journal

Saturday, February 2, 2002
Hi Everyone-

Thanks for visiting the website; I hope you enjoy all the hard work Jenny is doing on it. It has been a long month! First with
Nationals in Los Angeles, and then one week home, and then flying to Korea for Four Continents. I'm very tired and very pleased at how my season has culminated.

First I'll talk about Nationals. Before arriving at Nationals I was skating awesome. Clean run-throughs every day, landing quad sals, and getting close again on quad toes. I felt really good going to LA. When I got there, I got over the first little batch of nerves, the first practice. Despite being a little shaky, it went well. The Draw Party was a lot of fun. I sat with my team mates from the University of Delaware and cheered them on at the draw. The local organizing committee had it made up like an awards show. Every skater got to go up and choose an Oscar with their start number underneath the base. It was a very original idea, I liked it. Anyway, back to skating. Practices kept going well, and I was pleased to at least try some quad sals, standing up on a few. Two days before the short program, my shin was really bothering me, so I had to get off practice really early. It was very annoying, but I knew I could skate through it, I'd have to. The day of the short rolled around, and I just felt awesome all day. I rented 'Moulin Rouge' in my room before going to the rink, I ate a big lunch so I'd have energy, and I just felt awesome. I got to the rink for a practice that afternoon, and stayed until I had to skate the short. I skated third, so I was able to watch my whole event after. When I skated a clean short I was so happy. I think it was possibly the best I've ever skated, and I was so happy. The judges were very generous with my marks even though I skated early, and I wound up fourth which was surprising, but I'm not complaining! The day between the short and long was a little tough. I don't know why, it just was, so going into the long I was a little worried. I skated last after Todd Eldredge. He had the biggest ovation I've ever heard, I was so scared. I actually asked my coach for a percoset before I skated. I was very scared, and after watching the tape visibly so, but I was proud of myself for fighting through a tough performance. Watching it on tape was so boring to me. I just looked scared to death, and I hope never to do that again. The crowd was very supportive, and the judges were generous with their marking again, so I wound up fifth. It's a good placement, and I was pleased to move up a spot from last year. Other great things from Nationals were watching Sasha Cohen make the Olympic Team, after her telling me in Paris how much she wanted to go. Seeing Tanith and Ben skate a great freedance was also fabulous. And just being with friends that I don't see on a day to day basis was excellent. My nationals experience was good; it taught me a lot of things, and I'll be more confident for next time!

The week I got home from Nationals I had to continue training for Four Continents in Jeonju City, Korea. I skated late night ice, usually around midnight, to get acclimated to skating at Korean time. Practices went very well, so I was ready once again, five days after arriving home from Nationals, to do it all again. The trip of course was insanely long to Jeonju. I left Saturday morning (EST), flew to San Francisco, then on to Tokyo, then to Seoul, and then I had a four hour bus ride from Seoul to Jeonju and arrived at my hotel at about 4am Monday morning Korean time. It was so exhausting. I know all you do is sit and eat while traveling, but it just takes so much out of you. Practices in Jeonju were awful. I fell a lot, and the rinks were so cold that my shin started to swell and get really sore. Of course, I had to push through it and make the best of it. I had an awesome draw for the short, which I assumed would be lucky. Too bad it didn't turn out that way. In the short program I was very stiff. I did a little tap dance on my opening footwork, then landed the triple lutz/triple toe and triple axel. I flew into the triple flip and put my hand down. Then on my final straight-line footwork there was another tap dance. I was very upset with the skate, and my placement. I knew I could have been higher if I had skated better. In the long, I think I was awful. I missed both triple axels and landed all my other jumps. The first axel was popped and the second one I flipped out of. I was again very angry with myself for skating like that, and I was upset that I had fallen to fourth, when I know if I'd skated better I'd be higher. My shin was just such a mess all week, and I guess I let it affect me too much. One good thing was that before I skated the long program I did a scratch spin to warm up, and the crowd started screaming and going crazy. It was so cool, Koreans love scratch spins. I had to do the exhibition, and I skated well to a new number that I had never been through. I skated to 'Cinema Paradiso' the opera version. I'll have more specs for you all later, but I skated very well in the exhibition, so I was feeling a little better about my experience. Then it was the long trip home. Thirty hours of travel, and I was finally home. The things I'll probably remember most from Korea are the scratch spin craze and hanging out with my ladies from Detroit, Tanith and Stephanie. It was a lot of fun, and it was, of course, a good experience.

Right now I am still training in case something amazing happens and I get to go to Worlds. I have a bunch of shows lined up for spring, and I am hopefully going away for vacation at some point. I'm also thinking about new music for next year's programs. I'm thinking a tango and something Egyptian? Let me know what you think! Thanks so much for visiting the site. I hope you've enjoyed hearing about my experiences!

Bisous,

-J