Neither Autumn or I had ever been to this arena before so we weren't sure what to expect. It's very small and there is very easy access to the skaters after the show. This was nice since the passes we were supposed to get never showed up! We were very happy with our tickets though because they were in the VIP sections. After the LA show last year, we had preordered for the new Staples Center. Since the tour was not able to work out a date with them, I got a letter from Champions on Ice offering to get us tickets either in Anaheim or San Diego. We already had Anaheim so we chose San Diego. The lady at COI had told us they would be great tickets and she was right. When we got to our seats, we were surrounded by all these people with official VIP backstage passes. A few minutes later, we looked up and Sarah Kawahara was sitting right in front of us. Tom Collins also came by to show some people to their seats in our section. This was all really cool!
Onto the show. All the cast from Anaheim was in San Diego except for Elvis and Angela. They all looked nice and rested because I'm sure many of them had spent Monday down at the beach. The best part about this show was the crowd was really into all the skaters. We did have a lot more jump problems at this show than in Anaheim, but we thought the overall show was better. We both decided that Tim Goebel's program was a lot better this time as was Anissina & Peizerat. Michelle had problems with her lutz again and she doubled another jump. After the intermission, we figured Tim was going to skate first since Angela was not here, but to our surprise it was Eric Millot. The funny part about all this was we had both just seen the Sprite commercial he is in for the first time back at the hotel. We both looked at each and said, "it's the Sprite guy!" He was good, but most of the crowd had no idea who he was.
Todd, of course, was wonderful. He had been good in Anaheim, but this time he was great. He landed all his jumps including the triple lutz he missed Sunday and his spins were a lot faster. He got the only partial standing ovation of the night. Sarah Kawahara also really applauded for Todd. It was fun to watch her reaction to many of the skaters. The best was when Oksana skated. Sarah just kept her arms folded and shook her head as Oksana fell on many of her jumps.
The finale was also really great. Our seats gave us a better view this time and we were lucky enough to have Todd in front of us most of the time. At this show, he and Evgeny Platov were totally fooling around. Some of their poses were absolutely hilarious to watch. They kept pretending to shoot each other across the rink. I think Sarah was pleased with her finale also!
