Busy Week as Most of Europe Holds Nationals

Four Nationals marred by alarming injury; German Nationals plagued by multiple injuries; top French and Italian stars do better at their Nationals.

For European skaters, December means Nationals. Most of the countries on the continent have their Nationals sometime in the month. This week was the peak, with a dozen different nations holding events. Most European National Championships are very small affairs, often containing only a handful of top-level skaters, if that. But this week, the countries holding Nationals including France, Italy, and Germany. They also included four smaller countries who hold their Nationals together as one, where things this weekend took an alarming turn for the top name there.

Four Nationals

For many years now, Hungary, the Czech Republic, and Slovakia have held their Nationals together, as one event. Three years ago, Poland joined them for the first time, and this year the country’s hosting it, in the southern city of Katowice. Through this manner each country offered three senior titles, plus their junior ice dance titles. Also novice pair titles, but there was no senior pairs competition. The results of each country’s skaters also gets them points towards a team trophy, which ultimately went to Poland.

By far the best skater present, Michel Brezina won the short program by some way, despite a lack of quadruple jumps and a doubled axel jump, and looked well on his way to his fourth Czech title. Then while skating his free, he fell on his shoulder hard enough he couldn’t continue. In fact, he could barely get off the ice on his own power. Now comes an anxious wait to see if he’ll show up at Europeans and whether there’s any chance of his reversing his recent struggles there.

In his place, young Jiri Belohradsky rose up to take his first national title, ten points ahead of brother Matyas, and squeaked to the top of the overall standings. A couple of mistakes had left him in fifth after the short, but despite trouble with his lutzs, including a fall, his free was a good one. Krzysztof Gala, who had been second after the short, ultimately stayed there, but with a fourth place free he only very narrowly managed his first Polish title ahead of defending champion Igor Reznichenko. Gala landed a quad toe loop-triple toe loop jump combination in his short. Reznichenko landed his triple axel, but put a hand down on a solo quad toe and botched a combination. Neither landed clean quads or skated at all well in the free, thought Reznichenko pulled off another clean triple axel and generally more technical content.

Matyas Belohradsky strugged with underrotations in his free and finished fourth. Below him, Alexander Borovoj in eight and Jakub Krsnak in ninth won their first Hungarian and Slovakian titles respectively. They both struggled to rotate harder triple jumps, or even land easier ones clean. But there was only one other Hungarian and two other Slovakian men in the competition, and they finished much lower.

Ivett Toth blew the other ladies off the ice, claiming her fourth straight Hungarian title. She had a spin invalidated in the free, but she landed all of her jumps, including a triple toe-triple toe in the short and a triple lutz-loop-triple salchow in the free. In second and third, on the other hand, things ended up being pretty close between Nicole Rajicova winning her fourth Slovakian title and Michaela Lucie Hanzlikova winning her first Czech one. Finishing second, Rajicova didn’t have anyone able to challenge her for the title. This was fortunate for her, since she botched her combination in the short and fell twice in the free, including on the only hard triple she attempted.

Hanzlikova didn’t do much more technical content, but her skating was cleaner, which she needed  to get the title over four time and reigning champion Eliska Brezinova. Brezinova unsuccessfully attempted a lutz in each program, had a fall in each, managed only triple toes clean, and finished fourth overall. The four of them were far above the rest of the field, including Elzbieta Gabryszak in eighth, who claimed her first Polish title over Agnieszka Rejment in ninth. The salchow Gabryszak landed in combination in the short was the only clean triple any Polish lady in the competition landed.

The senior ice dance competition started with two Polish teams, two Czech teams, and one Slovakian team. One Polish team withdrew. The other, two time and reigning champions Natalia Kalizek & Maksym Spodyriev, topped the standings. A slight higher technical tariff helped new Slovakian team Lucie Mysliveckova & Lukas Csolley tail them in the short dance, but crispness and energy helped them distance themselves more in the free, where the tariffs matched. Both Czech team had twizzle problems in the short dance, but their free dances were smoother. Cortney Mansour & Michal Ceska ultimately had little trouble winning their second title. The junior field had six teams, four of which were Polish, and two of which fought for the top and the Polish title. Anastasija Polibina & Radoslaw Barszczak ultimately came from behind to win it when Oleksandra Borysova & Cezary Zawadzki struggled with their twizzles throughout.

View full results here.

French Nationals

French Nationals took place in the northwestern city of Caen. Usually each singles event is supposed to have 10 participants, determined by who scored the highest free skate technical scores during the fall, although this year a special invite took the ladies field up to eleven. Three pairs competed, and five ice dance teams. There were also Ballet on Ice and synchronized events.

Kevin Aymoz won his first title by 1.01 points over defending men’s champion Chafik Besseghier. He took the short by skating mostly clean, while Besseghier landed a quad toe-triple toe but doubled a salchow. It was a similar story in the free, where he again skated mostly clean, while Besseghier landed solo quads toe and salchow and even a quad-double-double, but then had a fall. It was a result not without controversy, though. Recently retired star Florent Amodio questioning Besseghier’s losing despite the quads on social media. In third, Romain Ponsart got off on a bad foot, starting his short late and falling on an underrotated quad, and finished his free late enough for a time violation, after a late fall. But in between he did well for himself, with his quad in the free going a bit better.

The other three events were all blowouts. Ladies winner Laurine Lecavelier was far from perfect, and even had two major errors in her free. But her presentation scores were firmly above everyone else’s. She was also one of only three ladies to land any difficult triples. Only silver medalist Mae Berenice Meite, the one she’d won silver behind the last three years, could’ve beaten her. But Meite’s only successful hard triple was in a short where her combination still went badly wrong. Her free went even more wrong, with only two triples even rotated. She was third in the free behind Julia Froetscher, who landed the other hard triples in a mostly good free program. But she had a fall, and a disastrous short, and she couldn’t quite overtake Alizee Crozet for bronze. Crozet couldn’t rotate anything harder than a triple toe, but gained an edge from her presentation scores.

Vanessa James & Morgan Cipres, in taking their fifth straight pairs title, skated relatively well. They also landed side by side salchows in both programs, although their throw flips and throw quad salchow didn’t work out. In the world of inflated intranational scores, when Gabriella Papadakis & Guillaume Cizeron claimed their third straight dance title, and had to please only five judges, they maxed out the scores for two of the elements in their short dance and six of the nine elements in their free.

Full results are available here, although they’re in French. Click on the word Résultants. First, Dames are ladies, Messieurs men, Danse sur glace ice dance, and Couples artistique pairs. For the short and free program, look at Scores programme court and libre, respectively. Finally, Classement intermédaire represents the standings after the short, and Classement final the final standings.

Italian Nationals

Italian Nationals took place in the northern city of Egna. Seniors and juniors both competed. As in France, synchronized skating was also held, and on both levels.

Ivan Righini claimed his fourth straight Italian men’s title, but it wasn’t the easiest thing. He didn’t land a clean triple axel throughout the competition, falling on it in the short, and jumping doubles in the free. He went for a quad in the latter, but stepped out of it. Those weren’t the only mistakes there. The only skater who did land the triple axel was silver medalist Matteo Rizzo, who did so in both segments. In the free, he was better technically than Righini, and would’ve won the segment, and perhaps even the title, if he hadn’t had two singles. Luckily for Rizzo, there are berths at the European Championships for both of them. Bronze medalist Maurizio Zandron also struggled with the triple axel, but his free was largely clean. He also did more technical content than most of those below him.

Carolina Kostner, unchallenged for the ladies title, is working on getting her harder triples back. In her short she still went only for the triple toe-triple toe as she landed everything. But in the long she landed the flip, and went for the lutz. The latter wasn’t clean, and she had a couple of other minor issues besides, but both programs remained excellent shows. Also putting on a pair of excellent shows was silver medalist Roberta Rodeghiero. She skated two clean programs, including a short program with the triple toe-triple toe. Her reward is Italy’s second berth to Europeans. Giada Russo took the bronze even while landing only the easiest two triples, due to landing them well and having good presentation.

In a three-team pairs field, things were close between defending champions Nicole Della Monica & Matteo Guarise and the champions before them, Valentina Marchei & Ondrej Hotarek. Both shorts were close to clean, but smoother elements in general gave Della Monica & Guarise the advantage. Marchei & Hotarek also had a close to clean free skate, and won that segment Della Monica & Guarise doubled and singled out their side by sides. Arguably they should’ve won overall. But when the numbers crunched together, Della Monica & Guarise prevailed by .36. Anna Cappellini & Luca Lanotte very easily took their sixth straight dance title against two other teams. They perhaps lost a little energy at the end of their short dance, but had no such trouble in their free. The latter also had the five judges give the highest score possible to their opening lift.

Daniel Grassl blew out the junior men. His technical content alone was far above theirs, and his only real trouble came on his ill-fated triple axel attempt. He scored higher than all the senior men except the top three. Elisabetta Leccardi likewise easily won the junior ladies. She landed an easy triple-triple in the short and a harder one in the free. She had some underrotations in the latter, however. Only one of the two junior pairs that started the competition, Irma Angela Caldara & Edoardo Caputo, ended it. Six junior dance teams competed, with the title going to Flora Agnes Muhlmeyer & Pietro Papetti.

View full results here.

German Nationals

German Nationals took place in Berlin. They had synchronized skating on three different levels, but for figure skating, only seniors competed. The final fields consisted of six men, five ladies, four ice dance teams, and two pairs.

The men had a close competition, but ultimately Peter Liebers prevailed to win his sixth title over Paul Fentz. Liebers skated clean in the short, while Fentz underrotated and fell on a quad attempt. Fentz landed the quad in the free, where Liebers underrotated and fell trying it. But when he had a fall of his own, and they both had other mistakes, Liebers won that segment too, by half a point.

Nonetheless, Fentz got what he needed. German rules give their one spot to the Europeans to who has the highest combined pair of season’s best scores. Fentz got enough to beat Liebers to it by .07.  Bronze went to Franz Streubel. He was the only other skater to land the quad toe or triple axel, pulling the latter off in two decent programs. The German federation is currently putting off decided between the three men on who goes to Worlds.

Ladies was originally supposed to have more competitors. Unfortunately bad luck struck the top German girls. Two of them, Nicole Schott and Lutricia Bock got severe injuries. Bock’s is bad enough to end her season, and Schott couldn’t compete this week either. The third, Nathalie Wienzierl, had to skate through a fever. Despite this she skated a good clean short program, with a triple lutz-triple toe. But it took its toll in her free, which had a number of errors. Nonetheless, she pretty much won her second national title by default. She and Schott got Germany’s two spots to Europeans, but Schott might not recover in time.

Aliona Savchenko is also now taking long enough to recover for her and Bruno Massot to be in doubt for Europeans. They did take to the ice in Berlin, but only to skate their programs in exhibition, without jump elements. Two more pairs skated their short program, but a disastrous attempt at a triple twist left Minerva Fabieene Hase & Nolan Seegert unable to skate their free and also uncertain for Europeans, even though three berths guaranteed them a spot anyway. Mari Vartmann & Ruben Blommeart got to the end to claim their first national title together. They even managed a side by side triple toe-triple toe sequence in the free, though their other more difficult elements failed. Kavita Lorenz & Joti Polizoakis repeated as dance champions with much less fuss, and with skating that has gone a level up recently.

View full results here. Herren is men, Damen ladies, Paare pairs, and Eistanze ice dance.

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The biggest Nationals competition in Europe is coming up next week. Russian Nationals will be December 20-26.