Continuity mistake: During Kate and Doug's first meeting, there's a scene where he lifts then drops her. At first Kate puts her arms on her knees. In the next shot, her hands are on the ice.
Factual error: During the movie, Doug watches video from the previous Olympic competition. The skaters are shown performing in a darkened arena lit by spotlights. Special lighting effects like this are not allowed in competition. All competitions take place in a brightly lit arena.
Continuity mistake: When Doug and Kate are doing the short programme at the Nationals and they perform the side-by-side double axels, when Kate spins, the sole of her boot is wooden. When she lands the spin, it is black plastic.
Other mistake: Doug gives Kate his Bobby Hull jersey for Christmas and says it's a game worn jersey. It couldn't have been worn by Bobby Hull because the jersey is missing the Chicago 'C' shoulder patches.
Continuity mistake: In the scene where the coach comes to recruit Doug, Doug is hanging upside down hammering nails. The nails change position several times.
Factual error: Doug and Kate's first meeting, very early in the film, is when they run into each other in the hallway of an ice arena - supposedly she's running off, leaving the rink where she was just practicing, while he's running towards the rink where his game is. Thing is, in reality they wouldn't have both been in that building at that time. Hockey (Doug's event) and figure skating (Kate's event) were given totally separate buildings.
Factual error: The couple couldn't have debuted at Nationals. They would have needed to have placed at Regionals in order to compete. You must be qualified from competitions that year. Even if you were National Champion in previous years, it doesn't ensure participation. And even if Kate had qualified with another partner, that doesn't count - it is the complete pair who must qualify.
Factual error: In the scene at the end where they do the Pamchenko in competition it appears to be an impossible move. He was spinning in circles, in one place, when he released and threw her, but in order to catch her, moving away from him, he would have had to have superhuman acceleration.
Audio problem: When Kate skates off after we see the "I've got laundry that can skate better than that" scene, we see her skating and can hear the sounds of her blades scraping the ice. However, the moves she's making doesn't match the sounds we hear.
Continuity mistake: In the first training montage, Kate changes clothing for a split second. Initially she is wearing a red outfit with black legwarmers. She changes to green lycra pants and black legwarmers, then back to the red dress and black legwarmers. You can also see Douglas' grey hoodie is swapped for a red top. (00:23:55)
Factual error: The shot of the stadium outside concourse and parking lot on the second day of nationals would be assumed to be the Chicago Stadium, home of Blackhawks. A closer look reveals the stadium is the outside concourse and parking lot of Comiskey Park home of the Chicago White Sox, which is an all outside venue particularly used for baseball games, and can not hold any indoor competition. (01:05:10)
Continuity mistake: In the opening of the movie Kate has left her Olympic warm up early and is walking down the hallway in the arena. At the same time Doug is running down the same hallway to get to the Olympic hockey game that he is late to. He asks her "Does this go up to the ice?!" There is no way that Kate's practice was over in time for an entire arena of ice hockey fans to enter and already be into the 1st period of the game...yet she is still walking down the hallway or she is the slowest walker ever.
Chosen answer: One reason is that singles skating focuses on jumps. Pair skaters usually do side-by-side jumps like double axles and the easier triple jumps. Single skaters now do up to three triple jumps in a row - a skill that pair skaters do not work so hard to master and may set her back in competitions.