#arlet levandi

it was a murder, but not a crime

Arlet Levandi skating to Mauvaise journée by Stromae for his short program at the 2023 Grand Prix of Espoo.

My 10 favourite programes of 2021–2022 (men)

Elements:

3A (<, 2F, fall) | 3F | CCoSp4 | 3Lz3T (niiiice) | FCS4 | StSq4 | CSS4

Program: Yumeji’s Theme, No. 6

This program for the most part, I think is a little big for Arlet’s current skating, however I really appreciate how much he went for it, especially from that combination on — because that Step Sequence was definitely unexpected, special and unique. I am honeslty so excited for Estonia becuase they have such a deep field of so many young and upcoming skaters, and this young man will certainly be one to watch as he grows and matures.

Also Holy cow I’ve found a new favorite men’s costume for the year. This is just GORGEOUS. The only thing I’d change is the fit to the sleeves, and potentially making the tunic a tucked in shirt, but it’s so pretty 🥺

I’m watching the Youth Olympics with a bit of a delay, so here’s some thoughts on the men’s SP. I watched the Pairs as well, but can’t really think of much to say there. So let’s talk about the Junior Men:

- Noah Bodenstein was amazing and I’m so happy he got to have a performance like this in his home city in front of a home crowd. Well done!

- Arlet Levandi was really fun to watch, shame about the missed jump.

- Does anyone know what happened with Yudong Chen’s music? Was it just me, or was “Fly me to the Moon” clearly playing in the background at the same time as his actual music during the whole performance? Did no one notice that? That must have distracted him - it certainly distracted me.

- My patience with the commentator ran out really quickly when he started hyping up Samsonov so much during group three’s warm up (and afterwards). If I had a shot every time he called him “a phenomenon”, I’d be drunk now. And of course he had to mention “that phenomenal school of Eteri Tutberidze” as well for good measure - since we won’t be hearing that during the Ladies’ event this time. And then he talked about “giving him a 10 for courage” for skating the rest of the program clean after his mistake - as if no other skater has ever done that before.

- Yuma’s mistake was awful and made me feel really bad for him :/ At least the boards are soft here, so crashing into them doesn’t hurt as much. I’ve got to say I really like his program, though. Even with a mistake he’s just so pleasing to watch. I’d say his score (by itself) was still pretty good for what he did. I really hope he can pull a Shun-at-the-GPF and make up the difference in the free. I’d love for him to win this, especially after the commetator kept ignoring him to only talk about the Russians.

- I really like Aleksa Rakic, and this was a great skate from him. I love the music and the program, and it was nice to see how happy he was about the score. Good luck in the free!

- Daniil is obviously very talented, and the one thing I’ve got to give him is that his spins are gorgeous. But the way the commentator was hyping him up really got on my nerves, and I do think he was really overscored in comparison to Yuma. Both of them had a major mistake in their program and both of them should be getting similar PCS (normally I’d say Yuma’s should be higher, but this wasn’t his best day). Yet somehow Daniil is 4 points ahead of Yuma. I don’t agree, but who asked me.

- I hate the music of Andrei Mozalev’s SP with a passion and it ruins the performance for me, sorry. I also don’t really find his skating that special. Oh and he was overscored as well, imo.

- I’m really happy for Younghyun Cha. Good luck in the free!

- I miss Shun Sato and I’m so sad he can’t be here :(( I do think Yuma deserves to be here and I understand the decision (he was better than Shun in both Junior and Senior Nationals), but Shun just won the JGPF and it feels wrong not to have the reigning JGPF champion here, while the silver and bronze medalists are. I really wish Japan had two spots.

- And now for some more complaints about the commentator: I hate how he made this whole thing sound like a rivalry between the two Russians. First he mentioned in the beginning how “there’s two really strong Russians in that last group”, without mentioning Yuma as a possible contender for gold. Then he kept mentioning how Mozalev and Samsonov won Silver and Bronze at the JGPF (making me wish more than ever that Shun was here, because surely he’d have to say something about him then?). Then he introduced Mozalev as Samsonov’s “arch rival”, as if this entire season had been a battle between them. Then he said that the margin between them (3 points) wasn’t that big so it would be “all to play for in the free between those two”, even though Yuma is also only 4 points behind Samsonov and could easily still make up for that.

“The battle for Gold will be between those two Russians, but we’ll see what happens with the bronze” - Like, what the hell? At this point he’s just lying??? Yuma’s right there??? Is being ignored as a possible winner just what being a Japanese person in an international skating competition means these days? (Unless you’ve won two OGMs, of course. Not that Yuzuru gets treated fairly in competitions - he absolutely doesn’t - but at the very least he doesn’t get ignored.)