that we arrive at and show the person up there our ticket. We thought that this was very strange and started to wonder where we were going. After going up two flights of stairs, we reach the door and show the woman our ticket and she lets us in. We notice that the floors are carpeted, the walls have wood paneling, and there was a full service restaurant in front of us (which made us feel really strange because we were carrying around our 'dinners' from Nate and Al's downstairs). It was all very swank and completely surprising to us since we had no idea that there was this section in the Staples Center. We also noticed that this was the floor with access to the private suites, which were mainly empty for this event. We finally reach our section and were told to wait until the skater finished his routine. We were eventually led to our seats, which were quite comfortable. They were fully padded and the good thing for Nick was that the walkway was in front of us, so Nick could stretch out his legs if he wanted to. While we weren't at the floor level, we still had a good view of the ice.

After watching the first couple of groups perform, I realize that technically, these skaters weren't as bad as I had expected. With the exception of one skater, all of them attempted a triple axel, and some of them even landed a quad jump. Their speed and artistry may not be up to par with the best in the world, but they were still exciting to watch.

There was a skater from Kazakhstan, Denis Ten, who was 17th after the short program, but skated an amazing long program. Two triple axels (one in combination) and no falls on his other jumps, great spins and flexibility, and a wonderfully choreographed routine to one of the famous classical composers (I want to say Bach, but it may have been Rachmaninoff). We gave him a standing ovation for his great performance, and at the end of the night, he ended up in 8th place.

Another touching moment was from the Japanese skater, Nobinaru Oda. He also skated cleanly and received high marks for his program. It was easy to tell that he was happy with his performance because he was crying from the joy of doing so well at one of the biggest skating competitions out there.

And then we got to the final group, with Canada's Patrick Chan, France's Brian Joubert, and the USA's Evan Lysacek. There was also the Italian skater, Samuel Contesti, who had a very interesting performance to a cowboy theme...at one point, he was skating to Cotton Eye Joe. We thought it was a great routine, but the judges didn't see it that way.

But the night belonged to Evan Lysacek. He skated a clean routine, landing both of his triple axels and was so excited about his performance that during his final combination spin, he was pumping his arms. He got a rousing standing ovation and the best free skate score of the night. The leader after the short program, Brian Joubert, had the difficult task of following Evan and he did very well for the first 4 minutes 25 seconds. He cleanly landed his quad and a triple axel, triple toe loop, but stepped out of his second triple axel, which wasn't too serious of an error. However, with 15 seconds left in his routine, he performed a double axel, which he over-rotated so much that it caused him to fall on his stomach and slide towards the wall (fortunately, he was able to stop himself from hitting the wall). He got up to finish his routine, but after the music stopped, you could see the disappointment on his face as he stood on the ice, shocked that he lost the world title at the very end of his routine. It was sad to watch, but for the Americans in the crowd, we were thrilled to see Evan Lysacek win his first world title. Hopefully this will is a good sign of what's to come at the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver :)