JESSICA ROSE PAETSCH & JON NUSS: In their own words
(December 2007)
Q: What are some of your favorite on-ice/off-ice moment(s) on the JGP this season?
Our favorite moment during the Junior Grand Prix was the short program in Chemnitz, Germany. It was the first time in competition this year that we skated clean.
Off the ice it was great to meet Jessica’s aunt in Germany. She was great and really helped us order the foods we wanted at the restaurant. It was also fun to go shopping in Lake Placid.
Q: What is your favorite place/country to visit as an international competitor to date and why?
Our favorite country we visited was Taipei, Taiwan in the 2006 JGP. The people there were incredibly nice, even though there was a revolution going on at the same time. There was a shopping mall attached to the hotel. We went sightseeing in the tallest observatory in the world, Taipei 101. We went to a Buddhist temple and witnessed the people praying with incense and beads. Shopping on the streets was a great way to see how the people of Taiwan shop and eat. It was one of the best trips we have taken.
Q: Favorite trip and/or travel horror story so far?
Taipei was definitely our favorite trip.
Our first time through Frankfurt on our way to Budapest, Hungary we followed Jon in the airport and got lost. The travel horror story has to do with the airline transfers in Frankfurt as we were going to Chemnitz, Germany. Jessica likes to travel with a lot of things. We had to get from one side of the airport to the other with almost no time to do it in. We had to go through customs, get all our bags, go to the other side of the airport, turn in our bags, go through customs again (which they almost didn’t let us do because of the skates in our carry-ons), and get on the airplane. We almost didn’t make it. It was all about running, carrying stuff, and sweating (lots of sweating).
In another trip, Sofia, Bulgaria, we had a delay coming back because of the fog. They closed the airport. We didn’t get our connecting flight in Frankfurt and had to stay a night in Frankfurt and hope that we could get on the standby flights.
There is always something when traveling is involved. It almost never happens the way it should. Even though… it has been a great experience that we would never want to trade for anything in the world.
Q: What are your personal skating goals for the JGP Final? Are you planning any significant changes in your programs?
Our main goal is to skate with as much expression as possible. We are also working on relating to one another on the ice. We have been working hard on the lifts. Sometimes the lifts can be difficult while in the program. We would like to skate clean and have the best time ever. We like to have fun while we skate. We have no changes to our program at this time. We have found that the levels we are going for are good. We are hoping that we will get the levels that we have practiced.
Q: Was the JGP in Chemnitz, Germany (short program) the first time you both landed the side-by-side double Axels in competition?
Yes. We have landed it together a number of times after last season and during practices. Doing it in the competition was a huge step. It made us more confident about doing it.
Q: How did your Lake Placid JGP free skate (5th place) motivate you to improve your competition performances in Chemnitz and win the gold medal there?
Throughout the summer we have had little mistakes at each competition but really didn’t take the time to address and take them seriously. There were little things that didn’t happen all the time during practices. Then… Lake Placid … ! It forced us to look back and motivated us to address the problems head on. The head games and physical challenges started to come out. We had to do a lot of assessing and re-evaluating. Chemnitz was a success to our training. We have worked hard now for the finals and hope that we will come out ahead of the game.
COACH QUOTE: Dalilah Sappenfield
"For all my teams it's always our goal to improve in our personal best score. For this competition I also want them to control the pressure of expectations from others and themselves, and just go out and skate how we train, if not maybe even better."
