Should figures be a requirement in a skater's training regimen? | Page 2 | Golden Skate

Should figures be a requirement in a skater's training regimen?

S

SkateFan4Life

Guest
OK, here's a little history of compulsory school figures:

I’m sure many of us have seen figure skating books and/or manuals that contain photographs or drawings of skaters tracing school figures. These intricate patterns, all variations of the figure eight, were originally the entire content of figure skating competitions. Competitive skaters of the early era (before World War I or so) traced the figures in outdoor competitions.

While jumping, spinning, and other athletic maneuvers were added to the sport and a program of skating was added to the competition, the school figures, for many years, carried the majority of weight in the overall score. If you weren’t a strong school figures skater, you simply could not expect to win a medal, unless the rest of the field self-destructed. As late as 1968, when Peggy Fleming won the Olympic gold medal, the school figures comprised 60 percent of her total score. Peggy emassed such a huge lead in the figures that her victory was a foregone conclusion. Her free skating was also outstanding – elegant and athletic. However, had Peggy not been a strong school figures skater, she would not have won the Olympic title or her three World titles.

Austrian Trixi Schuba won two World titles and the 1972 Olympic gold medal, based on the strength of her outstanding school figures. Trixi was probably the best school figures skater of all time, as her tracings were, typically, exactly on axis and right on top of each other. The scoring was changed so that the figures and long program were 50/50 in weight; however, you still had to be a strong figures skater to medal. Trixi built up such enormous leads that all she had to do – pretty much – was stay on her feet and not fall nine times to win the title. Her free skating was quite weak and almost embarrassing, compared to the strong free skaters of her era, such as Karen Magnussen, Janet Lynn, and Julie Lynn Holmes. At the 1972 Worlds, Schuba’s final amateur competition, she won the figures by a wide margin and then finished only 7th in the free skate – yet she still won by a substantial margin. As part of her exhibition performance, Trixi traced a few figure eights on the ice.

The school figures were reduced to 30 percent of the overall score, with the new short program weighing 20 percent and the long program 50 percent by the 1980s. However, the figures still sometimes determined the final outcome. At the 1984 Olympics, Brian Orser finished 7th in the figures, won both the short and long programs, yet had to settle for the silver medal behind Scott Hamilton, who had won the figures and finished 2nd in both the short and long programs.

The judges sometimes used the school figures as a means of marking up and marking down skaters to set them up for medals. The figures were also used as a basis for making new skaters “wait their turn”. Typically, a skater in his/her first appearance at Worlds could expect to be placed lower then 10th in the school figures, even if he or she skated solid figures. I think of the 1990 Worlds in which Todd Eldredge, the new US champion, skated clean figures, yet was ranked out of the top 10. He skated good short and long programs, but finished out of the medals. At the 1984 Winter Olympics, US silver medalist Tiffany Chin skated good figures but was marked 12th. She finished 2nd in the short and 3rd in the long program and 4th overall. Had she received the marks she deserved to receive for the figures, she may well have won a medal. Conversely, at the 1988 Worlds, Katarina Witt skated subpar school figures – really blowing one of them – and she was ranked 1st in that discipline. The judges, obviously, wanted to keep her up, since she was the defending World and Olympic champion.

School figures were eliminated from competition after the 1990 season, and probably nobody was happier about that than Midori Ito. Ito, who had won the 1989 World title, skated disastrous school figures at the 1990 Worlds and was buried in 10th place. I remember seeing a tracing of one of her figures – it was all over the place. She rebounded back, won both the short and long programs, and won t he silver medal. Had she finished 9th in the figures, she would have retained her title. Jill Trenary won her World title, thanks to her 1st place in the school figures.

Skaters had to spend hours skating patches, often before dawn, to learn to trace the school figures. I commend them for spending all of those hours over so many years. If there was any benefit, IMHO, it was that the skaters learned discipline, good carriage, and balance.

As a number of posters wrote, the recent "Ice Wars" telecast featured performances from champion skaters who competed in the days of the school figures - Brian Boitano, Kurt Browning (at least prior to 1990), Yuka Sato (who learned them in her early years of training), etc. Their clean, deep edges, flow, and excellent posture were developed, at least partially, during their many years of practicing the school figures.

Contrast that with Timothy Goebel, who probably never skated school figures, or at least did not train seriously with them. Look at his slouching posture, rounded back, poor carriage, etc. I am sure that he would have benefited tremendously from training with figures.

Perhaps the "figure" should be removed from "figure skating".
 

Alsace

On the Ice
Joined
Mar 22, 2004
Great freestylists and figures

soogar said:
Most of the best freeskaters weren't that great at figures anyway.
SkateFan4Life said:
At the 1984 Olympics, Brian Orser finished 7th in the figures, won both the short and long programs...
Well, they were usually still in the top ten (though I agree that Ito's last figure was atrocious), so their figure skills probably helped their free skating.
 

JOHIO2

Medalist
Joined
Jul 29, 2003
I'm with soogar. Figures shouldn't be required, as the original figures routines were time consuming and repetitive beyond belief. In fact, figures went out of fashion so soon after being dropped by the ISU for Worlds that the USFSA couldn't even get a decent number of people to even compete them at all and thus dropped them. As I understand from others posts, Canada still has some skaters doing figures. And competing? The point for me is learning the ways to use edges and the confidence to use them.

But I also agree with SkateFan4Life - they did increase awareness of posture and carriage in a skater. You can't make precise tracings without complete control of your posture and carriage, just as a slight off-balance leads to a roaming spin. But those aspects of awareness and control could also be practiced using yoga or tai chi and dance. (OK, don't get started - we all know that Elvis's martial arts didn't add much grace to his skating, but he DID have good awareness and agility because of it.)
 

soogar

Record Breaker
Joined
Dec 18, 2003
SkateFan4Life said:
Contrast that with Timothy Goebel, who probably never skated school figures, or at least did not train seriously with them. Look at his slouching posture, rounded back, poor carriage, etc. I am sure that he would have benefited tremendously from training with figures.

Well Weir never skated figures (nor has Sasha) and both have beautiful carriage and Weir has great edges to match. Tim would have benefitted from training figures and he might have done them as he was with Frank Carroll for a few years. However figures isn't going to give someone magical grace and style. Trixie Schuba was a clunker on the ice and she was the best in figures.
 

CzarinaAnya

Medalist
Joined
Aug 29, 2003
Sasha, matt, and Johnny, do have beautiful edgings. But figures may be a good solution in someone elses training, that is not as natural with their edgings as the aformentioned skaters.

I don't think they should be required in competition. The proof is in the pudding, so to speak, when they skate their programs. I DO think that exceptional edging should be given bonus points, levels 1-4, just like with spins and jumps.
 
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gkelly

Record Breaker
Joined
Jul 26, 2003
SkateFan4Life said:
Contrast that with Timothy Goebel, who probably never skated school figures, or at least did not train seriously with them. Look at his slouching posture, rounded back, poor carriage, etc. I am sure that he would have benefited tremendously from training with figures.

Goebel had to pass the third figure test according to the US rules at the time he was competing as an intermediate and novice. I'm sure I posted that here a few months ago.

His posture definitely has problems. I was impressed by the difficulty of his footwork in his short program that he skated at Marshalls.

In the US, all the turns (including mohawks and choctaws, which don't appear in figures) are required in the Moves in the Field tests at or one level below the level where they were introduced in the US figure tests. So if young skaters don't know what the advanced turns are because they haven't paid attention to what the more advanced skaters are doing in moves tests, the same would be true if they didn't pay attention to what the more advanced skaters were doing in figure tests. More so, even, because it's useful to learn to recognize the patterns for the advanced moves if you're skating on the same freestyle or designated moves session, so you know where and when to get out of the way. On a patch session, there's really no need to pay attention to what someone is doing two patches over.


Rgirl said:
I'd propose a combined system: Every skater would neet to learn a "figures program" that is the same for all skaters, depending on their level, ie, one for juveniles, one for intermediate, etc. Each figures program would enclude every basic edge move, rockers, brackets, counters, put together the way cborsky described.

How would this differ from the Moves in the Field? Less repetitive patterns to get more variety of turns etc. into one circuit of the rink? More precision and less speed demanded?

You wouldn't really require rockers and counters for juveniles would you?
Many serious juvenile competitors have tested or are working on novice and junior moves where these turns are first introduced (they were on the sixth and seventh -- junior -- figure tests in the old days). Juveniles who spend fewer hours per week on the ice may still be struggling to get through the intermediate patterns (which includes brackets).

Other countries, of course, have somewhat different test structures.

The ISU controls what's required in junior and senior competition and offers suggestions for novice but has no control over what each federation does in terms of testing skaters nor the content of competitive programs below novice level.

So who's going to do the requiring? The ISU? The national federations?

Individual coaches? Some do indeed require their skaters to learn edges and turns in a figures context, but the patch ice time just isn't available in most places to develop the higher level figures to a test passing standard.

Will all skating clubs or rinks with any competitive or serious test skaters need to return to an economic model that includes offering frequent patch ice? How much more expensive will that ice time be than the freestyle time? How many skaters will choose to quit rather than spend the extra time and money? How many countries that are starting to develop competitive freestyle programs fade back to obscurity because there just isn't enough ice time available at their few rinks to support patch time as well?

Rgirl's idea of a compulsory edge program might be more useful than returning to figure eights, if it could be practiced on freestyle ice.
 
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Mafke

Medalist
Joined
Mar 22, 2004
The whole format of skating has never made sense as far as I can tell. Figures and free skating were rather different kinds of disciplines and very few excelled at both. A sport whose officials didn't have their heads up their butts would have separated the two a long time ago (in the mid 60's) with separate figures, free skating and combined competitions, three sets of medals and a lot more opportunity for creating stars (which any sport/discipline needs). Instead, they held on to an outdated format so long that the only option left was dumping figures and heralding an age of clutzy skaters throwing themselves in the air and wobbling around on what should be simple spins.

And the competition consists (most of the time) of two LP's and an SP (with less and less difference between the two formats, first and second SLP?) .

A more sane approach would be to dump the SP entirely or rework it drastically to concentrate on basic, but high level skills (no triples?) and have two sets of medals up for grabs. (more medals means more chances for stars to appear).

Just wanted to vent, you're welcome.
 

Mafke

Medalist
Joined
Mar 22, 2004
SkateFan4Life said:
The school figures were reduced to 30 percent of the overall score, with the new short program weighing 20 percent and the long program 50 percent by the 1980s. However, the figures still sometimes determined the final outcome.

Through 1980, figures actually counted for a lot more than the 30 percent they did on paper. This was due to scoring that took margins of points between skaters into account and the fact that difference in placements for figures was bigger than in free skating, so figures specialist could still build up a big lead (see Annett Poetzsch, she was a far better free skater than Schuba was, but she wouldn't have won the gold medals she did without being able to build up a big lead in figures). The change to factored placements was the end of figures speciaists being able to win entire competitions with subpar free skating.
 
Joined
Jul 11, 2003
Just a quick note on my defence of Tim. Although he is not my choice of a favorite skater, he has improved in every way over the years albeit slowly. I agree with gkelly that he needs better posture, but even that has improved since I first saw him, and yes his Marshals program had excellent footwork which he handled very well and not easy with jitterbug music. (His posture problem lies in his neck which is not flowing with the rest of him otherwise there has been much improvement in the body movements.)

I doubt imposing figures on young skaters today is going to work (but I could be wrong), I do think imposing compulsory dances on young skates would work. It would be fun to see how they master those counters and rockers and smooth out their mohawks and choctaws. A good coach would have her hands filled but that's what coaches are paid to do. A second benefit of compulsory dance would be that the skaters will be learning how to relate to each other without knowing that they are doing this and pave the way to better Pairs and Dance as well as super edges for Singles. At 12 years of age they could feel they would prefer a certain discipline.

Joe
 

dlkksk8fan

Medalist
Joined
Jul 26, 2003
Even though figures are not required, skaters can still do them. At the rink I skate at we have coaches that still teach them ( how many coaches are left that can teach them I'm not sure).
 

treeskater

Rinkside
Joined
Jan 22, 2004
The number of coaches who learned figures and can pass them on in their teaching is rapidly dwindling. We now have so many young coaches (starting in their teens!) that never learned figures themselves. And there is an equal number of judges that never saw figures done properly.

MITF was a compromise for our rapidly changing society and interest of the young skaters today (short attention span.) The key here is having a coach that really understands the use of the blade to educate the skater so their MITF result is high quality......the coach who does usually has a figures background. The young coaches of today do not have the background and understanding to make great MITF testers. With so much focus on jumps and spins, the students are not made to train smart and be self-disciplined enough to train their edges too. As we had various elite Russian skaters come through our rink over the years, including Baiul, what impressed my coach is how they all did nothing but edge exercises for 20 minutes before doing anything else, and the jumps were saved for last (when the body was fully warmed up.)

Ice Theatre of New York introduced Plie Power Workshops that made edging so important. And Ann Schelter of "Annie's Edges" also gave workshops in North America and the UK.

I would like to see a real thrust from the PSA and USFSA to include in their ratings programs (PSA) the specific teaching of edges and some figure moves at all levels, and the advanced LTS basic skills program to incorporate focus on edges. It would also take educated judges and honest judges to not pass skaters who lack this basic foundation. IMHO.....
 

sk8er1964

On the Ice
Joined
Jul 26, 2003
treeskater said:
The key here is having a coach that really understands the use of the blade to educate the skater so their MITF result is high quality......the coach who does usually has a figures background. The young coaches of today do not have the background and understanding to make great MITF testers.

I've seen some MIF tests passed that would really raise eyebrows, but Susie needed the test to make the synchro team or to be able to teach or whatever. Comparable figure tests would never have passed back in the old days - those judges were tough!

My current coach never did figures, but he did take his MIF's from higher level coaches who did. It shows in his skating (especially since he's turned to dance) and he is a stickler for good edges in his students. He has quite a few students who are referred to him for MIF's for that very reason.

As for figures, the main problem as I see it is ice time and ice expense. The clubs would have to seriously subsidize patch sessions because instead of having 30 skaters on the ice, there would be only a few (I can't rememebr how many patches we used to get - maybe 8?) Ice time costs lots, at least in this area. We used to have to do it before school at 5 am because that was the only ice the club could afford.

MIF's are a good training tool - personally I think figures are better. However, I'd be very surprised if they ever made a comeback because, in the end, for the rinks and clubs it's all about the money and figures are just too expensive.
 
S

SkateFan4Life

Guest
soogar said:
Well Weir never skated figures (nor has Sasha) and both have beautiful carriage and Weir has great edges to match. Tim would have benefitted from training figures and he might have done them as he was with Frank Carroll for a few years. However figures isn't going to give someone magical grace and style. Trixie Schuba was a clunker on the ice and she was the best in figures.

ITA with you on Johnny Weir and Sasha Cohen's grace. They never trained in figures (I'm assuming), but they are elegant and have gorgeous carriage and line. I'm sure their training has incorporated lots of stretching, dance classes, and other activities that more than make up for a lack of school figures training.

As for Trixi Schuba, I remember watching her skating at the Worlds and Olympics in the early 1970s when she won gold medals. The woman was a master at the school figures, but her free skating was mediocre, to put it mildly. She was quite heavy, had stocky legs, and, well, did not have an iota of grace or elegance. Of course, the scoring in those days was a cumulative point system, and she won according to the rules. Go figure. :scratch:
 
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