Ladies

An extremely strong group of young ladies is challenging World Champion Kimmie Meissner in what Scott Hamilton called an incredible second half of the women’s short program competition Thursday night.

Mirai Nagasu sits atop the leader board right now with a record score of 70.23! This 14-year-old member of the Pasadena Figure Skating Club took advantage of Kimmie’s slight bobble on one jump and flew past second place finisher, Ashley Wagner of Washington. Ashley’s score of 65.15 bested Rachael Flatt (Broadmore) by two and half points.

That left Kimmie in fourth place before the freeskate. Her score of 57.58 is only half a point above fifth place finisher, Katrina Hacker of Boston. Katrina and sixth place finisher Bebe Liang (All Year) will not let Kimmie make any mistakes if she is to regain her crown.

Pairs

Keauna McLaughlin and Rockne Brubaker (LA & Broadmoor Figure Skating Clubs) overthrew World Bronze Medalists Rena Inoue and John Baldwin of the All Year Figure Skating Club. The top scores were 66.54 and 65.24 respectively, so there’s not much “bobble” room for either pair as we head in to tomorrows free skate.

Current National Champions Brooke Castile and Ben Okolski, both from the Arctic Figure Skating Club, sit in third place with 58.95 points. Fourth and fifth place finishers posted point totals of 58.95 and 57.10. They are Amanda Evora and Mark Ladwig (Southwest Florida and Red River Valley Figure Skating Clubs) followed by Tiffany Vise and Derek Trent (Broadmoor).

Ice Dance

The Compulsory Dance, during which teams have to skate the same moves and pattern to the same music, brought no surprises for the top teams. In fact, those standing remained the same through the OD. Final standings aren’t likely to change, but hey, ice is slippery, and anything can happen, right?