Dear Freddy
Thanks a lot for your complete review of ARD Gala, that was cool:)
I am so happy about Maria successful jumps but still worry about her axels =
in a
time that I wished she goes for triple this season .but who knows maybe she=

fixes it and go for triple axel in SLC ;)
But in artistry I think that Maria is better in both Sp and Lp than Irina a=
nd
kwan.
So Elena and Anton did their new Lp , Meditation (Thais) it is a nice music=
I
think has more chance to win judges idea than Charlie!!
And Alexei with winter and mitim, wow :) really wonder that why Daniel Weis=
s
and ARD always show this event in last days of sep. !!Last season it was no=
t
important but this time with such stars :)
Anyway, Maria's next event is, Masters of figure skating, I guess.
So
GOOD LUCK MASHA

Pam

>
> Well, I have never written a report before, but I tried to :~)
> The Gala started with the opening to ‚Music was my first love'
> Then the German pair Kautz/Jeschke skated to ‚Blues Brothers'. They
> looked very insecure and had some shaky landings.
> Next were Margarita and Povilas, skating their exhibiton number.
> Margarita wore black pans with a top made of illusion fabric and blue
> fabric. It looked great. Povilas wore black, I think. In this number
> they had a lot of highlights and some great movements, a very fast
> rotating (sp?) lift.
> Maria Butyrskaya was next. She presented her new SP. She wore the
> costue she wore for her SP at Worlds. She landed all her jumps and
> only the axel landing was a little shaky.
> Then came Laurent Tobel from France. He skated to Jeff Bec (sp?). I
> didn't like it as much as the other skaters but the audience certainly
> liked it.
> I can't remember what Mandy Wötzel and Ingo Steuer skated to but she
> wore a simple black dress, which suited her well. His costume is open
> for discussion ;~)
> Kati Winkler and René Lohse did parts of their new FD which is similar
> to their last season's OD. They have some movements from the OD in the
> FD for example the part where she is waving at the audience and I
> think a lift or a dacne spin was the same.
> Plushenko presented his new SP and fell on the first jump. Otehrwise,
> his footwork is good and I kind of like the SP but the way he uses the
> music is weird. Changing from slow to fast to slow to fast.
> Elena and Anton skated next. They were announced with the words that
> this may be their new LP, so I think it is not sure yet. It was
> classical music again and not even near Charlie Chaplin IMO. They had
> some troubles, Elena missed her triple (?) Toe and the throw axel or
> salchow, don't know and Anton missed his axel.
> Alexei Yagudin closed the first part with his new SP. That was really
> amazing. He did some gorgeous footwork and landed all his jumps. I
> think his short is as strong as last years. He skated to Winter and
> the program really suits him.
> Afterwards there were retakes because of the TV coverage. Plushenko
> did his missed jump again and he did a triple-double (or
> triple)-double-double. The audience was quite amazed by that.
> Elena and Anton repeated their jumps as well and landed all of them.
> First to skate after the break was Susanne Stadlmüller. She skated to
> ‚Somewhere over the rainbow' and missed her triple lutz and double
> axel and had to repeat them several times for the retakes.
> Again Margarita and Povilas was the second couple to skate, which no
> one really understood. Their OD is really fast and has some good dance
> spins. The one they do at the end of the Paso Doble (I think) looks
> really great. They are in a quite simple position, facing each other
> but she leans back a little and it just looks great. At the end of
> their straight line footwork they were slighlty out of sync. But they
> have a lot of twizzles in the footwork. And a great rotating lift. She
> wore a black skirt and a top made of pink with some blue glitter and
> illusion fabric. Povilas wore black with the same blue glitter she
> has. I don't really think pink is the right color for the dance but
> the costumes look great.
> Maria Butyrskaya skated her new LP. It is the same music as last
> season but she looked very secure about it and confident. She only had
> a shaky landing at her axel and presented everything else very well.
> Laurent Tobel did his Carmen number, which I liked better than his
> first number and I think the audience as well.
> Then came Mandy Wötzel and Ingo Steuer again to ‚A wink and a smile'
> They had a good program with some funny movements. She missed her
> throw double axel.
> Andrejs Vlascenko presented his new SP to ‚Pagganini' (sp?) I don't
> know how he sakted because I was obersving the skaters sitting
> opposite of us and discussing and Alexei was warming up. They all
> watched each others performances.
> Kati and René skated to live music (I fogot the title) The had some of
> the lifts from last years FD in it. Her costume looked great. It was
> kind of like a bathing suit, open back and some flowing fabric over
> it.
> The couple of Sarah Jentgens and Mirko Müller were next. They looked
> much more secure on the ice than Kautz/Jeschke although the did only a
> double throw. But the performance they gave was very good and
> polished. They didn't make a mistake as far as I can remember.
> Elena and Anton skated their Charlie Chaplin Exhibition number which
> was really appreciated by the audience. They didn't make a mistake
> with that one and skated like we are used to :~) They seemd to enjoy
> themselves and Anton played with the audience while Daniel Weiss
> (commentator) was waiting for his signal to start announcing them.
> Alexei was next and presented his new LP to ‚The Man in the Iron Maks'
> Knwoing the one from Marina and Gwendal it was quite strange to hear
> the msuic in another way but the way he has it seems weird. He has
> only two fast parts for his footworks the other ones are slwo and
> basically the same. He concentrated on the etchnical elements and no
> one was really overwhelmed because the artistic side is still missing.
> He landed all his jumps but did some turns after I think a triple axel
> or so and stepped out of another one. He wore a black costume with a
> bronze mask on it and gloves which were black on the inside and bronze
> on the outside (we didn't really like the gloves because they look
> like he is trying to immitade Plushenko)
> Last to skate before the final was Plushenko with ‚Sex Bomb' It was
> definitely an audience favourite. Before the show we could watch
> Mishin placing a table behind the boards where Plushenko could jump on
> to get into the audience because there was no other way. He stood
> about 3 or 4 meters in front of us because we sat in the third row. As
> he tried to get back, he hit his skate at the metal bars :~)
> Then we waited for him to change for the final.
> After the final we hurried around the rink and got some skaters -
> Alexei, Plushenko, Kati, René and some of the other Germans. We didn't
> see Margarita and Povials either arrive or depart :~) Maria was
> interviewed after the gala but then she somehow disappeared :~)
>
> Freddy
>
> >
> >
> >
> > --- In butyrskaya@y..., "Freddy" <m_g_fan@h...> wrote:
> > > After what I have read about the Italian show, I must say, Maria
> > > trained a lot :~) She landed all her jumps - the axel was still
> shaky
> > > but she didn't have a single fall and she finally seems
> comfortable
> > > with her long program. :~) I liked her short as well.
> > >
> > > Freddy