The surprise of Four Continents was Polina Edmunds' victory. Based on her skating all season, no one expected her to skate nearly as well as she did here.
The short program has been her biggest issue all season, and now that she finally has the combo in the program under control she has a far greater chance at success. This short program is definitely the better of her two programs. Even when she skates the freeskate cleanly it is not of the same maturity level of other women in the world.
Polina had pretty good skates here, but her chances of landing on the podium at Worlds are slim with the kind of programs she has and the way that she skates. However, this was a huge achievement for her.
For Satoko Miyahara, this event was hers to lose. After the short program she had a decent lead, but fell apart in the freeskate and was unable to hold onto her lead.
Her skating is less emotive and tends to be more technical, so when she can't hold the technical elements together, like here she doesn't have the quality in the second mark to make up for a mistake. However a freeskate like this one could not be saved, regardless of the quality of skating between elements and the performance quality.
Her jumps aren't that big, so there is less room for error, so when her jumps are off, the mistakes can be disastrous. There is a chance for her to take the third spot on the podium, but she is going to have to forget this skate happened and skate at her best for any chance at all.
Rika Hongo skated well, but I find her bad posture to be extremely distracting. She lets her shoulders ride up and loses her neck when she goes into her jumps and sometimes during footwork. These little details make it more difficult to focus on the good aspects of her skating, especially when she isn't the greatest performer either. She's a good enough skater, but I don't see her finishing on the podium at Worlds.
Gracie Gold was a bit of a disappointment. I think everyone expected her to skate better than she did, but she wasn't able to hold it together through the freeskate. Her programs are boring, and it's obvious that she thinks so too.
These programs really aren't anything special, and it's obvious she is just going through the motions, unlike with her exhibition number. Now that she has the chance to skate to any music she wants, it's time to start skating to something she actually enjoys so that she can really commit to the performance. At this point it's too late to do anything for Worlds, so I don't think these programs are enough to get her on the podium, unless others, like Ashley Wagner and Satoko Miyahara make significant mistakes.
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