COLUMBUS, Ohio — Despite a slightly bumpy performance in Friday night’s free skate at the US Figure Skating Championships, Plano’s Amber Glenn (24) held on and survived the 18-skater field to claim her first US women’s national title.
16-year-old phenom Isabeau Levito, the reigning national champion and favorite, stunningly fell three times during her program and left the door open for Glenn to take home the annual event’s top honor.
Levito led the field entering the free skate after edging out Glenn in Thursday’s short program. That set the stage for an inevitable head-to-head showdown between the event’s two biggest stars on Friday night. However, 15-year-old Josephine Lee had other plans as she delivered perhaps the night’s finest performance. Lee’s impressive showing placed her in prime position to contend for the top medal with Levito and Glenn.
Then came Glenn’s program, which was the second to last of the evening. Glenn started strong, putting her signature skating style on display. Glenn’s hallmarks are skating aggressively and with power. And she did that during the first half of her program. But in the program’s second half, Glenn suffered a pair of blemishes that appeared to put her pursuit for a US women’s figure skating national title in peril — especially with one of the best figure skaters in the world on deck in Levito (who’s ranked third in the world per ISU women’s world standings). Even surpassing Lee at that point seemed questionable.