The dance field at Four Continents this year was small and rather messy, and we discuss an alarming number of falls for a smaller dance event, our hope for up and coming teams from outside North America to be better appreciated in the future, and wonder what next season might hold for the North American teams here who weren't quite strong enough to make it to the Olympics.

There were some really great skates from the women at Four Continents, and we discuss whether it was a good idea to have the Korean Olympic team compete here so close to the Olympics, some lenient tech calling (and whether that's an indication of the calling we might see at the Olympics), and some exciting head-to-heads we're excited to see in coming seasons among the young Korean and Japanese women.

This weekend's Four Continents Championships was a bit of a smaller one due to the upcoming Olympics, but we begin our recaps with an interesting men's event! We discuss the many skaters likely ending their seasons here with a strong set of skates to set them up for next year, successes and failures in jump math, and why it was really unnecessary for Australia to leave their Olympic team selections so very down to the wire this year.

We wrap up this year's European Championships with the women, and discuss some very last minute Olympic spots that are still in question, some really joyful skates that could have been better rewarded in the scores, and what some skates here might indicate about how the Olympic team event could go down.

The pairs event at Europeans this year saw some inconsistent skating, and we discuss Olympic season score inflation which we hope can be addressed at the next Congress, whether a double twist has an unwarranted effect on PCS, and some young teams who we will hope will continue to skate together for many years to ensure a real future for the discipline outside of Russia.

Despite a number of withdrawals from the dance event at Europeans it was an interesting event, and we discuss the conclusion of the battle for the lone Spanish ice dance spot at the Olympics, teams we hope will finally make it to the Olympics versus those who unfortunately won't be able to go, and teams we hope are really finding their identity in terms of program style versus those still seemingly struggling to do so.

This week's European Championships had a very exciting and pretty well skated men's event, and we discuss the tough choice to make for the third man on the Russian Olympic team, some real jump math problems in the free skate, and some exciting young skaters making their debut at Europeans (though some due to unfortunate withdrawals).

We wrap up this weekend of skating with the US men and discuss some surprise podium placements and how it should have impacted the Olympic team selection, chaotic jumps at this event and the potential for more of them in the future internationally, and the many signs and indications that our eventual Olympic men's team should just not have come to nationals in the first place.

Next, we discuss the US women, including the front runners unable to compete due to COVID (and whether this competition was really necessary to determine Olympic spots), our opinions on how we might have had these standings turn out at the end of the day, and how this nationals tech calling might compare to that of an international panel.

There was a deep field in dance at US nationals, and some very interesting head-to-head match-ups, and we discuss why this year's patterns might make it slightly easier to do a half-junior, half-senior season, twizzle mistakes really determining the placements on the lower half of the podium, and how hard it is to give out late season international assignments when you have so many strong teams and only so many places (even in this Olympic year).