Shaky triple flips drop Broadmoor skater Flatt to seventh at Olympics

VANCOUVER – Perhaps better known for the solid technical aspects in her skating than the middle-of-the-road artistry, Rachael Flatt was doomed Thursday in her first Olympics by two downgraded triple jumps, keeping her off the podium at the Vancouver Games.

The Broadmoor Skating Club member received low marks when attempting triple flips in a graceful yet spunky long program, and her scores from three combinations weren’t high enough against a stacked field, as she finished seventh, 20.15 points away from a medal.

World champion Kim Yu-na of South Korea kept her lead after the short program with a world-record score to win a gold, and the other two stands of the podium stayed intact, as Mao Asada of Japan claimed silver and Canadian Joannie Rochette grabbed bronze, four days removed from her mother’s death. The other American, Mirai Nagasu, took fourth.

The first Broadmoor woman to compete in the Olympics in 22 years, Flatt had the same elegance she displayed in a fifth-place finish in Tuesday’s short program, and she brought her usual pop, performing seven triple jumps to “Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini” by Sergei Rachmaninoff while wearing a moderate red dress with sparkling gold sequins.

Judges hit Flatt, the 17-year-old national champion, with less-than-average marks for a triple flip that also featured a triple toe loop in her opening combination, and they did the same when she threw a triple flip on the front end of a combination including a double toe and a double loop. Flatt got a decent score on her middle combo, a triple lutz-double toe.

“They felt fine,” Flatt said of her flips. “They felt normal. I’ll have to take a closer look when I get home. … As far as I can remember, I’ve never gotten it downgraded.”

Flatt suggested the height of her flips “might have been a little lower than normal,” and it appeared she maybe spent too much time between jumps in combinations, with somewhat of a mechanical approach instead of powering from element to element.

Compared to the U.S. Championships, when Flatt beat her score of 182.49 in Vancouver by 17.62 points, Flatt said Thursday was “more of a free program. I kind of showed more emotion and more feeling throughout the program.” Kim recorded 228.56 points to pass her previous mark by 18.53 points and top Asada, her longtime rival, by 23.06 points.

Flatt hopes to attend the men’s ice hockey gold-medal game and Closing Ceremony on Sunday, and she’ll depart Vancouver feeling satisfied with an Olympic debut she wasn’t expected to make until 2014, an experience she called “incredibly exciting, and I thought I had given it all that I had. … I just wanted to have fun and enjoy the moment.”

Next season should be Flatt’s time to shine, when the Cheyenne Mountain High School senior makes her third go-round on the senior tour, having won two medals at Grand Prix competitions, a silver at the 2008 Cup of Russia and a silver at 2009 Skate America. She will compete next month at the world championships, where she placed fifth last year.

Taking advanced-placement classes in calculus, English, French and physics, Flatt hasn’t decided if she’ll give herself a break from figure skating before college – she has applied to nine schools, most notably Harvard, Stanford and Yale. If she stays on her current track, she would again be the face of the U.S. team, especially after Sasha Cohen’s retirement.

Flatt said, “I’m certainly looking forward to improving upon these performances. … It would be such a great experience to come back. Now, I know what to expect.”

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