the crazy stuff they like

This was also the Grand Prix debut for Australians Ekaterina Alexandrovskaya & Harley Windsor. Although the team has already competed at the Olympics and two senior Worlds, this was their first senior Grand Prix. The Australians had a quite decent performance of their “Never Tear Us Apart” SP. Windsor unfortunately doubled his side-by-side triple toe loop, which cost them 3 points in base value. However, the rest of their elements were mostly good. Artistically, the program needs more connection, both to the music and between the partners, but it was a solid effort overall. They scored 60.77 points for fifth.

Alexandrovskaya & Windsor talked afterwards about their recent coaching change to Richard Gauthier and Bruno Marcotte in Montreal. “It’s so different,” said Alexandrovskaya. “So different between the Russian coaches and the Canadian coaches. Because it’s a different system. Different technique.”

Australian team Ekaterina Alexandrovskaya & Harley Windsor landed some good elements in their tango free skate (level 4 triple twist, nice throw triple flip, death spiral). However, they had small mistakes on three jump elements, and their lifts and spin were a bit on the slow side. Ideally, I’d like to see the Australians carry more speed into and out of their elements, as they visibly slow down before some elements. Artistically, their tango program had a studied, step-by-step feel to it; it didn’t really flow or feel very connected to the music. Their PCS marks were mixed, with some scores up in the low-7s, but a handful dipping into the high-5s. Still, they improved on their long program at U.S. Classic, earning a season’s best 106.18 to place seventh in the LP and overall.

Afterwards, the Australians expressed satisfaction with their performance, particularly considering the changes they experienced during the off-season in switching coaches to Richard Gauthier and Bruno Marcotte.

“I think it’s better than our previous competitions. We’re slowly moving forward, and we’re starting to understand now what it’s like to be in senior events,” Windsor said. “But overall, for our first senior Grand Prix, I think it was okay. There’s still a lot of work to do, obviously. I can’t say I’m disappointed with it, but I’m not satisfied with it, either.”

“We had [a] long break after the World Championships,” Alexandrovskaya said.

Windsor concurred: “We started off a lot behind where we should be, in physical form—just because we had such a long break after Worlds, and the whole relocation of coaches and training. I think we’re on the right track. But we’re still a little bit behind of where we want to be.”

Alexandrovskaya & Windsor discussed the factors that led to their decision to change coaches.

“We reached a certain point in juniors. And we wanted to take the next step and really try and move up in seniors and start to become more of a proper senior pair, rather than just juniors who are kind of in the mix. We don’t want to just be participating in competitions, we actually want to be competitive skaters. So we thought that the move here would help us with that,” Windsor explained. “And it’s slowly happening, but it takes time.”

There were some issues with their previous coaching arrangement. “We had a lot of complications after Worlds and Olympics. In Russia, there were a lot of complications with coaching, with ice, with going there with visas, a little bit with the Russian federation,” Windsor explained.

“It was just a whole lot of things that were playing a factor. And it was just a big mess, for a while,” he admitted. “We weren’t sure what we were going to do—if we were going to continue to skate, if we were going to move somewhere. So that’s why we took such a long break, because we didn’t know what we were going to do.”

The team decided to explore other coaching options. “I knew Bruno through competitions previously, and had spoken to him,” said Windsor. “And knew they had a really good track record, obviously, with Meagan [Duhamel] and Eric [Radford]. And I got in contact with Bruno and Richard, and asked if we could come for a tryout sort of thing and see how the whole thing would work. So far, we’re liking the change.”

Alexandrovskaya & Windsor discussed the differences between their previous Russian training style and the Canadian approach. “I think the biggest change is the mindset that everybody has,” Windsor said. “Here, we work a lot more on not just elements, but actual presenting and skating.