How high do skaters jump?

Kurt Browning had a little feature in the U.S. Nationals coverage where he measured the height of his jump. "31 inches, not bad for a 40-year-old."

What kind of hops do eligible skaters have in general? Who has the highest jumps?

http://images.vpro.nl/img.db?27605296+s(200)

One of my favorite moments was about 10 years ago at SOI...I was sitting in the 8th row in the corner and Kurt Browing did a triple axel right over my head! Well, not really, but that is what it felt like! It seemed like he was practically 4 feet off the ground and sailed about 20 feet! Not bad for a 30-year old!

The jump height of skaters seems quite variable (Lipinski vs Slutskaya)...I wonder if the distance of a jump is more consistant?

eliza88

Seems to depend on the skater. Some are high jumpers and some are low jumpers.

Compare Debbie Thomas, Tonya Harding and Dorothy Hamill with Katy Taylor, Kimmie Meisner and Rachel Flatt.

What impresses me is that skaters from the figures era (before 1992) seemed to jump a lot higher than most of the current crop (this is especially noticeable with the ladies). My theory is that mastery of figures delayed the age at which girls learned jumps, the girls were older/physically more mature when they perfected the jumps and strong enough to jump high, where as today the girls learn their triples by the age of 12 and the jumps stay microscopic as the girls mature physically because that's the technique they are used to.

The biggest jumps I have seen recently are Meghan Duhamel. She flies into and out of them.

I have a trivial question--what outdoor rink was Kurt doing that demonstration on? It looked huge.

How high are the boards in a typical rink? Because I'm pretty positive that I've seen skaters jump the height of the boards (including Kurt Browning)...

On the other hand, I remember when watching skaters like Tara Lipinski or Kristi Yamaguchi (I think) jump in Stars on Ice, they looked like they were barely clearing the ice...