Canada's Joannie Rochette (see right) is on a roll! She won Skate Canada and now she's won the 2008 Trophee Eric Bompard with a total of 180.73 points. Joannie was well ahead of silver medalist Mao Asada from Japan who racked up 167.59 points overall. Skating to Concierto de Aranjuez by Rodrigo, Joannie exhibited her usual solid skating style and jumps. Now that I've seen her skate the program a few times, I've realized what I like about her - she has a really calm aura around her, and even when she singled the triple loop in the free skate, you never doubt that she's going to be perfect in the other elements. Is that the mark of a great champion?
Speaking of champions, Mao couldn't defend her title at this year and settled for second place. Skating to a new program called Masquerade by Aram Khachaturian and under a new coach, Tatiana Tarasova, I like the new Mao! First off, I love the program as a piece of choreography and Mao can certainly pull off the drama and elegance needed. She must be getting used to performing it before an audience or maybe it was nerves? I saw a few two-footed landings and she popped the triple Salchow.
The United States' Caroline Zhang gave a great, fall-free performance to Sleeping Beauty by Tchaikovsky to win the bronze with 156.54 points. I remember watching Caroline perform this program at Skate Canada (she came in fifth overall) and she was wearing a canary yellow dress. This time, it was more on the red side and I thought it suited her better. In the Kiss and Cry area, she commented to her coach that as of two days she didn't have a dress, so maybe the yellow one will make an appearance, but I hope not.
Candice Didier from France finished fourth and the United States' Beatrisa Liang and Emily Hughes finished fifth and ninth, respectively. Candice and Gwendoline Didier (not related) have an interesting backstory. You can read it here and it's the first time I've ever seen the term "the mafia of skating."
Complete results for the ladies are below. (Note: SP=Short Program; FS=Free Skate)
| FPl | Name |
Nat | Points | SP | FS |
| 1 | Joannie Rochette |
CAN | 180.73 | 1 | 1 |
| 2 | Mao Asada |
JPN | 167.59 | 2 | 2 |
| 3 | Caroline Zhang |
USA | 156.54 | 3 | 3 |
| 4 | Candice Didier |
FRA | 135.25 | 5 | 4 |
| 5 | Beatrisa Liang |
USA | 134.29 | 4 | 5 |
| 6 | Binshu Xu |
CHN | 123.83 | 10 | 6 |
| 7 | Elene Gedevanishvili |
GEO | 121.78 | 9 | 7 |
| 8 | Anastasia Gimazetdinova |
UZB | 116.99 | 7 | 8 |
| 9 | Emily Hughes |
USA | 115.48 | 8 | 9 |
| 10 | Gwendoline Didier |
FRA | 111.18 | 6 | 10 |
Actually i dont like masquerade for Mao, not beacuse i think she should be stocked in soft music, is that i just dont like it xD thank you so much for keeping me informed, luv your blog ^^
Posted by: amelie | November 16, 2008 at 08:32 AM