After injury, Laxson on the right track for nationals

Last season, Brianna Laxson was heading to nationals with a slew of triple jumps and was ready to contend for the novice podium (read her pre-San Jose interview here).  This season she's taken a different approach to training for nationals as an injury sidelined her during the off season and cut her preparation time for qualifying events.  She trains at the Ashburn Ice House and represents the Washington Figure Skating Club and at just 13 years of age has already competed nationally for three years.  She won the pewter medal at South Atlantic Regionals and at Eastern Sectionals to qualify for nationals.  She took some time away from a busy school and training schedule to talk about her first experience at nationals, the Washington Figure Skating Club and coming back from her injury.    

Last season was your first Nationals experience after competing two years at Junior Nationals.  What did you take away from that competition and how has it prepared you to make the jump to Juniors this season?
Last year at Nationals, I wasn’t exactly sure what to expect. I got to skate in a huge arena for the first time and seeing myself on the screen when I looked up was definitely weird. This time I know what it will be like and that gives me more confidence. 

The Washington Figure Skating Club qualified four junior ladies to sectionals and three to nationals.  What do you think makes your Club so successful?
I think it helps that the Washington FSC is so large. It is a well run, organized club and they do a good job supporting their skaters. 

What are the advantages and disadvantages of training with your competition?

I think that the greatest advantage of training with competitors is that it is almost like competing all the time. I think that it might be a disadvantage if skaters didn’t get along. I consider myself fortunate to have a good relationship with the other skaters that I train with.

What new elements have you added for this season and/or what have you been focusing on in your programs?
This year was very challenging for me because I missed several months because of an injury. My first competition of the year was regionals and I only had about 5 weeks to prepare. Mostly what I have been working on is having consistency in my programs.

You landed a double flip at regionals and a triple flip at sectionals.  Do you think upgrading that required jump gives you an advantage?
I was happy to be able to get the triple flip back into my program at sectionals. Since the flip is required in the short it gives me some points over some skaters who are not doing a triple flip.

The jump layout in your programs changed between regionals and sectionals. Tell me about the process of finding the right jumps at the right moments in the program.

The layout of my programs has changed many times as I continue to recover from my injury. It has been a gradual process of adding jumps back into my programs as they became more consistent. It was about trying to find the right elements for each event.

Washington Figure Skating Club Nationals Send-Off

The Washington Figure Skating Club held their nationals send-off in conjunction with the Wheaton Ice Arena Winter Ice Show.  The show opened up with Intermediate Dance competitors Gwen Sletten and Elliot Verburg.  They skated their Paso Doble themed free dance with good speed and edges, nice twizzles and an excellent straight line and rotational lift.  They both have great expression and she's a real firecracker on the ice.

McNamara and Carpenter have gorgeous transitions in their free dance and a nice combination lift with two one foot sectionals.  What you really appreciate about them when you see them perform live is that his facial expressions continue even in the lifts.  They performed their zombie themed short dance later in the show and had the audience laughing from the opening note.  They had excellent twizzles, ice coverage and nice matching leg lines in the blues section.

Gamelin and Gamelin will be competing in senior dance at nationals.  In their short dance they had nice positions in their lift and solid twizzles.  The twizzles were slightly off in their free dance but the straight line lift into a curve lift was nice.

Miller and MacMillan had nice expression throughout their short dance and a clean straight line lift.  They had good ice coverage on their blues section and a good feel for the hip hop rhythm.  Their twizzles were a little wobby in their free dance but they had a great upside down one hand hold lift.  She is very facially expressive and he has excellent carriage throughout his upper body.

Pogrebinsky and Gudis had a nice one foot straight line lift in their free dance and she had a good Biellman position in their dance spin.  They had a very nice non touching step sequence with lots of arm details in their short dance along with nice lines in the blues section.  Their music flows well between sections and there's a cool illusion spin step near the end fo rthe program.

Oleksiy Melnyk got one of the largest crowd reactions of the night for his solid free skate.  He landed a triple loop, triple salchow and triple toe + triple toe combination.  His only mistake was a popped lutz at the beginning of the program.

Eliana Gropman and Ian Somerville are the reigning Juvenile Champions and are competing as Intermediates this season.  They had a clean lift and a dance spin with a good change of direction.  They also had nice speed on their twizzles.  Their music is very catchy and they really play to the crowd during the program.

Caroline and Gordon Green will be competing as Juveniles at nationals in Omaha.  They showed nice speed and flexibility in their dance spin, good twizzles and good expression.  The comraderie of the ice dancers was evident when Ian Somerville cheered them on from the audience throughout the entire program.

Brianna Laxson skated her free skate in a gorgeous red lace dress.  She stepped out of a few of her triples early in the program.  She had good speed going into the jumps but seemed a little hesitant.  She still landed a triple lutz and a triple loop along with a three jump combination.  She had nice speed in her spins and a beautiful Ina Bauer.

Maria Yang started off her program with a triple lutz + double loop + double loop with great height throughout the combination.  She also landed a solo triple lutz, a spiral into a double axel and a spread eagle into a double axel + double toe.  There are lots of details in her program from the transitions to arm movements which give the whole program a polished feel.

A few of the young skaters left an impression and will be ones to watch in the coming years.  Morgan Sletten and Jordan Lin had good stroking and good ice coverage and he is the younger brother of Gwen Sleten.  Kaitlyn Chuang has good speed in her spins and attacks her jumps.  Maria Soldoatova and Fadey Solatov were some of the youngest performers at the show and had good matching lines.  She in particular had beautiful balletic arms.

Gigi and Luca Becker and Madison Vinci were scheduled to perform but did not.  The Parson siblings were also in attendance even though they had to withdraw from nationals due to his injury.

Overall, all the skaters looked prepared for nationals and ready to contend for the podium.  Nothing was perfect, but the skaters are on the pace to peak at nationals.  It was a great show and the skaters are ready to make a splash in Omaha.

Eastern Sectionals Junior Ladies Results

Place	Start No.	Name	Short Program		Free Skate		Total Score
			Place	Score	Place	Score
1	8	Maria Yang, Washington FSC	3	46.73	1	94.23	140.96
2	10	Madison Vinci, Washington FSC	1	47.30	2	87.63	134.93
3	11	Olivia Serafini, SC of New York	2	46.77	3	82.72	129.49
4	9	Brianna Laxson, Washington FSC	4	45.28	4	80.09	125.37
5	12	Melanie Chang, Washington FSC	6	39.75	5	71.22	110.97
6	7	Morgan Sewall, North Atlantic FSC	5	40.70	6	69.94	110.64
7	3	Heidi Munger, SC Of Boston	9	36.34	7	67.18	103.52
8	2	Eve Agler, SC of New York	10	34.69	8	63.04	97.73
9	1	Sydney Jones, SC of New York	8	37.01	9	59.97	96.98
10	4	Adrianna Gonera, SC of New York	7	38.23	11	56.23	94.46
11	5	Olivia Pastore, SC Of Boston	12	28.90	10	58.06	86.96
12	6	Ainsley McGill, Charter Oak FSC	11	33.83	12	47.85	81.68

U.S, Nationals: Novice Ladies Free Skate Results

Place	Start No.	Name	Short Program		Free Skate		Total Score
			Place	Score	Place	Score
1	8	Karen Chen, Peninsula SC	1	46.54	1	93.63	140.17
2	9	Amber Glenn, Dallas FSC	3	42.45	2	83.43	125.88
3	7	Amanda Gelb, Los Angeles FSC	2	43.67	3	78.67	122.34
4	10	Madison Vinci, WA FSC	4	41.90	7	74.66	116.56
5	11	Olivia Serafini, SC of NY	6	38.64	4	76.76	115.40
6	4	Brianna Laxson, WA FSC	7	38.41	6	76.13	114.54
7	12	Selena Zhao, Highland SC	5	39.12	8	72.16	111.28
8	2	Avery Kurtz, Broadmoor SC	9	32.97	5	76.26	109.23
9	1	Dyllan McIntee, SC of Phoenix	8	34.36	10	67.26	101.62
10	3	Bradie Tennell, Wagon Wheel FSC	10	32.60	9	68.78	101.38
11	5	Morgan Sewall, North Atlantic FSC	11	30.38	11	64.64	95.02
12	6	Madison DeLuca, Arctic FSC	12	28.81	12	52.98	81.79

Laxson heads to San Jose with arsenal of triples

Brianna Laxson is a 12 year old who represents the Washington Figure Skating Club and trains in Virginia.  She won the pewter medal in Intermediate Ladies last season and is making the jump to novice this season.  She took home the gold at South Atlantic Regionals and silver at Eastern Sectionals to qualify for nationals.  


In between midterms and training for nationals, she found the time to talk to me about trying four new triples in one year, making the jump to novice and her goals for nationals.

Tell me about yourself outside of skating.

When I am not skating, I am usually doing schoolwork. I am a seventh grader at the Virginia Virtual Academy. When I am not doing either of these things, I like to read.

How would you describe your skating to someone who had never seen you skate before?
I am at the novice level, which is the third highest level and I have been skating for about 8 years. Last season, I landed my first triple jump in competition. Since then I have landed 4 other different triple jumps.

In 2011, you successfully landed 4 new triple jumps in competition.  Was it difficult to add so many new jumps at once?
It was challenging to go from one triple jump to four because there was more pressure of landing the more difficult jumps. I was always changing my programs because sometimes one jump would be less consistent than other jumps. The jump that I was having trouble with tended to change. Over the season I have been changing jumps and have landed all my triples in competition.

Is there anything in particular you've been focusing on for nationals?

For nationals, I have just been training hard and working on perfecting all of my elements.

You've competed at Junior Nationals twice.  How do you think nationals will be different?

I am not really sure since I haven't been to a nationals. Although a couple people have told me that it's a lot different from Junior Nationals. I am very excited to find out!

Madison Vinci (1st, Eastern Sectionals) also represents the Washington Figure Skating Club.  What advantages are there to having someone from your club competing at nationals at the same level?

It is fun to have another skater from my club skating at the same level, because later we can talk about the great experience. Another great thing is that I will have at least one friend there to watch all the events with.

What are your goals for nationals?  How do you hope nationals will set you up for your short term and long term goals as a skater?

My main goal at nationals is to skate my programs clean. My short term goal is to do well enough to be considered for a Junior Grand Prix assignment next season. In the future, I would like to represent the U.S. at larger international competitions.

What are you looking forward to most about nationals?

Watching all the different events! I am also looking forward to seeing some of my family that lives in San Jose.

U.S. Nationals Novice Ladies Preview

Karen Chen blew the field away at both of her qualifying events cruising to two gold medals.  She already has a national title under her belt from last season and is entering this event as the favorite.  She has the two top scores of the qualifying season and could cruise to a victory of 10 points or more here at nationals if she can keep up the same level.  She also showed a slight improvement between events and her scores were consistent which is extremely important at this level.  She is also one of the youngest ladies in this event at only 12 years old.  


Amber Glenn and Avery Kurtz flip flopped between events winning the silver and gold medals in their regional and sectional events.  Glenn beat Kurtz by 13 points at regionals and Kurtz beat Glenn by 9 points at sectionals.  Whoever skates clean will likely take the silver medal but I think they'll both wind up on the medal stand.


Madison Vinci and Brianna Laxson are training mates who also switched results throughout qualifying.  Laxson had a less than 5 point lead over Vinci at regionals but Vinci took a 1 point lead over Laxson at sectionals.  These two should be very close again and will likely be trying to hold off Selena Zhao for the final spot on the podium.


My medal predictions:
Gold: Karen Chen
Silver: Amber Glenn
Bronze: Avery Kurtz
Pewter: Brianna Laxson


Bios of the competitors:
Brianna Laxson: She is 12 years old and represents the Washington Figure Skating Club.  She finished 20th in Juvenile Girls in 2010 and is the 2011 Intermediate Ladies pewter medalist.  She won gold at South Atlantic Regionals and silver at Eastern Sectionals to qualify for nationals.  She has the 9th best short program, 4th best free skate and 5th best total scores.


Olivia Serafini: She is 14 years old and represents the Albany Figure Skating Club.  She won gold at North Atlantic Regionals and bronze at Eastern Sectionals to qualify for nationals.

Morgan Sewall: She is 14 years old and represents the North Atlantic Figure Skating Club.  She won gold at New England Regionals and pewter at Eastern Sectionals to qualify for nationals.

Madison Vinci: She is 15 years old and represents the Washington Figure Skating Club.  She is the 2011 bronze medalist in Intermediate Ladies.  She won silver at South Atlantic Regionals and gold at Eastern Sectionals to qualify for nationals.  She has the 4th best short program, 8th best free skate and 7th best total score.

Madison DeLuca: She is 15 years old and represents the Arctic Figure Skating Club.  She finished 9th in Intermediate Ladies in 2010.  She won gold at Eastern Great Lakes Regionals and pewter at Midwestern Regionals to qualify for nationals.  


Amber Glenn: She is 12 years old and represents the Dallas Figure Skating Club.  She finished 10th in Intermediate Ladies in 2011 and 12th in Juvenile Girls in 2009.  She won gold at Southwest Regionals and silver at Midwest Sectionals to qualify for nationals.  She has the 7th best short program score and 3rd best free skate and total score.


Avery Kurtz: She is 14 years old and represents the Broadmoor Skating Club.  She is the 2010 Intermediate Ladies pewter medalist.   She won silver at Southwest Regionals and gold at Midwest Sectionals to qualify for nationals.  She has the 3rd best short program, 2nd best free skate and 2nd best total score.


Bradie Tennell: She is 13 years old and represents the Wagon Wheel Figure Skating Club.  She finished 10th in Juvenile Girls in 2010 and 15th in Intermediate Ladies in 2011.  She won bronze at Upper Great Lakes Regionals and Midwest Sectionals to qualify for nationals.  She has the 9th best free skate score.

Karen Chen: She is 12 years old and represents the Peninsula Skating Club.  She won pewter in Juvenile Girls in 2010 and is the 2011 Intermediate Ladies Champion.  She won gold at Central Pacific Regionals and Pacific Sectionals to qualify for nationals.  She has the best short program, free skate and total scores.


Amanda Gelb: She represents the Los Angeles Figure Skating Club.  She won gold at Southwest Pacific Regionals and bronze at Pacific Sectionals to qualify for nationals.  She has the 7th best short program, 8th best free skate and 7th best total score.


Dyllan McIntee: She is 13 years old and represents the Skating Club of Phoenix.  She is the 2010 Juvenile Girls Champion.  She finished 11th in Intermediate Ladies in 2011.  She won pewter at Southwest Pacific Regionals and silver at Pacific Sectionals to qualify for nationals.  She has the 6th best free skate and total score.


Selena Zhao: She represents the Highland Skating Club.  She won gold at Northwest Pacific Regionals and pewter at Pacific Sectionals to qualify for nationals.  She has the 8th best short program, 5th best free skate and 4th best total score.