ARD Gala

The ARD Gala was on October 3rd and I saw it on a private video, not the TV braodcast. It will broadcasted only on German TV on Dec 25th. But I can tell you, Evgeni did a great performance at the Gala!!! He showed a powerful MJ short program. He fell on his first jump, the 4 Toeloop but then there was a good 3 Axel. He does not do the same spins he does in competition. He leaved out the donut and Biellmann spin. I've noticed that he leave out those spins on some exhibitions so far like on last years ARD Gala where he did not the Biellman spin on any of both performances. At the beginning of Billie Jean he does the hip moves and the audience cheered a lot to it, they loved the Billie Jean music! The audience applauded a lot during the program. Then he did the amazing circular footwork very fast and powerful, then a 2 Lutz and a spin combination. He changed a little bit the music of the second part of Childhood before "They don't care about us" begins. Then the next amazing footwork, sit spin and that was the end, the German public loved that program!! And since on TV we only see perfect performances, Evgeni was supposed to do a 3 Toeloop in the break to replace the fall on the 4 Toeloop, but he did a really incredible 3T-3T-2R-2R jump combination,flawless and clean!!!! He also needed to do the 3 Lutz again, he also did that jump clean! I don't know why we should only see flawless programs on TV, it was good as it was, even with mistakes... Second performance was Sex Bomb, he performed it like on the GWG but he climbed over that high board to hug a young girl. The German audience also loved that program at every movement the audience cheered a lot , they were in a great mood!! During the program he did a 2 Toeloop, 2 Axel and a 3 Toeloop but this program is not about jumps it's entertainment! Report from Vera who went to the ARD Gala on Ice: Intro (group number): typical opening number, but with a very symoblic end - Yagudin and Plushenko stand in the middle of the ice (a few meters apart from each other), holding their right hands up and facing each other for maybe a minute or something like that, until Daniel Weiss, started his TV presentation. MJ medley (SP). The choreography was a bit in that miltary style of last years Bolero, but I think a bit more dancy (including that hip movement, of course... ), and his step sequence WAS overwhelming, really impressing. He fell on his 4 toeloop, and after the first half of the show, all the skaters who fell or did an unclean element had to retake it for television (on TV we will only see absolutely flawless programmes), and instead of a 4 toeloop, he did some 3-3-2-2 combo! Don't know which jumps, but who cares.....I've never seen anything like this before..... Sexbomb: We had 2nd row seats (the best actually, because in front of the first row there's a huge wall thing which does not allow a perfect view at the ice), and we were a bit worried.......but when we actually saw that really high wall or board, we considered ourselves safe. But you know......erm......well...he jumped over it! I did not believe what my eyes were seeing when he climbed over that wall and kissed a girl in the neighbouring block, exactly in the 2nd row....some friends of ours were sitting there and I hope they took good pictures of that moment.... Then he had some little difficulties to jump back on the ice. Photo © by Sportfoto Lucke Photos of the ARD Gala