Skate Canada #2: Practice Day

I am sure that everyone reading this either knows or can guess that I love photographing skating. What some of you may not know about me is how much I love eating breakfast—when someone else makes it for me, that is. One of my favourite breakfast restaurants is Cora’s, a nationwide (Canadian) chain that began in Montréal. So today, since dance practice does not begin until after noon, I am kicking off my day o’ skating photography with breakfast at Cora’s. To make things even better, the sun is shining and the sky is blue. This day is heavenly.

Yesterday was grand, too, although I was constantly aware of how exhausted and disheveled I looked because people kept giving me “sympathetic eyes.” You know what I mean? When someone thinks, “Oh, that poor girl, she looks a wreck,” they have a certain expression in their eyes. Four hours of sleep plus 4.5 hours driving that began at 5.30 a.m. just does not agree with me, but I persevered because dance was the last discipline to practice last night.

The ladies skated first, and I can hardly remember them. I was concentrating more on the photography aspect, tweaking my camera settings, and writing my first blog. Elizaveta Tuktamysheva really caught my eye, because I knew her as a jumper, but I found her to be so expressive and delicate, wearing all black with black gloves, too. She’s certainly a charmer! I’ll pay attention to everyone better when they compete, I promise.

Before the dancers arrived, the pairs were the ones who really impressed me. I am so excited about the pairs event here, because most of the teams on the roster are energetic and expressive performers. It’s going to be fun to shoot! I was so excited to finally see Tatiana Volosozhar (pictured, right) live. I think she is magnificent, but I have never had the chance to photograph her before. (Her partner is also a wonderful skater, but I have seen him live before.) I was also impressed by the improvements that Meagan Duhamel & Eric Radford and Paige Lawrence & Rudi Swiegers have made in the off-season. And watch for Narumi Takahashi & Mervin Tran in the short today. I didn’t care for the music, but I thought that their program was lovely. On the whole, I was so thrilled by how much I enjoyed watching the pairs. While I was growing up, pairs was my favourite discipline, but as my longtime favourites started to trickle into retirement, I was drawn more and more to ice dance. It has been a few years since I felt this excited about seeing a pairs event.

In men’s practice, I was so impressed by Elladj Baldé (pictured, right) , and so was the CTV team, who were sitting behind me. I really hope he hits his programs. He’s such a delight and the crowd is going to love him. Kevin van der Perren struggled with the quad at my end of the rink for most of the practice, but when he finally hit a couple, the spectators at our end all applauded for him, getting him to smile on what was clearly a frustrating session. Speaking of quads, Adam Rippon tried the quad Lutz twice, I think, but he fell both times. I have heard that he is still planning it for the free skate. Patrick Chan looked mostly good, although his free program has not drawn me in yet. He did have a weird fall at my end—it looked like he tripped on his heel and then fell backwards into the boards, ending up on his back, laughing.

The dancers were finally up after that. Everyone today could choose which program they wanted to practice, so I saw shorts from Harvey & Gagnon, Weaver & Poje, Riazanova & Tkachenko, and Cappellini & Lanotte. Virtue & Moir and Chock & Bates skated their free. I actually cannot remember which program Pushkash & Guerreiro did, but I don’t have photos of them in rhumba steps, so if I have to guess, I will guess the free for them, too.

The most important thing that I have to say about dance practice is “YES, RED!” This is in reference to Tessa’s striking red dress, which made me enjoy their free dance so much more. I just hope that it’s not a practice-only dress, with a plan to go back to white for the competition.

Everyone looked quite solid in practice, and I was so impressed with the energy on the ice. If you missed the photos that we posted last night, they’re here. I had so much fun shooting practice, and I cannot wait to get back to the rink and keep going today! In fact, I think I’ll head back now…the waitress has already come by again to make sure that everything is okay. She’d probably like me to pay my bill and vacate the table.