Keauna McLaughlin and Rockne Brubaker have ended their partnership. In US Pairs Skater years, they are ending a union lasting a quarter century. At times, they had even come close to achieving unison on their side-by-side spins.
Keauna will take a year off from competitive skating to focus on school and other interests. We can only hope that she doesn't have test anxiety similar to the inner hell she experiences during competition.
Rockne will begin his search for a new partner. After such a dismal Nationals and Four Continents, the question is why they didn't split sooner. The high profile splits took place moments after Worlds and the best partners have already been snatched.
Male pairs skaters in the US better be on their toes. Ideas are going to form in the minds of overzealous skating parents.
What a shock and how terribly sad. They were crushed not to have made the team but I always felt that they could get through this and be that 2008 team couple again. I hope they are both happier but it seems odd that Keauna was the one who left while Rockne was the half who had to watch his partner dash all his Olympic dreams.
ReplyDeleteSO SAD!!! It's the worst feeling to see a pair with so much unrealized potential just put everything down the drain like that. Perhaps another coaching change would have been a better solution. There was no guarantee that it was going to work out with Nicks, and neither one of them thanked him in the USFSA statement (which could mean they were displeased with him). Why didn't they look for a new coach? I have believed all season that people were being way too tough on Keauna. The Olympic pressure was enormous, and they had more sponsorship deals than they probably should have... And now Rockne has no partner, nevermind one with whom he was well matched like he had with Keauna. This whole thing is sad.
ReplyDeleteRockne is short, and he lucked out that Keauna has an adult height of around 5 foot. If they had waited a little longer and got her adjusted to puberty, they could have been fine. At least try to hold things together in a non-Olympic season! They were so smoking hot together. I suspect it will be a needle in a haystack finding a partner as good as her for Rockne now.
ReplyDeleteI don't believe for a second that girl just wants to go to high school for a year and be "regular" now. She had STAR written all over her and you could tell she loved being with Rockne. USFSA should have stepped in and helped them not let the success go to their heads. I thought leaving Sappenfield after 1 bad result was a total panic move, and now it seems that again, 1 bad result is leaving them a little too distraught. "Baby" pair teams aren't supposed to get discouraged like this!
To be realistic, it wasn't just one bad season. The heartbreak at Nationals was the last straw. the previous year they were hot and cold all season, had a less than spectacular Nationals ( compared with lights out Denny and Barrett) and a disapointing World debut in LA. Keauna struggled with her jumps when she was a skinny 15-year old and now that she has filled out and grown and the mind games have set in...Sad yes. Unexpected? yes, but I expected them to split right after Nats.
ReplyDeleteThey key word is "debut". You do one Worlds and one Olympic try after a crazy offseason of moving and a coaching change and then quit because it doesn't go perfectly? Where they expecting to win every year or to never have adversity? I don't understand. This is pairs skating... You don't come out of the gates blazing. Shen and Zhao were out of the top 10 their first three Worlds appearances. I'm disappointed in John Nicks for sucking the life out of Keauna. She has always loved pair skating and seemed so determined. And yeah, maybe there were too many endorsements, but you could tell she loved every moment of being a top athlete traveling the world. And now wants to be a normal student? I don't buy it. Also, Nicks as coach should have stepped in and changed their element order so that they weren't doing throws at the end of their LP. There is no reason why they couldn't have done clean longs in the very near future.
ReplyDeleteSounds like Keauna got burnt out. Rockne sounds like he wanted to absolutely keep skating with her. Keauna is 17, who knows what is going through her head... She may not know what she wants right now. She could easily wake up tomorrow and want to skate again. You just don't know when/if she will miss it. I worried about the coaching change to California/LA area that Keauna could become distracted by that lifestyle since she is from there. I think Colorado with the Olympic Training Center and training will all the other pair teams and top singles skaters is more motivating, disciplined, and more conducive to what K + R were trying to accomplish. I was worried that Nicks would be too burnt out himself to keep them excited and building at the beginning of an Olympic cycle.
ReplyDeleteKeauna is yet another girl eaten alive by the sport and its pressures. Nicks really helped them improve a ton this season in terms of polish and style. It was a giant leap forward from Sappenfield but it was clear that she just couldn't do it anymore. They were trying to hold it together, but they had had issues for a while and it was just falling apart at the seams.
ReplyDeleteI think the previous year had actually been completely fine (up until Worlds) and wrongly criticized by Sandra Besic/Phil Hersh. I didn't mind that they didn't skate as well as a "lights out" Denney and Barrett. Mclaughlin and Brubaker were in a different stratosphere in terms of polish, lines, and presentation. This year, they struggled more, but even still, I saw some very good things, and they got through the first half of the season with the highest US scores. I figured whatever problems they had could be worked around, and an offseason would have helped them calm down. But Keauna still seems to having trouble coping with all that happened. Poor girl. Perhaps a little more time off with help her.
ReplyDeleteBut honestly, I don't see what is so traumatizing about this. You got through the hardest season of your life, now relax and have fun. Why go out on a bad note that's just going to leave you miserable? A more relaxing season this year could have also helped her mentally recover. Gotta wonder, where is the sports psychologist? USFSA requires all their skaters to attend a "mental training". They need more of this!
ReplyDeleteWe saw them at Skate for Hope Saturday night. She didn't land either of her throw triples. The fierceness I saw at 2008 Nationals was just gone; she was fearless then. But to give up at age 17 just doesn't sound right... I guess the pressure can be pretty overwhelming.
ReplyDeleteThere is something really wrong with US pairs skating when we can't even keep a top pair girl happy at 17 years old. Seriously? Burned out? Did anyone tell them that missing an Olympic team does not have to collapse your skating career? Because it's really not believable that she would want to suddenly give up everything for school, art, and dance, which honestly, unless she's enrolling in a dance school, probably means dancing at a club or something. So what the hell has happened here? Why has this talented and motivated skater suddenly burned out? Who ingrained in their heads that the first Olympic try of their young careers would be the be-all and end-all?
ReplyDeletehonestly, perhaps keauna had a head-strong, stage mother (ala mcdonough), and this was never her own dream for herself.
ReplyDeleteOR, as i've suspected for a LONG time, she had a crush on/infatuation with rockne, which was not returned, and which ultimately took the life out of her. i mean, who wouldn't fall in love with those eyes!
i'm relieved...even though they had promise, it was clear something was just broken emotionally...i wouldn't want to have to watch that another 1-3 seasons.
I thought they were just stressed from the Olympic year. This was supposed to be a year of more relaxation with all the Olympic pressure over with and no more sponsors trying to get a piece of them. I don't think this was her mom's dream. Keauna has always seemed very passionate about skating and has always commented about wanting to win competitions. And that, to me, was part of the problem, because it seemed like the thought of NOT winning everything or doing well ALL the time seemed to affect her mentally. I think someone needed to step in and help her keep things in better perspective.
ReplyDeleteIf she had a crush on Rockne, I wouldn't be surprised. I've found them to be very cute with each other. And the on-ice performances are sometimes quite hot. But I doubt whether or not they have feelings for each other would lead to Keauna leaving the sport.
I'm still in disbelief over this one. There's no reason why they couldn't have gotten through this. There are ups and downs in every long pair career. And JumpingClappingMan, if she had a crush on him, they should just date because I found them completely hot together on the ice, and warm with each other off of it. Such good chemistry and such a good match for each other. I wish someone could knock some sense into her and convince her to continue. How has Rockne rebounded so easily from the Olympic disappointment while Keauna is still worried about it enough to not skate? Sad.
ReplyDeleteYou should have posted a video of their Rostelecom Cup Short Program. It was beautiful. Their potential was so very good. I will always wonder what could have been. I hope the relationship between them remains intact, especially in case there is an opportunity for them to skate together again in the future.
ReplyDeleteRockne is in his 20's while Keauna is an emotional teenager who probably feels responsible for their failures. There might also be a new injury we don't know about she has...
ReplyDeleteWhat injury? Or are you just making a guess?
ReplyDeletejust a guess. we don't know what went down between 4CC and now. Did she want to quit then but Rockne/ Mr. Nicks/ her parents advise her to wait a few months? Did something happen this spring to make her give up? As for a romantic complication, I think you would have to be blind not to read her body language towards him. I think she choose Malaguena just to be sexy.
ReplyDeleteI definitely saw Keauna's body language towards him and figured she would eventually want to be his girlfriend, if she hadn't already.
ReplyDeleteI wish we had more info about this decision though. It would make it easier to digest the disappointing fact that they did not reach the potential. There is no doubt they could have made another World team and improved on what they had been doing until this point. As for her mental toughness in competition, I think that also improves with age and experience (and as you learn to accept the fact you are not going to win every year). She is 17 competing in a discipline with many skaters in their late 20s and 30s. She deserves more of a chance.
I'm wondering if Nationals did have her feeling down like she wanted to quit, but she keep going in hopes that the excitement of a new season would cheer her up. Maybe she just needs more time. I suppose there is always a chance that she could reunite with Rockne in the future. It's an idea that they should absolutely keep open, I would think.
Their side by side spins were in sync much more this season than ever before, by the way. :P
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of that Youtube video linked here... Keauna and Rockne did a run-through in practice of all the major elements in that long program that same day.. And it was completely clean and solid.
ReplyDeleteI truly believed it was only a matter of time until they started skating clean in competition.