Mao

The lovely Mao Asada, the first and only woman to pull off back-to-back triple axels on the ice.  Mao Asada, la première et seule femme à réussir deux triple Axels consécutives.

I watched part of the Grand Prix of Figure Skating on TV on Saturday.  It was held in Goyang, South Korea, and Korea's darling Kim Yu-na had a pretty hefty home-turf advantage (even the Korean prime minister made it out to cheer her on).  Of course, that also made for a lot of pressure (she's on billboards all over the place in Korea).

Here's Yu-na being extremely intense at the 2008 Skate America competition.  Yu-na se concentre . . .

Yu-na was good, but Mao-chan won the free skate on technique and looked damn good doing it.  Check it out.

Had he been around to witness it, this would have been a real thorn in the side of Mao Zedong, who of course was never able to pull off consecutive triple axels.

Mao Zedong.

And, for absolutely no reason, a grooving (if long) performance of "Change the World" by Eric Clapton and Babyface, who co-wrote it (?).

J'ai vu le Grand prix de patinage artistique, qui a eu lieu à Goyang en Corée du Sud, à la télé samedi.  La chouchou de la Corée, Kim Yu-na, avait le soutien de tout le pays, ainsi que le premier ministre coréen.  Elle est apparue, d'ailleurs, dans de divers publicités partout dans le pays.  Elle a peut-être écroulé sous la pression, parce qu'elle a perdu à la technique impeccable de Mao-chan.  Si il était encore en vie pour le témoigner, la victoire de Mao Asada aurait sans doute agacé Mao Zedong, qui n'est jamais arrivé à perfectionner son triple Axel à lui.  Puis, juste comme ça, un clip de "Change the World" de Eric Clapton et Babyface.