Team Finland 1 wins 2011 World Synchronized Skating Championships

• Team Finland 1 takes gold at the ISU World Synchronized Skating Championships 2011. [ISU]

• Brian Orser analyzes the departure of Adam Rippon. [Chicago Tribune]

• Preparations for 2014 Sochi Olympics are ahead of schedule. [RT]

• Evgeni Plushenko seeks amateur status on his road to 2014 Sochi Olympics. [USA Today]

• 2011 U.S. Adult Championships kick off this week in Salt Lake City. [icenetwork]

• Jamie Sale, David Pelletier and Kurt Browning help honor Royal Glenora Club. [Canada.com]

• Great piece on Alissa Czisny. [YouTube]

• What took so long? A children's book about Yu-Na Kim (cover at right). [WSJ]

• Yu-Na Kim has her own skating reality show - Kim Yuna’s Kiss & Cry. [Allpop]

• Catching up with...college student Kimmie Meissner. [icenetwork]

• Johnny Weir, Brandon Mroz and Ashley Wagner headline Skate-To-Learn on May 1 in Hackensack, NJ. [Skate-To-Learn]

• Midori Ito entered the ISU's Adult Competition in Obertsdorf!?! And a review of Stars on Ice by What the Buck's Michael Buckley. [Aunt Joyce's Ice Cream Stand]

Johnny Weir is a weirdo

• Who is Johnny Weir? A weirdo. [ThePostGame]

• Kyoko Ina and John Zimmerman return to the ice for Stars On Ice. [icenetwork]

• Meryl Davis and Charlie White just added to Stars On Ice tour. [StarsOnIce]

• Politicians and parade personalities come together for skating at Coney Island, Brooklyn. [Brooklyn Daily Eagle]

• Finnish figure skater Laura Lepistö to miss World Championships in Japan. [YLE]

• This is the best print interview of Evan Lysacek (at right) I've ever read. [NYMag]

• Yu-Na Kim to help with PyeongChang 2018 Winter Olympics bid. [FeverSkating]

• Final results of 2011 US Synchronized Skating Championships in Ontario, California. [icenetwork]

• High-priced lawyers duke it out on the ice. [NYT]

• Podcast with Yuka Sato, coach to Alissa Czisny and Jeremy Abbott. [ManleyWomanSkateCast]

• Figure skating pioneer Maribel Vinson-Owen spotlighted In RISE. [ThePostGame]

2011 Regional and Sectional Championships schedule

Ever wonder how all the skaters you see at the US Championships (or commonly known as "Nationals") got there? Most qualified through regional and sectional events. US Figure Skating has divided the country into nine regions. Click here to see which state belongs in which region.

From October 1 - 19, regional championships ("regionals") will be held through the country:

WHEN	EVENT	HOST FSC/LOCATION
October 1-5, 2010	Upper Great Lakes Regional	Greater Green Bay FSC/Cornerstone Community Center in DePere, WI
October 1-5, 2010	North Atlantic Regional	Skating Club of Lake Placid/Lake Placid, NY
October 1-5, 2010	Northwest Pacific Regional	Boise FSC/Idaho Ice World, Boise, ID
October 8-12, 2010	Southwest Pacific Regional	Los Angeles FSC/Pickwick Ice Arena, Burbank, CA
October 8-12, 2010	New England Regional	Charter Oak FSC/Simsbury, CT
October 8-12, 2010	Eastern Great Lakes Regional	Nashville FSC/Franklin, TN
October 15-19, 2010	Southwestern Regional	Broadmoor Skating Club/Colorado Springs, CO
October 15-19, 2010	Central Pacific Regional	Capital City FSC/Skatetown Ice Arena, Roseville, CA
October 15-19, 2010	South Atlantic Regional	Triangle FSC/The Polar Ice House @ The Factory, Wake Forest, NC

Skaters who place in the top four at their regionals qualify for the sectional championships. There are three sectional championships:

WHEN	EVENT	HOST FSC/LOCATION
November 9-13, 2010	Eastern Sectional	IceWorks Skating Club/IceWorks Skating Complex, Aston, PA
November 9-13, 2010	Midwestern Sectional	Ann Arbor FSC/Ann Arbor, MI
November 9-13, 2010	Pacific Coast Sectional	All Year FSC/Culver City, CA

And you guessed it, skaters who place in the top four at sectionals qualify for the 2011 US Championships, which will be held in Greensboro, North Carolina, from January 22 - 30, 2011. Some skaters don't need to qualify through regionals and sectionals -- they will receive automatic byes if they placed in the top five as a senior at the 2010 US Championships, if they won a medal at the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics or World Championships, went to the Grand Prix Final or Junior Grand Prix Final, or if sectionals conflict with an international competition they've already been assigned to.

Keep in mind also that the US Championships will crown the winners in the novice, junior, and senior divisions in men and ladies singles, pairs and ice dancing. The other two levels below novice -- juvenile and intermediate -- hold their own Nationals called the "U.S. Junior Championships" and it will be held in Salt Lake City, from December 14 - 18, 2010. Below is a great chart from U.S. Figure Skating explaining all of this:

For all the synchronized skaters out there, they have their own US Championships and sectionals. For synchro skaters, there are no regionals -- teams qualify for the US Synchronized Skating Championships at one of three sectional competitions:

WHEN	EVENT	HOST FSC/LOCATION
February 3-5, 2011	Eastern Sectional	Skating Club of Lake Placid, Lake Placid, NY
February 3-5, 2011	Midwestern/Pacific Coast Sectional	Rochester FSC/Rochester, MN

The 2011 US Synchronized Skating Championships will be hosted by the Glacier Falls FSC and will be held at the Citizens Bank Arean, in Ontario, California from March 2 - 5, 2011.

Finland dominates 2010 World Synchronized Skating Championships

• Russians hire former USOC executive to fix their Olympic program. [Washington Post]

• Meryl Davis and Charlie White get a visit from Kumu Gupta -- who's Kumu Gupta!?! [icenetwork]

• Nancy Kerrigan's brother charged with manslaughter. [Associated Press]

• If you can't ice dance, go into pairs. My how times have changed! [ESPN]

• Patrick Chan over Kurt Browning? Hm... [Oxford Review]

• Holiday On Ice puts many costumes on sale and some of them are pretty zany. [Ice Charades]

• Adult Nationals begin this week in Bloomington, Minnesota. [U.S. Figure Skating]

• What exactly do Evan Lysacek, Ben Agosto and Jeremy Abbott tweet about? [State of the Skate]

• Evan Lysacek's Stars on Ice gig worth $300,000! His Dancing With The Stars gig potentially worth $1,000,000! [Chicago Tribune]

• Finland dominates at the 2010 World Synchronized Skating Championships. U.S. wins bronze. [ISU] (Photo below, Team Finland 1 The Rockettes) 

Yu-Na Kim's commemorative coin set is NOT issued in Korea!?!

• Johnny Weir appears in story about the Spirit Awards at 0:13. I'm guessing the editors thought he was an actor. [WSJ]

• Yu-Na Kim prepares for her ice show Festa On Ice on April 16 in Korea. But first she needs to defend her world title on March 22. [Chosun Ilbo]

• What percentage of judges are really honest -- 10%, 50% or 90%? [Tony Wheeler's Thoughts in the World of Figure Skating]

• Christopher Dean and Jill Trenary officially call it quits. He's been living overseas for a while -- is anyone surprised? [Daily Mail]

• A moment of total win for Stephen Colbert. [Aunt Joyce's Ice Cream Stand]

• 2006 Olympic silver medalist Stephane Lambiel retires from competition and begins his exhibition extravaganza. [AFP]

• Evan Lysacek agreed to do Dancing With The Stars before the Olympics! [ET Online]

• Complete results from the 2010 U.S. Synchronized Skating Championships in Minneapolis, Minnesota. [icenetwork]

• Joannie Rochette will skate a special exhibition number for Thin Ice, a skating reality show airing on ABC on March 19 and 21st. [MGM Grand Foxwoods]

• Yu-Na Kim commemorative coin set (see right) to be issued on April 8 and not in Korea. [Chosun Ilbo]

• Yu-Na Kim, I mean, Stella Yu-Na Kim, is Catholic. Did you know that? [UCA News]

• Continuing with the religious theme, listen to Scott Hamilton on God's Word Collectibles. [Inspirations]