Cup of China Summary

Cup of China, the third competition in the International Skating Union’s Grand Prix series, was held last week, November 9-12. There are six competitions in the series, the finals among the top six scorers in each discipline taking place next month in St. Petersburg, Russia.

It is still early in the season, so programs are being shaken out, tested, and improved. For example, it was the first competition for American ice dancers Tanith Belbin and Benjamin Agosto this season, as well as the debut of their long program, set to the overture of “That’s Entertainment.” They came in second, to Russians Domnina and Shabalin, even though they were leading by the end of their original dance.

For Evan Lysacek, the tried and true seemed to be the trick. His marvelous “Carmen” long program, which has helped him come from behind several times, including the Olympics, when he surged from tenth to fourth. (He advanced from eighth to third at the world championships in February and March.) At Cup of China, Lysacek moved from second after the short program to score a near twenty-one point win.

Emily Hughes, younger sister of Olympic gold medalist Sarah Hughes, has experienced highs and lows in her performances so far this season. Both her programs are relatively new, although she has performed her short program (ironically, also set to “Carmen”) more often than her long program. As a result, at Cup of China, Emily was first after her short program, but faltered to third after completing her long program.

Although Emily came in fifth at Skate America in Hartford two weeks earlier, she built upon that experience making improvements to her short program, enabling her to “skate clean” and take first after the first day of competition in Nanjing.

“I already did this program once and I knew the parts I had to focus on, and I was really happy the way it turned out,” Emily said. “I came into this competition with a little different mind set from Skate America. Every time I go out I want to do a better program.”

Her short program included a triple-flip toe-loop combination, a triple flip, and double Axel, as well as some interesting spins. Emily won a bronze at last year’s national championships and competed at the Olympics in Nagano when she replaced Michelle Kwan, who dropped out due to injury. She received a level four for her combination spin and a level three for her flying sit spin picking up 56.74 points.

“My combination was questionable at Skate America, so being able to come out here and do a clean program and moving on from Skate America was big for me,” Emily said. She opted out of doing a triple Lutz in combination. “My triple Lutz combination has not been as good as it could be, so we decided to change the combination to the (triple) flip, hoping that it would get a higher score and it did.”

Unfortunately, Emily experienced some problems in her long program, which featured a double Axel, a triple flip-double toe-loop combination, a triple Salchow and a combination spin that was graded a level four. However, important points were lost when she under-rotated a triple toe-loop, a Lutz, and a flip. As a result, her lower score (94.38) caused her to slip to third place. Julia Sebestyen of Hungary captured the gold medal, and Yukari Nakano of Japan took the silver.

“I knew I had to go out there and do a really good program,” Emily said. “There are a lot of things I could have done better. I felt a little shaky and tried to go for the jumps, but some of them weren't really there - but it's a medal and so I am really happy about it.”

“There were some points that were a little shaky with some of my jumps and the steps in between, but I still feel it was a better program than I did last time, and that was one of my goals coming into this competition. So I did two things – getting a medal and doing a better program and I am happy about both of those things.”

Emily is in a good position to qualify for the Grand Prix finals in St. Petersburg the week before Christmas. After three events, she is in first place, earning seven points at Skate America and eleven at China. She has one more non-scoring Grand Prix event.