Nice to see you've got the time William

File under "Sanctimony".

After a sparsely attended and empty rink-board'ed Canadians, William Thompson shows up on fsuniverse to defend Skate Canada's honor in the judging-influence department. Goodness he takes his responsibilities seriously.

Good morning

To clarify one point. Skate Canada does not in any way pressure or manipulate judging. In fact, we specifically request that they judge what occurs on the evening and not worry about team selection etc. We have selection criteria that allows us to look at more than one event.

As a former Olympic judge, I find this suggestion completely objectionable and patently untrue. Our first obligation is athletic fairness to the skaters. If judges make errors, it is because they are human and not as a result of pressure from Skate Canada to place skaters in a particular order.

William Thompson
CEO Skate Canada

(On a paid subscription thread.)

Well, that settles that, obviously. If Skate Canada were pressuring and manipulating, they'd tell us straight away.

Bill knows from things both objectionable and untrue. And he knows about manipulating. Or maybe the problem is he doesn't. Bill & Co. care about what's being said about them by FANS? They absolutely don't give a flying shit about how well they're doing their own jobs - how well Canadians went off? Boy do they have priorities.

What are they saying about us?

Where do these people get the balls?

Bill! Two programs at 4CC's 2011. Remember? Jessica/Scott - remember? Debbi W. and Debbie M. in the Kiss'n'Cry hauling Jessica down, right? And Tessa's shins being the only reason whatsoever she and Scott didn't compete the GP and Nationals last season? I know in his mind it's not the same thing. Truth is a one-way street - Skate Canada lying its face off to fans is part of its "responsibility to the skaters as athletes." Bill Thompson is in no position to go on a fan chat board and posture about transparency and truth.

Why is their response always to blunder in and showcase themselves?

Even though here the topic is judging, Thompson is not in a position to say any type of fan speculation is objectionable. This is like when he bailed on twitter. "I don't lie on twitter." Read I don't lie on twitter.

It's objectionable that Skate Canada would pressure judges to score a certain way! I'm a former Olympic judge.

Read - we lie our asses off in other ways but not that.

Too bad - what Skate Canada does contaminates everything so he's got nothing. They're unbelievable, how they compartmentalize. They're corrupt "here" but "innocent" there, so they're going to grandstand about the area in which they find themselves innocent.

In his words, though, I believe we find the key to how Thompson intends to justify all the bullshit and lying they did to fans.

They are going to turn pious. They were protecting the skaters' personal lives. And while they're at it, why not market lies about their personal lives to the fans and have fans shell out for it? And why not use Skatebuzz to market Debbi - he was doing what he needed to do for Debbi too, right? Making fools of people was part of their obligation to skaters as athletes. Because there's no other way to protect privacy than the way they did it.

Read, there's no other way to protect privacy and keep a bunch of clowns in charge of it than the way they did it. Bait and switch, tease and wink, hint and pull the rug out, photo bomb and blitz, sham and stagecraft. These are all time-tested, professional ways of fulfilling your responsibility to your skaters.

None of what they've done with the shamming and hoaxing has been necessary for the skaters. Their operating premises are insane. It's like when Thompson told twitter that something was "personal to Tessa." Since when? When a then-Director of Marketing and Public Relations (now Director of Business Development) asks one of their own teams if they're a couple (Wilkes to D&D), when SC helps promote a book full of lies purporting to be a book full of personal revelations (VM's book) - they can't then get all pompous and talk about "personal" and "our responsibility to the skaters" - they're too pro-active. They're only obsessed with fans as to their personal reputations on gossip forums. Not their job performance. Not their ethics. I live for the day the president of the USFSA shows up on fsu riding a high horse.

In the judging department, Thompson says "the skaters as athletes" but almost anything SC does with the skaters can be swept under that umbrella and they do a LOT that's dishonest vis a vis the public, and a lot that is unnecessary.

Then too, Skate Canada has other obligations to their figure skaters - an obligation to direct and manage a financially viable organization. An obligation not to squander important relationships and resources. An obligation to put competent people in key positions. An obligation to market and promote events so the figure skaters are rewarded with the idea that the public actually gives a damn about what they work and sacrifice for year round.

Thompson has been sitting on his ass ignoring those obligations for two years.

He has an obligation to the public as Skate Canada has public funding. Don't pull the wool over the public's eyes and market hoaxes to them whether it's a book signing hoax or a relationship hoax or a wedding guest hoax-by-implication, all so you can sell falsehood to them while making them think they're paying for the real deal.

Amazing. One little area where he thinks he's got some authentic standing and he can't wait to on a fan message board how clean his hands are.

That's an awful lot of self-righteousness for a guy in his position. And it's revealing about what matters to him.

What are people saying?

They don't get it.

After a couple of posters snarked, William Thompson returned to say:

Good afternoon. I have been on the board for many years. Criticize me if you wish but the reason I am here is that I read the board from time to time to pay attention to skating fans. I would see this as a positive. Occasionally I correct things where I feel they are incorrect. In this case, there was no defense of the judging rather, I corrected the assertion in this thread that Skate Canada told the judges how they are to judge. Further, I do it in my own name for complete transparency.

William Thompson

You know what I love most? Bill not only posts to a message board about a few fans chewing the fat about judging, he sticks around to see people's reactions. He doesn't care for some of them  so he comes back to "correct" them! Canadians were this past weekend. It's a week day. He's got stuff to do! What's he doing checking how people reacted to his post on a fan board and then overreacting when I think maybe two participants rolled their eyes?

Come back and correct us soon again Bill.

This is them. Obsessed with themselves, not their jobs. They're wannabe stars, SC's personnel.

I think skating fans as well as sponsors are already aware William Thompson would "see it as a positive" if attention of any kind were paid to them by the self-impressed Skate Canada higher-ups.

OTOH, I think it might be argued that Skate Canada, led by William Thompson, pays way too much attention to skating fans in all the wrong ways (hoaxing, shamming, reputation protecting, lying, high horsing, message board gossip about themselves when they don't care if the same posters are full of shit about skaters due to the lies Skate Canada disseminates) and not enough attention to the public in the right ways (a web page that's user-friendly, not a showcase for the in-house media whore, ethical use of publicly-funded resources and venues, and a well-run figure skating competition).

Dear lord he bragged on his transparency. Well yeah, Skate Canada is transparent but not in that way, Bill.

William Thompson's facebook is restricted.  However, this photo isn't:

"Ah .. St. Lucie."

This he leaves open to the public so the public can be impressed by how much weight he'd lost and his streamlined physique. Why would a former mediocre figure skater turned organization official publicize his naked torso? Vanity. It's not vanity, necessarily, about that godlike silhouette pictured above. It's vanity thinking fans are interested.

Just like him mentioning to a bunch of fans on fsu that he thinks they should basically count themselves fortunate someone at Skate Canada is paying attention to what they say - even if all he cares about is what a bunch of fans say about HIM. Yeah Bill, not so much.

Russian fans post darkly about the Russian Fed, all Feds get gossip about dealmaking and politiks. Bill has to step in twice on a fan message board? He talks back to fans? And when a fan or two wonders why he's thrusting himself into fan business, he lectures they ought to be gratefeul attention is paid at all? What's wrong with him?

I tell you what, based on Skate Canada's track record of squawking loudest when they're guilty of something, I figure Thompson showing up on fsu means Skate Canada politicked pretty hard for Gilles/Poirier with the judges and simply didn't expect so many fans to call them out on that.

I'll also, like many fans, call them out on their reluctance to send Amelie Lacoste to Worlds. Okay, if Kaetlyn wins, we'll send her - no skate-off with Cynthia. If Cynthia wins, she goes. If Amelie wins, skate-off.

Athletic fairness to the skaters. Bill is all about it.

Screw him.

Is this figure skating?

I recently outlined the Scott/Tessa/Skate Canada situation to an attorney friend in order to give it a real world taste test. So Atty Doe's eyes wouldn't glaze over when I brought up figure skating, I hit the Skate Canada piece of it hardest. She's media savvy - everybody in a major city or media market brands these days, everybody uses web tools and social media to focus their message, everybody has an internet presence and decides what it is they're selling and what to leave out that's not in their best interests. Everybody pays attention to ethics, particularly where the public sector is concerned, and knows where the line is even if they have no ethical compass because nobody wants their organizational ass in a sling.

All of this isn't just a game for public figures.

It's just coincidental AD was an attorney - she's a sophisticated person and well-connected. Also civic minded so I was anticipating a "that's fucked up" about Skate Canada's getting its hands dirty in the Scott and Jessica hoax. I said doesn't all this raise questions.

AD said: "Yes it raises a question - what the fuck is wrong with you Scott and Tessa!!"

I was actually floored. I was like - what about the SC stuff? She was shrugging that off - I guess that kind of dirty isn't news to an attorney in her sector.  She was all "What the fuck is wrong with them!"

This is a woman who spent another portion of our conversation telling me about a sports star with a major market professional sports franchise whose personal life is kept on the dl so the (beer-swilling, face-painting, tailgating) demographic never finds out about it. But the athlete in question plays a real sport. He's not called upon to talk about breakfast tacos, relationship quizzes or whether his teammates are a part of him but he only thinks of them as friends.

Scott and Tessa's deal she thought was a freak show. Which it is. But I'd thought the basic algorithm made sense - public figures, private lives, fake private life to protect real one. Just the execution is all kinds of fucked up.

Nope. She thought the whole thing was fucked up - facebook, Jessica, the whole deal, in view of Scott and Tessa's current personal situation, over and out. They're sick.

She even said sorry, they made the choice. The second you lace up the skates, that's part of the deal. You don't shove it off on everyone else because you don't want to cope with it.

There was not even an "I get it, but" going on with her when it comes to this.

So I reached for the only analogy I could think of. Pageants. I said - you know the whole pageant circuit, you know that world. The intensity and obsession inside a narrowly focused environment to where common sense turns upside down and all perspective goes down the toilet. There's no reality check because real world air doesn't get in.  It's an environment that breeds crazy.

THEN the lightbulb went on.

So Skate Canada figure skating at its heart is like this world:

I think the analogy actually is valid. Figure skating in Canada is a national sport populated by a teensy, insular, parochial community with a blinkered worldview and neurotic priorities, self-referential and self-obsessed.  It's a Christopher Guest movie. And unfortunately, that applies to the officials in charge of it. The premise of how they do everything is warped, and proceeds "rationally" from there because they completely lack any ability to determine the essential sanity of their assumptions.

I believe even the most entitled, overfamiliar, intrusive fan occupies more of the real world than some of these figure skaters and Skate Canada's personnel. Their skater obsessions are entertainment or fixations. If they got checked, they'd redirect. The crazy is Skate Canada, not Skate Canada managing the crazy of the fans. Skate Canada is plain crazier.

Unlike the pageant circuit, Skate Canada has access to sophisticated, knowledgeable media advice and so do the figure skaters. They go the do-it-yourself route because they have massive egos inverse to their capabilities, and they don't want to relinquish control, personal visibility and perks.

There's also a clear obsession with micromanaging the personal while being unprofessional slobs on the business side.

There are regional high schools with better managed pr than Skate Canada, but that requires that the school principal and school board and the rest of the personnel aren't bent on promoting themselves at the expense of the school, aren't power-tripping, honestly want effective pr and also are accountable.

And really, the pageant world is healthier. It's doing its best with what it has. Skate Canada turns its back on obvious resources. Its ineptitude is a choice. I think it's funny if totally insane that these huge egos went and did it themselves and did a worse job than your average middle schooler going on the internet to promote a fund raising drive. But then it's likely the middle-schoolers had a clearer agenda. Skate Canada is a little hamstrung by its directors' personal agendas.

It's not going to be a real sport - not to hockey loving men, not to the mainstream - til they get the weird out. Mainstream your weird, Skate Canada. You're an outlier.

The very fact that the Scott/Tessa/Jessica thing was planned and dear God, executed as it has been up to and including the family viewing parties showcasing Jessica at competitions, baby holding, Xmas faking and make-out feigning - shows a not-ready-for-prime time mentality. No wonder important sponsors can't cope with it.

Even the thumbnail is priceless

Look at that. Right from the top, a heavenly beam of light shining upon Sandra. God's own lens filter.*

But Debbi won't go down without a fight. Who's going to face emote more? Who's smarmier? Who marvels the most? Who will shrug more, smile most wisely, sprinkle more spoon-sized portions of pedestrian platitudes hacked from the largest blocks of mind-numbing banality? Whose cloying self-satisfaction will smog up the frame first? We'll just see!

Well let's be real - Sandra had this won going in.

But just look at that symphony of competitive passive aggressive upstaging. The beams of wry, well-earned worldly wisdom, the turning to and fro to us, the viewer. Sandra smiles, Debbi smiles, Sandra laughs lightly, Debbi laughs lightly, Sandra's eyes widen, Debbi's eyes narrow then widen, they both swivel towards us then back towards each other, dear God.

You almost figure that Sandra is who Debbi would want to be and Debbi is who Sandra thinks about when she gets down on her metaphorical knees and thanks God for good-looking parents.

Not that Debbi isn't lovely, but the difference between her and Sandra is genetics.

This must be a dream sequence I watched on netflix from the makers of The Hangover. It's too good to be real.
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*And that's a LOT of filter, gotta say. Kudos for finding meadow calibre sunshine in a Canadian January.*

               _________________________
               * Or did the sunshine find her?

P.S.
On a non-snark basis, below is a link to the basic responsibilities of a business development department. Just adapt the model to an organization like Skate Canada, and remember that Debbi is the so-called Director of this department. Remember that Canadian competitions are the showcase for SC's business development department - SC's business development department should be up to its ears in networking, hospitality and access initiatives for existing and potential sponsors - and a director of business development ought to be on task nurturing and developing relationships all year long. It requires research, targeted outreach, strategic planning, project management, review, short and long-term goal setting, budgeting, analysis, etc.

Instead during the Vancouver Olympics Debbi was up in the star figure skaters' grill as usual, overseeing a public hoax, and team freaking leader. At every Canadian competition, domestic or international, there's her mug on Skatebuzz and there's her face at practices. When there's no competition, she finds filler to get her face on Skatebuzz. And on a "runs itself" event like HPC, she's making sure she's the only background with an unobstructed, face forward camera lens sightline. Not to mention Debbi popping up "in line" at a book signing no actual fan apparently attended at Western Challenge 2010 in order to stick her gigantic mike in Scott and Tessa's faces and inform them what she needs them to say.

What she does on camera takes a lot of prep.

No way Debbi is doing this

So Debbi is doing no business development. I don't know what you'd call her creepy Minister of Information/in-house goodwill ambassador/ media personality gig, but that's what she does.

See all the white space on the boards at Canadians? No business development. I suspect Debbi is owed in some way as there seems no limit to the on camera opportunities she's free to create for herself on Channel Debbi, such as the Bezic interview here. We don't see Sandra enough, we needed Debbi to be our window.

It's not as if Debbi is pitching in with the camera stuff because Skate Canada is run by volunteers and she has to wear a media hat in addition to her business development hat. There is no business development hat, and Skatebuzz promotes Debbi versus promoting figure skating.

Who is doing business development?

Last point- I'm seriously mystified by Skate Canada's obsession with its own logo. Yes, that's the brand image but the brand itself has to be developed before you obsess over the graphics. The graphic itself is not going to do anything to get people interested in Skate Canada.

Was that so hard?

 Tesssa & Scott's interview with P.J.Kwong.

P.J. asked each to define what romance means to them. Tessa can't help herself - at first she thrashed like a fish on dry dock and pretended the question was about the romantic elements of Funny Face. Which, you know, isn't really a romantic program. Audrey & Fred in Paris -come on. Let's look at it techically, from a composition standpoint. I could go on for days:

 

Romantic? Funny, we don't think of Funny Face as romantic; it's a
man helping a woman to have more fun, take life less seriously, they
rub foreheads and cheeks together like Eskimos, they stroke each other's
faces a little bit and then end up gloriously in love, but is that really romantic?

To be fair, on the scale of what Tessa and Scott usually do on the ice, that's not romantic. I think what she getting at is saying it's not JUST romantic - they actually do other activity besides paw each other between elements. Activity like having fun together, teasing each other, being playful, holding hands and gliding and twirling, fooling around with different dance styles. So, not romantic.

But then Scott takes the ball:

How crushing for Tessa/Scott shippers. Clearly, he was thinking of:

There she is to his left - his other half. And he didn't even have to find her in the world. Skate Canada served her up on a platter.

Then Tessa says her definition of romance is:

"I think the ability to laugh and be completely yourself with
someone is the most romantic thing ever."

That's got to sting. When has Tessa ever said her favorite thing about Scott is that he makes her laugh?

In their own tightly-wound way, they basically said they love each other and romance is each other. They won't admit that's what they said, but they didn't go out of their way to describe something that couldn't possibly be each other - they described what could only be each other.

And they didn't turn into pillars of salt, nobody burst into flames, people's heads didn't swivel as they pointed fingers and made fun. The world didn't stop spinning and Tessa was still breathing when she was done answering. She wasn't spewing pea soup.

Baby steps, for which they will compensate by sham-messaging just as soon as Jessica can unclutch herself from embracing and intertwining fingers with Sebastien.

Have to give Jessica credit - that relationship was turning toxic but I believe Jessica's drive to remain viable in Canadian skating and postpone engagement with the real world - her status as a demi-celebrity and top dog in Quebec skating is so central to what drives her - that she actually focused, and turned the relationship with Sebastien around - and that (relationships where SHE steps up) is not her metier. But she's got willpower when it comes to her agendas, that's for sure. She doesn't want another worlds medal, she doesn't care much about international results, and she's as ecstatic with a mediocre program skated with meh GOES as others are with near-perfection. Going forward is not her agenda but absolutely, her world as it's been since she's been in senior skating is how she wants it to stay.

At the same time, at Canadians, she demonstrated plainly that she's not some insecure nervous-in-the-clutch figure skater who underperforms despite her deep desire to succeed. That's fans being defensive about Jessica - needlessly. The Jessica they protect is a fantasy version.

The real Jessica doesn't get down on herself. The real Jessica thinks she's fine and if there's a problem it's going to be someone else's problem.  She was one of the few pairs women to keep her composure and hit her elements despite more than one wobble (and a de rigeur doubling of the 3 salchow). She's not nervous, self-doubting or insecure. In the past, she didn't put in the work, she was lazy, she has a great deal of strong, natural technique, great balance and stability and gets deep into the ice. Without those assets in combination with her work ethic in the past, she'd have been even worse.  What's happened in the past with her is her resisting her partner, putting more energy into that than in training, resisting going outside her comfort zone, and also using the ice as a passive aggressive venue if, off ice, someone else's will (Bryce's, say) prevailed over hers in any area either professionally or personally. She'd pay them back on the ice.

At this point it does appear as if she's succeeded in simply putting Sebastien in Bryce's place - only a Bryce who is not pushing for higher level of difficulty, more challenging content, and a shake-up in training centers. Just nice, basic, reasonably consistent pairs programs (Skate Canada-speaking) that keep her in the mix.

What is wrong with her?



"Say it!!!"
Debbi Wilkes "interviews" Virtue and Moir

"And I know you talk a lot about now you feel like you're the veterans but I think you also feel that there's a responsibility in that too am I right Scott?"

BOOM. 

This woman literally spoons the words into the skaters' mouths. It's all her her her. She's unbearable.

From what I gather Debbi Wilkes was an okay pairs skater who medaled in an Olympics. That's great but she's not a particular stand-out in Canadian skating history. Where does she get her hubris? Where does she get her belief that her audience is a bunch of imbeciles who need her to act. out. her. interviews. Where does she get her idea that the camera loves her face?

Tracy Wilson has about ninety thousand times the resume and recognition factor but does not turn and cheese at the camera to cue us how to react to what was just said, nor does she pry open the skater's mouth and put in the words. And in the category of former skaters as media personalities, there are all kinds of good-natured seeming blithering idiots but none with the self-regard of Debbi Wilkes, none with the absolute belief in his/her own pompous pronouncements. From her interview with Carolina Kostner, which remains epic in recent annals of condescension, to Wilkes shamelessly orchestrating each interview with each figure skater so as to continually reference herself, to how neither she nor Thompson bother pretending she actually attends to the responsibilities attendant with her Director's title, what the unholy fuck with this woman.

Where does this lady get her balls? What higher ups fucked a bunch of goats and because Debbi has the photos they turned Debbi loose in front of a camera and gave her a bunch of phony, ever-evolving titles that essentially build-in on-camera-face time because the job description has "marketing" "public relations" or "communications" in it?

Debbi Wilkes is like a movie character.  Her smarmy demeanor, her just-folks word usage, her power-tripping cloaked in unctuous, control freak manipulation and pandering. Her fake job. Her omnipresence. Her fingers in every pie, and her sticking a bit too close to the skaters' personal lives and in their physical space. The way she makes each little sentence component a little teaching moment because we're so dim witted we can only process information a syllable at a time. Her huge smile - often when no one else is smiling. Her obsession with controlling the narrative and putting words in people's mouths. She's straight out of Central Casting as a stereotypical movie villain - she could go in a comedy sketch as is without tweaking a thing. Sometimes it's hard to believe she's real. 

P.S. - Moore-Towers Moscovitch had a trainwreck of a long program and so Dube/Wolfe got silver after putting down a somewhat cautious, wobbly, apprehensive-feeling but overall clean program. They've improved a lot but even adding in the triple twist, their clean skate finished only about eight points ahead of  MTM's spectacular debacle. They are unlikely to add choreographic content or up the difficulty.

William Thompson is making noise that he might send Phaneuf to Worlds. I think it's ridiculous not to send Lacoste. It doesn't matter if SC sends 1 lady to Worlds next year or twelve when all the ladies suck. Better to send the bronze medalist who can at least do a triple/triple. Instead of kissing mediocre veteran ass, give it to Kaitlyn Osmond so she can start getting international experience under her belt.  Hell, if you're going to play wriggle room games, give the second pairs slot at Worlds to MTM, who are unlikely to go down on a lift again in the same program where Kirsten trips and does a face plant mid jump sequence, and so are likely to place higher than a clean Dube/Wolfe.

Canadians

First of all, congratulations to Director of Business Development (formerly director of Marketing and Public Relations) Debbi Wilkes for her sterling performance at Canada's National Figure Skating Championships. Debbi and her team fell just short of half-filling a venue the size of my grandmother's high school auditorium.* Kudos Debbi. Looking forward to all of your interviews on Skatebuzz. You've earned the spotlight girl.

Second:

WTF was that?

They fixed what wasn't broken, and the rest of it - don't get it.

Third: Jessica! Congrats on bravely soldiering through your sudden onset single-itis to second place in the short - even executing a split TRIPLE twist! I thought I was watching Xue Shen out there. Could Rod Black have leaned any harder emphasizing how much HARD WORK and long hours it takes to perform like that? I smell some motivational speaking engagements for you, Jessica.

Fourth, Tracy Wilson said the Dube/Wolfe short was choreographed by David Wilson.

David Wilson

When Dube/Wolfe were doing Liberty and Quebec P.J. Kwong was happy to inform us their short program was by Marina Zoueva. Come Canadians, it's good old David Wilson. The name of their sp choreographer changes almost as often as Debbi Wilkes' director's titles.** What's the problem? Canadians too mainstream for a sham shout out? Somebody thought people might wonder who paid for Marina?

Also Rod Black asked us to imagine you're Sebastien Wolfe, and one day you get a call that a World medalist - a champion (put it together like that sort of implied World Champion) needs a partner.

This stuff is just pulled out of people's hind ends, isn't it? There is just no relationship whatsoever to who, how, where, when or the facts. And this is the media some fans think would be on the case if they really knew Scott and Tessa were lying about their relationship status. 

Just read this Tessa quote about the short dance:

We're testing it out, we're feeling it and seeing how we feel competing with the changes, and getting some feedback from judges," Virtue said. "We're anxious to prove ourselves, and to prove that the changes we made were good, but we have to know that they are and trust our process and go out there and have a fresh start (Saturday) with a program that we love.

Can't get inside her head but that's not a Stepford quote, that feels real and syncs up with how they looked yesterday.

Finally, Melanie Hoyt reports she keeps running into people at the venue who don't know who Virtue/Moir are. So the two years of post-Vancouver Scott/Tessa promotion brilliantly orchestrated by Skate Canada is reaping big dividends in-country, that's for sure. It's not a surprise - you'd have to be amazingly incompetent to blow it with Virtue Moir and Thompson, Slipchuk & Wilkes have been sensational failures.

Ironically, prior to the Vancouver Olympics one of their favorite interview gambits was to explain to us all their superior insight about figure skating promotion in Canada, the proper way to do it and grow skating's popularity, how it needed to be presented to the public, and they let us know that this was something they thoroughly understood how to do that their well-intentioned predecessors did not.

They are unbelieveable charletons. Turns out their priority is promoting themselves - none more relentlessly than Wilkes & Thompson although Barb McDonald is as opportunistic as they come. She and Wilkes see Skate Canada as their personal promotion platform. Ask not what you can do for Skate Canada, ask what Skate Canada can do to raise your profile and create your brand. That's all that's getting done effectively in the marketing, public relations and business development departments.
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 *I bet they get a full house in China.

**Who is Director of Marketing & Public Relations now that Wilkes is Director of Business Development. Wonder what job they'll pretend she's doing next season.

Tendonitis

P.J. Kwong reports Jessica Dube has withdrawn from ladies singles at Canadians due to sudden onset tendonitis in her toe-pick leg.

I will miss Jessica's non-tendonitis jump technique in singles.

Well that's a shame.

Any moment now, I suppose she'll withdraw from the pairs competition too, since you need that toe pick for the split twist.

No? She's gonna gut it out? What a trooper.

I have to confess, when Jessica withdrew from singles, and since she spent most of her last singles competition on her ass, I thought - well, of course. She's not really training her singles skating, she was just saving face since she swore she split from Bryce due to her renewed "spark" for singles skating. And now she's over it. She had pretended it was singles skating prompting her decision - that she had no idea she'd soon have Sebastien in the bag. She certainly couldn't be all "screw singles" right away once she had a new partner. That would make her look all manipulative and stuff. She had to keep up her singles for a bit, just for form's sake. So when she withdrew from Canadians I was like - yeah, she's done.

How bad do I feel now? I had no idea a reason would actually be produced, that reason being singles skating situational tendonitis. It's kind of like the jump flu virus she suddenly came down with last year the day of her Canadians singles lp. Remember that? Her eyes were clear, her skin tone was normal, she spun like a top, spirals were smooth and steady, footwork decent and she sourpussed like a pro. But when it came to the lutz, salchow, flip - jump flu.

Here's her chance to make up for it and darn the luck - she's hit with singles foot. When she toes in for a lutz or flip in her singles program - ouch, ouch OUCH!!! When she toes in for her split double twist in pairs, everything's fine. Well, except for her being a 24 year old world bronze medalist backsliding to a double twist.

Although fans of her singles skating will be disappointed, at least her case of singles foot will not be a roadblock when she climbs the podium to receive her bronze medal in pairs.