Official Site:
http://tokai-tv.com/figure09/index.html

Skater:
Mao Asada
Miki Ando
Yukari Nakano
Akiko Suzuki
Takahiko Kozuka
Yasuharu Nanri
Nobunari Oda
Takahito Mura
Yuzuru Hanyu (Junior Men)
Haruka Imai (Junior Ladies)
Sei Kawahara (Novice Men)
Mio Satou (Novice Ladies)

Guest Skater:
Shizuka Arakawa
Evgeni Plushenko
Fiona Zaldua & Dmitry Sukhanov
Violetta Afanasieva & Pete Dack

Does anyone know what will be the competition's format this year? Team or Individual..? And what type of judging will be used?

http://tokai-tv.com/figure09/player.html

Team Red:
Mao Asada
Takahiko Kozuka
Takahito Mura
Yukari Nakano
Yuzuru Hanyu (Junior Men)
Mio Satou (Novice Ladies)

Team Blue:
Nobunari Oda
Miki Ando
Akiko Suzuki
Yasuharu Nanri
Haruka Imai (Junior Ladies)
Sei Kawahara (Novice Men)

The team names are somewhat uninspired this year. I preffered Team Artist and Team Dream!

But the teams are great! Too bad there's no Fumie and Kanako, they are great entertainers.

I hope Kazu and Mura won't overwhelm themselves with technical difficulty like at Medalists on Ice... Good luck, boys!

I wonder what Mao will skate to... Maybe "Sing, sing, sing" this time..? I miss it!

Many Nobu fans are wishing he would skate to "New Cinema Paradise"... Personally I think there would be no better program for this type of a competition than "Around the World", but I'll eat my pants if he skates to it... I put my money on "Tosca", unless the fans are persistent enough . Just please, no hair gel!

Finally, I hope Mio and Sei won't be chacked. I've never seen them yet, and I always keep an eye open for the promising new skaters...

Official site lists Mao as skating to Por Una Cabeza again. Hmm...I wonder if we'll ever see Singx3 again. Nobu has "Fly me to the moon" down as his program music, which is great!

Looks like Kozu is sticking to "Save the last dance." Hope he won't overload himself again. I'm quite surprised to not see Fumie on the list.

Fuji TV will broadcast the event (taped) on the 10th, from 14:30 ~ 16:00, so hopefully KeyHole TV will make things go smoothly, as I'm back in the States now.

But hmm...the time alotted to the broadcast seems to indicate that the novice skaters, and maybe even the juniors will indeed be skipped over, if you consider the likelihood that Shizuka and Plushy's EX will make it on air as well...

http://headlines.yahoo.co.jp/hl?a=20090109-00000013-nks_fl-spo

Quote:

The exhibition Japan Super Challenge took place in the Nagoya city on January 9th. 12 competitiors, 6 men and 6 ladies, were divided into 2 teams which competed against each other. The total score was awarded by the special judge - theaudience and the judges team, including Midori Ito. Mao Asada, the leader of the Red Team, danced a wonderful tango, but lost 748-752 (4 points of difference). Mao said: "I'm frustrated to have lost. But I'm happy that everyone skated their best!" "Before the competition I thought it would be impossible to win againstagainst athlete Asada! I'm happy to have won.", said with a smile Nobunari Oda, the captain of the second team, Team Blue.

Team Mao was defeated. But Mao skated wonderful, as always!

I've seen a (short ) news clip on a Japanese forum. Mao looked gorgeous , but I wonder if it would be better to have used "Sing..." after all. The rink looked a bit small, and the boards were high, so that when Mao did her famous step sequence, it was barely visible. In the news clips it was filmed from behind, but those people who sat in the front of Mao probably only saw her head and shoulders...
But still, it looked like a fantastic performance (as usual), and the audience loved it.

Nobunari looked great!!! He had a really cute hairsyle. He skated in the "FMTTM" SP costume to "FMTTM" EX music (with vocals), and the choreo seemed a bit different than it was when he skated it two years ago. He skated with more fire than I've seen from him in a long, long time.

Miki skated to Bolero and she did a great triple out of a back charlotte.

Shizuka skated to "Ave Maria" as a guest. She had a new white dress and looked just GORGEOUS.

No one else was shown in the news clip...

A news clip:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFjEigAK3Xo

Mao looks so pretty! I just love Tango!

Congrats to Team Blue!

I can't wait to see the full show!

I just got home! Is anyone else around and watching this now?

Satou Miu is wearing Mao's 'Habanera' costume - awww, how cute!!

ETA Aww - Mao doubled the loop. It's too bad that Team Red lost (Mao+Kozu! ), and Mao said she was disappointed, but that's ok, I'm sure they'll get over it soon.

Watching the blue team celebrate is pretty cute.
Nobu says "Before I skated, I didn't think we could beat Mao, err, Team Red."

Here's another clip:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hryQqIxmE1w

[Nooo, not Ishikawa Ryo + Mao! hehehehe. ]

Is it just me, or has Mao's flip technique changed a little? I noticed this yesterday in the Nagoya festival vid - it seems like she's delaying the rotation until she's in the air or something...or maybe I'm just seeing things...

At the end, Mao is like "I was the captain, but I didn't really lead the team....in the end we lost, but the team competition was really fun and became a good memory."

Mao is looking so pretty!

http://hochi.yomiuri.co.jp/photo/20090109-655444-1-L.jpg
http://www.daily.co.jp/general/figure_photo/0001648933.shtml
http://www.daily.co.jp/general/figure_photo/photo2_0001648933.shtml
http://www.daily.co.jp/general/figure_photo/photo4_0001648933.shtml
http://www.nikkansports.com/sports/news/img/sp-090110-3-ns-big.jpg
http://www.sanspo.com/sports/images/090110/spm0901100501000-p1.jpg
http://www.sponichi.co.jp/sports/flash/images/KFullFlash20090109125_l.jpg
http://www.nikkansports.com/sports/news/img/f-sp-090109-3303-ns-big.jpg

Found these two on YT. I really wanted to see Akiko as well, but I couldn't find any others. Her EX is just

Mao Asada
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9dApKD4EbDc

Takahiko Kozuka
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PwMVoJhdN0w

More YT videos

Mao Asada
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=9dApKD4EbDc&feature=channel

Shizuka Arakawa
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=4mpyI0nc6Bs&feature=channel_page

Yukari Nakano
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=lvSJF6LMTU4&feature=channel

Miki Ando
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=hYVVt-bNjJk&feature=channel

Akiko Suzuki
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=ZueCDWEOzxI&feature=channel

Takahiko Kozuka
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=-UB2b4LeS1g&feature=channel

Nobunari Oda
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=Bh_HyqKQ7l8&feature=channel