| Junior Pairs – Short placings | ||
| 1 | Kevin Kneeland & Jennifer Williams | USA |
| 2 | Michael Schauf & Nicole Walter | USA |
| 3 | Massimo Carraro & Paola Cosaro | ITA |
| 4 | Luis De Mattia & Gabriela Tessore | ARG |
| Draw for precision staking order | ||
| 1 | Skate Attack | GER |
| 2 | Brookpark Team Elite | USA |
| 3 | Glendale Elite | USA |
| 4 | Holiday Artistic Skating Club of Orange | USA |
| 5 | Inspirations en Vogue | AUS |
| 6 | Synchronettes | AUS |
| 7 | Formation of Hanau | GER |
| 8 | Kiwi Cabaret | NZ |
| 9 | Dream Team | GER |
| 10 | Zeal Impressions | NZ |
| 11 | La Patinage | GER |
27 October 1999SKATERS ARRIVE ON THE GOLD COAST FOR THE
QANTAS JUNIOR WORLD ARTISTIC ROLLER SKATING CHAMPIONSHIPS
Competitors for the QANTAS Junior World Artistic Roller Skating Championships arrived on the Gold Coast on weekend and official training for the junior competition has been running on Tuesday and today.
The opening ceremony and competition begins at the Carrara Stadium tomorrow night with the opening ceremony and competition. There are 19 nations with over 200 competitors in the junior competition including Australian skater Scott Best from Brisbane who finished 4th in the Junior Mens Freeskating event last year in Colombia. Kristen Slade of Geelong in Victoria is also competing in the Junior Ladies Freeskating event. Kristen finished 4th at last years World titles and is also a chance of placing in her event.
The QANTAS World Precision Roller Skating Championships is on Sunday night and the main event begins on Wednesday night for the QANTAS Senior World Artistic Roller Skating Championships with the opening ceremony show starring BACHELOR GIRL Tania Doko.
In the Senior competition Australia has two World Champions skating and are very good medal prospects. Dance couple Brett Mooney and Tanya Titman from Clevland are representing Australian in the Senior competition. The senior teams start arriving on the Gold Coast this Friday.
Thursday, 28 October 1999QANTAS WORLD JUNIOR ARTISTIC ROLLER SKATING CHAMPIONSHIPS COMMENCE TODAYFIGURES
Today the Junior Mens and Ladies Figure competition begins. Figures is the basics of all roller skating events. It require precision and concentration to trace the a painted figure eight circle around the rink. The figure event is definitely n ot a spectator sport but is as seriously contested as the more glamorous events such as dance but nevertheless figures skaters are still drug tested and competitors still work as hard to accumulate points for their nations with medals.In the Junior World Championships Shannon Cole from Mackay and Kristen Slade from Geelong will compete for Australia in the Ladies event. Kristen Slade is skating in three events, figures, freeskating and combined (figures 50% and freeskating 50%) a nd although figures is he least dominant event she is hoping for a top 10 finish in the figures which will help her feature prominently in the ladies combined event. Kristen Slade placed 4th in the Ladies freeskating at last years World Cham pionships in Colombia and should also be a medal prospect in that event. Cole from Mackay is representing Australia for the first time, but has be training consistently at all official training and should perform well in her home state.The USA Team Coach David Morrell said, “the Junior Ladies Figure event will be a very close battle. Any one of 6 or 7 skaters can win it. Argentina, Italy and the USA all have very strong skaters in this and this will be the best competition w e’ve had in a number of years for the title”.
Results for the figure events will be available at 5.30PM this evening.COMPULSORY DANCE & OSP
Australian couple Elizabeth Allen and Phillip Turner of Melbourne will try to improve on their 6th place finish at the World Junior championships in Colombia last year. Coach Martin Hass (former world champion dance sk ater when competing for Germany) stated, “..the competition is tight. My couple have improved considerably this year, but will be hard pressed to beat the Spanish team of Pedro Moreno & Soledad Martinez. Technically the Spaniards are hard to beat and they have the power and maturity of the Senior Dancers”.
The compulsory dances makes up one third of the over dance event result. The OSP (original set pattern) is another third and commences at 8.30 this evening. The OSP is a Rumba and should prove to be a great spectacle. The freedance is the final part of the dance competition and is contested on Friday night.
OPENING CEREMONY
The Opening Ceremony for the Junior World Artistic Roller Skating begins at 7.00pm. 19 countries are marching and Gold Coast singer Jamie Wilson will sing the national anthem. There will be a spectacular skating show featuring s katers from all around Australia. For more information contact Jodie Johnson on 0410 652 255
JUNIOR PAIRS SHORT PROGRAM
The most spectacular event in artistic roller skating the pairs skating will be the highlight of the junior championships. CIPA (Committee of International Artistic Skating) Mr James Pollard said “There are only four teams c ompeting in the pairs, which is due to the lack of coaches in the world and the lack of male skater. Parents of girls get scared when they see the boys lift the girl eight feet in the air and hope they don’t drop them! It comes back to coaching. Pair s is the hardest event to master and nations only send teams to the Worlds if they are medal chances.” The Italian team of Massimo Carraro & Paola Cesare will be favourites but it simply be a matter of the team who doesn’t make any mistakes wi ll win. The short program is worth 25% of the overall mark. The long program will be skated on Saturday to decide the placing.
29th OctoberJUNIOR WORLD ARTISTIC ROLLER SKATING CHAMPIONSHIPS OPENING NIGHTLast nights competition started with the opening ceremony of the QANTAS Junior World Artistic Roller Skating Championships. 19 countries are participating in the junior event and the march past featured local Gold Coast personality Jamie Wilson singing the national anthem.80 skaters from the age of 3 to 67 and from all around Australia have come to the Gold Coast to participate in an Australiania skating show to the theme song G’DAY G’DAY!Junior Italian star Luca D’Ausera (18 years old) 4 times junior world champion and celebrity (with the women!) was interviewed by Mr Ken Bradley (MC) about the popularity of roller skating in Italy. Through an Italian interpreter D’A usera stated, “…hopefully I will make the Italian senior team next year, my goal is to be champion of the world in the senior competition. In Italy we had 17,000 spectators at our championships.” D’Ausera competed in the mens figure event yesterday afternoon placing 4th. His main event is the Junior Mens freeskating that begins tonight at 7pm. D’Ausera will be defending his Mens Freeskating and combined titles that he had won for the past 2 years.
USA DOMINATE COMPETITION ON DAY 1
The USA took out the first two gold medals winning the Ladies Figures and Mens Figures yesterday. Four teams competed in pairs on Thursday evening. The short program was a tense battle with USA holding first and second place wit h Italy third. Kevin Kneeland & Jennifer Williams (in dark blue from USA) are leading with Michael Schauf & Nicole Walter of USA second and Italian pairs team Massimo Carraro & Paola Cesare (dark green) uncharacteristically falling 3 times missing required items to be placed third after the short program. The pairs long program concludes on Saturday evening at 9.15pm.
SPANISH DANCE TEAM DAZZLE
Spanish dance team Pedro Moreno & Soledad Martinez opened a reasonably strong lead with a polished performance in the Original Set Pattern RHUMBA. In a night of colour and movement Moreno and Martinez stood out in a very strong performance of the latin rhythm. Close behind are the USA team of Philip Gilpin Jr and Jayme Fitzgibbon who are very closely followed by the Italian dance team of Mirko Martini and Francesca Cresci. With the Freedance to finish the event tonight at 8.30pm, it makes for an interesting competition at the top.
