New and Improved

This year's Skate America seems to be all about being brand new and sparkly...at least for the Americans.

There's Kimmie Meissner. Google News her to find a bunch of articles just like this one. There are skaters whose style I like better, but my heart is 100% for Kimmie. If there is one skater who I am dying to see succeed at this competition, it is her. Will Richard Callaghan and Todd Eldredge (yeah, remember him and his amazing spins?!)work their magic? I think that I, and most of America, hope so...we're not quite ready to move on to Mirai, Caroline, and Rachael just yet. GO KIMMIE!!!!!

While Kimmie Meissner fell (literally and figuratively) at Nationals, our next duo fell at Worlds. I'm talking about Tanith Belbin and Ben Agosto. They, too, have changed coaches, this time to Natalia Linichuk and Gennadi Karponosov. I, for one, am thrilled that they did this--Michigan was looking a little bit crowded. While, with the sudden coaching change of Domina and Shabilin, Aston, PA may be feeling a bit cozy at the minute as well, I think that this coaching change is going to work out for the better. There's lots of hype about their new "back to basics" attitude, choreography, and (hopefully) improved compulsories. Again, I would LOVE to see these two have a really successful season--it hasn't really happened since the Olympics.

Next is Johnny Weir. His coaching change isn't quite as new, but hopefully it's for the better. He has a brand new, 100% focused on skating mentality that's bound to be dangerous to his competitors, so I figured that he should be put in here.

And last is Evan Lysacek. Evan didn't have a coaching change this year, but he did have a major choreographer one, moving to the one and only Queen of the Fur Coat herself, Tatiana Tarasova. Will Evan dabble into rhinestones and sparkles territory? Will we see something other than the all black, Zorro-Carmen-Tosca-esque guy we've been seing for the past four years? I love Evan, so hopefully we will be!

And that's all of the major changes for major skaters that I can think of this season.

And, because I forgot about them in my last post, try to find a way to watch Keauna McLaughlin and Rockne Brubaker. They're America's only feasible hope of a medal collection this season in the pairs event (unless Inoue and Baldwin surprise us), so I'd try to tune on online (I doubt they'll be shown on TV in the US) as they take on the Germans.