Nathan Chen rallies, wins GP France, sets possible Yuzuru Hanyu matchup

By Nick ZaccardiNov 24, 2018, 1:00 PM EST

Nathan Chen is going back to the Grand Prix Final for another possible showdown with Yuzuru Hanyu. Jason Brown, if he keeps this up, is on his way to a rebound season after missing the PyeongChang Olympic team.

The world champion Chen won his fifth straight Grand Prix event, moving from third after the short program to overtake Brown and prevail by 15.25 points at Internationaux de France on Saturday. Chen landed three quadruple jumps in a clean, watered-down free skate, totaling 271.58 between two programs.

He overcame a 9.47-point deficit to the 2014 Olympian Brown from Friday.

“I’m still not at the level I should be technically,” Chen, who had a record six quads in his PyeongChang Olympic free skate (five clean), said, according to the Olympic Channel. “There’s a lot of work to be done, but whatever I did, I did. I am pretty satisfied.

“What I did today was the maximum of my capabilities as of right now and we’ll see about the future.”

GP FRANCE: Full Results | TV/Stream Schedule

Chen landed a quad flip and two quad toe loops in the free, including one in combination after falling on an under-rotated quad flip in the short. He’s the first man to win five straight Grand Prix starts in more than a decade.

Chen has so far successfully juggled skating with freshman classes at Yale, training some 3,000 miles from his Southern California-based coach. Like Hanyu and Olympic silver medalist Shoma Uno, Chen swept his two Grand Prix Series starts.

The Grand Prix Final in two weeks is during a break from Yale classes, as were Chen’s two Grand Prix events. The Final, which takes the top six skaters per discipline from the Grand Prix Series, is the second-biggest annual competition behind the world championships.

At the Final, Chen is slated to face the Olympic champion Hanyu for the first time since PyeongChang, where the American was 17th in the short program but won the free skate to place fifth overall. But Hanyu, who has the world’s highest score this season by 16 points, could withdraw from the Final after suffering an ankle injury last Saturday.

“It definitely has pushed me quite a lot over the past few years, to be able to skate with him in practices and compete against him and also just to be able to watch him from afar and see what he’s doing to sort of motivate me and push myself in practices,” Chen said Saturday. “It’s definitely disappointing if he won’t be at the Grand Prix Final.”

Brown did not fall and did not attempt a quad in his programs in Grenoble. The 2015 U.S. champion has now made a Grand Prix podium in all six of his senior international seasons, an active streak shared only by Hanyu among male or female singles skaters.

The silver medal marked quite an improvement for Brown, who was sixth at the U.S. Championships in January and, after changing coaches to Brian Orser, sixth at his Grand Prix season debut in Canada last month.

Brown is now a favorite to make the three-man U.S. team for the world championships in March. Only Chen has a better score this season among Americans than Brown, who is 30 points clear of PyeongChang Olympian Vincent Zhou. Brown competes at least one more time before January’s nationals, at a lower-level event in Croatia in two weeks.

“I have a long way to go with [the free skate], but I’m really happy with the development as it has come a long way since the start to the season,” Brown said. “I’m still just scratching the surface of the potential that I have. … I’m still struggling every day with the changes.”

Later, three-time world champions Gabriella Papadakis and Guillaume Cizeron ran away with the ice dance title by 16.4 points in their first top-level senior event of the season. While their score — 216.78 — is the highest in the world this season by nearly 16 points, they are ineligible for the Grand Prix Final because they missed their first Grand Prix due to Cizeron’s back injury.

Americans Kaitlin Hawayek and Jean-Luc Baker finished fourth, securing their first Grand Prix Final berth. Hawayek and Baker won NHK Trophy two weeks ago. The favorites at the Final are U.S. champions and world silver medalists Madison Hubbell and Zachary Donohue, who won the first two Grand Prix events last month.

Grand Prix Final Qualifiers
Men
1. Yuzuru Hanyu (JPN) — 30 points
2. Shoma Uno (JPN) — 30 points
3. Nathan Chen (USA) — 30 points
4. Michal Brezina (CZE) — 26 points
5. Sergey Voronov (RUS) — 24 points
6. Cha Jun-Hwan (KOR) — 22 points

Ice Dance
1. Madison Hubbell/Zach Donohue (USA) — 30 points
2. Alexandra Stepanova/Ivan Bukin (RUS) — 30 points
3. Victoria Sinitsina/Nikita Katsalapov (RUS) — 26 points
4. Charlene Guignard/Marco Fabbri (ITA) — 26 points
5. Kaitlin Hawayek/Jean-Luc Baker (USA) — 24 points
6. Tiffany Zahorski/Jonathan Guerreiro (RUS) — 24 points

As a reminder, you can watch the ISU Grand Prix Series live and on-demand with the ‘Figure Skating Pass’ on NBC Sports Gold. GO HERE to sign up for access to every ISU Grand Prix and championship event, as well as domestic U.S. Figure Skating events throughout the season…NBC Sports Gold gives subscribers an unprecedented level of access on more platforms and devices than ever before.

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2023 French Open men’s singles draw, scores

By OlympicTalkMay 31, 2023, 6:46 PM EDT

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The French Open men’s singles draw is missing injured 14-time champion Rafael Nadal for the first time since 2004, leaving the Coupe des Mousquetaires ripe for the taking.

The tournament airs live on NBC Sports, Peacock and Tennis Channel through championship points in Paris.

Novak Djokovic is not only bidding for a third crown at Roland Garros, but also to lift a 23rd Grand Slam singles trophy to break his tie with Nadal for the most in men’s history.

FRENCH OPEN: Broadcast Schedule | Women’s Draw

But the No. 1 seed is Spaniard Carlos Alcaraz, who won last year’s U.S. Open to become, at 19, the youngest man to win a major since Nadal’s first French Open title in 2005.

Now Alcaraz looks to become the second-youngest man to win at Roland Garros since 1989, after Nadal of course.

Alcaraz missed the Australian Open in January due to a right leg injury, but since went 30-3 with four titles. Notably, he has not faced Djokovic this year. They could meet in the semifinals.

Russian Daniil Medvedev, the No. 2 seed, was upset in the first round by 172nd-ranked Brazilian qualifier Thiago Seyboth Wild. It marked the first time a men’s top-two seed lost in the first round of any major since 2003 Wimbledon (Ivo Karlovic d. Lleyton Hewitt).

No. 9 Taylor Fritz, No. 12 Frances Tiafoe and No. 16 Tommy Paul are the highest-seeded Americans, all looking to become the first U.S. man to make the French Open quarterfinals since Andre Agassi in 2003. Since then, five different American men combined to make the fourth round on eight occasions.

MORE: All you need to know for 2023 French Open

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2023 French Open Men’s Singles Draw

At the French Open, a Ukrainian mom makes her comeback

By OlympicTalkMay 31, 2023, 5:15 PM EDT

Ukraine’s Elina Svitolina, once the world’s third-ranked tennis player, is into the French Open third round in her first major tournament since childbirth.

Svitolina, 28, swept 2022 French Open semifinalist Martina Trevisan of Italy, then beat Australian qualifier Storm Hunter 2-6, 6-3, 6-1 to reach the last 32 at Roland Garros. She next plays 56th-ranked Russian Anna Blinkova, who took out the top French player, fifth seed Caroline Garcia, 4-6, 6-3, 7-5 on her ninth match point.

Svitolina’s husband, French player Gael Monfils, finished his first-round five-set win after midnight on Tuesday night/Wednesday morning. She watched that match on a computer before going to sleep ahead of her 11 a.m. start Wednesday.

“This morning, he told me, ‘I’m coming to your match, so make it worth it,'” she joked on Tennis Channel. “I was like, OK, no pressure.

“I don’t know what he’s doing here now. He should be resting.”

Also Wednesday, 108th-ranked Australian Thanasi Kokkinakis ousted three-time major champion Stan Wawrinka of Switzerland 3-6, 7-5, 6-3, 6-7 (4), 6-3 in four and a half hours. Wawrinka’s exit leaves Novak Djokovic as the lone man in the draw who has won the French Open and Djokovic and Carlos Alcaraz as the lone men left who have won any major.

The top seed Alcaraz beat 112th-ranked Taro Daniel of Japan 6-1, 3-6, 6-1, 6-2. The Spaniard gets 26th seed Denis Shapovalov of Canada in the third round. Djokovic, the No. 3 seed, swept 83rd-ranked Hungarian Marton Fucsovics 7-6 (2), 6-0, 6-3 to reach a third-round date with 29th seed Alejandro Davidovich Fokina of Spain.

FRENCH OPEN DRAWS: Women | Men | Broadcast Schedule

Svitolina made at least one major quarterfinal every year from 2017 through 2021, including the semifinals at Wimbledon and the U.S. Open in 2019. She married Monfils one week before the Tokyo Olympics, then won a singles bronze medal.

Svitolina played her last match before maternity leave on March 24, 2022, one month after Russia invaded her country. She gave birth to daughter Skai on Oct. 15.

Svitolina returned to competition in April. Last week, she won the tournament preceding the French Open, sweeping Blinkova to improve to 17-3 in her career in finals. She’s playing on a protected ranking of 27th after her year absence and, now, on a seven-match win streak.

“It was always in my head the plan to come back, but I didn’t put any pressure on myself, because obviously with the war going on, with the pregnancy, you never know how complicated it will go,” she said. “I’m as strong as I was before, maybe even stronger, because I feel that I can handle the work that I do off the court, and match by match I’m getting better. Also mentally, because mental can influence your physicality, as well.”

Svitolina said she’s motivated by goals to attain before she retires from the sport and to help Ukraine, such as donating her prize money from last week’s title in Strasbourg.

“These moments bring joy to people of Ukraine, to the kids as well, the kids who loved to play tennis before the war, and now maybe they don’t have the opportunity,” she said. “But these moments that can motivate them to look on the bright side and see these good moments and enjoy themselves as much as they can in this horrible situation.”

Svitolina was born in Odesa and has lived in Kharkiv, two cities that have been attacked by Russia.

“I talk a lot with my friends, with my family back in Ukraine, and it’s a horrible thing, but they are used to it now,” she said. “They are used to the alarms that are on. As soon as they hear something, they go to the bomb shelters. Sleepless nights. You know, it’s a terrible thing, but they tell me that now it’s a part of their life, which is very, very sad.”

Svitolina noted that she plays with a flag next to her name — unlike the Russians and Belarusians, who are allowed to play as neutral athletes.

“When I step on the court, I just try to think about the fighting spirit that all of us Ukrainians have and how Ukrainians are fighting for their values, for their freedom in Ukraine,” she said, “and me, I’m fighting here on my own front line.”

Svitolina said that she’s noticed “a lot of rubbish” concerning how tennis is reacting to the war.

“We have to focus on what the main point of what is going on,” she said. “Ukrainian people need help and need support. We are focusing on so many things like empty words, empty things that are not helping the situation, not helping anything.

“I want to invite everyone to focus on helping Ukrainians. That’s the main point of this, to help kids, to help women who lost their husbands because they are at the war, and they are fighting for Ukraine.

“You can donate. Couple of dollars might help and save lives. Or donate your time to something to help people.”

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2023 French Open Men’s Singles Draw

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