#junior men

Ladies - Kamila Valieva, Sofia Samoldelkina, Daria Usacheva, Anna Frolova, Maya Kromych (Reserve: Sofia Muravyova, Valeria Shulskaya)

Men - Artem Kovalev, Gleb Lutfullin, Daniil Samsonov, Evgeni Semenenko, Ilya Yablokov (Reserve: Georgiy Kunitsa, Andrey Kotovoy, Kirill Sarnovsky)

Pairs - Kseniia Akhanteva / Valerii Kolesov, Iuliia Artemeva / Mikhail Narzychev, Diana Mukhametzianova / Ilya Mironov, Anastasia Mukhortova / Dmitry Evgeniev (Reserve: Viktoria Vasilieva / Nikita Volodin, Tatyana Kuzmina / Alexey Khvalko, Ekaterina Petushkova / Evgeni Malikov)

This should be a showdown between two Japanese stars - Yuma Kagiyama and Shun Sato. Sato beat him at the Grand Prix Final, but Kagiyama was the star at both Japanese Junior and Senior Nationals. I think Kagiyama has the edge here, but don’t underestimate Sato.

Then there is a very interesting fight for the bronze medal. 

I think the top contenders for bronze are Reigning Bronze Medalist Daniel Grassl of Italy and Andrei Mozalev of Russia. Both are very talented, and either could easily end up in that third spot. It was Grassl last year, but Mozalev is more than capable. Grassl will need to watch his under-rotations in the free.

While they are the top contenders, there are others who could easily sneak in there if something happens. I would say the next group is Stephen Gogolev of Canada and Petr Gumenik of Russia. Both fell short of the podium last year, but are more than capable of great performances if they can skate their best here, they can be competitive.

Our next group skaters who should be fighting for the rest of the top ten are Aleksander Selevko of Estonia, Adam Siao Him Fa of France, Sihyeong Lee of South Korea, Andrew Torgashev of the US, Nikolaj Majorov of Sweden, and Ilya Yablokov of Russia. Yablokov is (arguably) the most consistent of the group, but most of the others have higher personal bests.

Other skaters who could make a splash that should be kept an eye on are: Joseph Phan of Canada, Mark Gorodnitsky of Israel, and the other two Americans - Ilia Malnin and Maxim Naumov.

I usually suck at these, but here we go anyway -

Men

GOLD - Yuma Kagiyama SILVER - Shun Sato BRONZE - Daniel Grassl 4th - Andrei Mozalev 5th - Stephen Gogolev 6th - Petr Gumenik 7th - Adam Siao Him Fa 8th - Ilya Yablokov 9th - Shiyeong Lee 10th - Aleksander Selevko

Ladies

GOLD - Kamila Valieva SILVER - Alysa Liu BRONZE - Haien Lee 4th - Daria Usacheva 5th - Maiia Kromykh 6th - Seoyeong Wi 7th - Mana Kawaba 8th - Ekaterina Ryabova 9th - Tomoe Kawabata 10th - Starr Andrews

Pairs

GOLD - Apollinaria Panfliova / Dmitry Rylov SILVER -  Kseniia Akhanteva / Valerri Kolesov BRONZE - Iulia Artemeva / Mikhail Nazarychev 4th - Annika Hocke / Robert Kunkel 5th - Kate Finster / Balazs Nagy 6th - Alina Butaeva / Luca Beruleva 7th - Cleo Hamon / Denis Strekalin 8th - Huidi Wang / Zigi Jia 9th - Yuchen Wang / Yihang Huang 10th - Kelly Ann Laurin / Lucas Either

Ice Dance

GOLD - Maria Kazakova / Gregory Reviya SILVER - Avonley Nguyen / Vadim Kolesnik BRONZE - Elizaveta Shanaeva / Devid Naryzhnyy 4th - Arina Ushakova / Maksim Nekrasov 5th - Loicia Demougeot / Theo Le Mericier 6th - Diana Davis / Gleb Smolkin 7th - Natalie Tasherlova / Filip Taschler 8th - Utana Yoshida / Shingo Nishiyama 9th - Miku Makita / Tyler Gunara 10th - Natalie D’Alessandro / Bruce Waddell

Entries: http://www.isuresults.com/events/fsevent03111895.htm Results: http://www.isuresults.com/results/season1920/jgpfra2019/index.htm Live stream: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCbv3gsBXzIwotCt2JGySfJA

Welcome to the first Junior Grand Prix event of the season - the JGP Courchevel in Courchevel, France. The competition runs Thursday - Saturday. It’s bound to be exciting!

Schedule

8/22: Ladies’ SP 14:15; Men’s SP 19:30 8/23: Rhythm Dance 14:15; Ladies’ FS 17:10 8/24: Men’s FS 11:45; Free Dance 15:15; Gala 20:30

Skaters to Watch

Now, just as a note, these are not all podium contenders - but some are those that I think should still be kept an eye on. They are in no particular order. 

Here are the qualifiers for the 2019 Junior Grand Prix Final for the Junior Men:

Andrei Mozalev (RUS)

1st JGP Final

Yuma Kagiyama (JPN)

1st JGP Final

Petr Gumenik (RUS)

2nd JGP Final

Silver in 2018

Only Qualifier with Finals experience

Daniel Grassl (ITA)

1st JGP Final

1st Italian Qualifier Since Alessandrini and Vautiri (Ice Dance) in 2009

1st Italian Singles Qualifier Since Stefania Berton in 2006

1st Italian Male Singles Qualifier

Daniil Samsonov (RUS)

1st JGP Final

Shun Sato (JPN)

1st JGP Final

And the alternates:

Artur Danielan (RUS)

Stephen Gogolev (CAN)

Ilya Yablokov (RUS)