FIGURE SKATING: In a comprehensive victory, Kailani Craine has won her fourth consecutive national title surpassing her personal best score by nearly five points at the Australian Figure Skating Championships in Brisbane.
23-year-old Brendan Kerry made it a six-time win, coming from well behind in the short program with a fighting free program to retain his crown as Australia’s Men’s Champion.
Selected PyeongChang 2018 Team memeber Kailani had a spectacular national’s campaign with a clean short program that included a triple/triple combo and backing up with two triple lutzes in her free program to Moulin Rouge, achieving a PB total of 172.06 points.
“I love my short program,” she said.
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In second place was the new junior national champion Amelia Jackson from Queensland who backed up by making the podium in senior ranks and in third was veterinary science student Katie Pasfield from NSW.
Struggling with multiple international flights and jet lag, Kerry skated a horror short program, missing every jump and ending up fifth on 57.17 points. He had his work cut out to catch short program leader Mark Webster who was on 65.03 points leading into the free program.
Fighting back to overhaul an eight-point lead, the Sochi 2014 Olympian landed two triple axels and a triple/triple combo in the free program, earning 197.29 points, which was enough to secure the title ahead of Andrew Dodds on 190.80 and Mark Webster on 184.51, both of whom also skated strong free programs.
Kerry had been testing out the order of the quad jump elements at the recent Shanghai Trophy in China and at the national championships.
“I wanted to see if I felt comfortable with the quad salchow as the first element, so we tried it in Shanghai but I didn’t want to base a decision off one comp, so nationals was a safe testing ground,” Kerry said.
“I’m definitely now able to sort the order of elements to put out strong consistent skates from here on out.”
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The selected PyeongChang figure skater will return to his new training base in New Jersey next week.
“I’m looking at getting in some really solid training time without having to bounce around for comps. They were disappointing skates at nationals but I’m really happy I pulled up and won my sixth title. It’s important to me, especially heading into the Olympics.
“At nationals I wanted a clean second half and when the loop didn’t happen, I was angry.”
Paris Stephens and Matthew Dodds took out the pairs championships and new dance team this year Chantelle Kerry and Andrew Dodds were impressive in their first championship together winning the dance.
Belinda Noonan
OWIA
