What will the 2010/2011 bring us in ICE DANCE?

Alessandrini / Vaturi are injured but I don't know any details.

There is an article about K/A in the latest issue of International Skating. They both sound very happy about the partnership, and Jana is happy about living in the US. A previous interview of Jana in Russian said that she find the Z/S school to be as friendly to each other as we have heard here in the states.

All good.

:disapp: I'm really sorry to hear about A/V..I was so looking forward to seeing them. What's with this season ? I don't think I remember a worse one for injuries...

In figure skating there seems to be a tendency in paying too much attention to details which have absolutely nothing to do with the skaters ability to skate and perform.

What has the hairdo to do with how she skates? Absolutely nothing. She looks like a maid? So be it. Fans might think the judges care, but I can surely tell that they don't.

Dress becomes an issue only if it gets in the skaters way, like Faiella's outfits at COC, or Maia Shibutani's skirt. Then it is a problem.
Otherwise, what is the issue? The ice rink is not the red carpet! let's be serious.
I have read someone criticizing Aliona Svachenko's pink outfit in her Free, that is "has to go"??? Hello? What for? It is actually right in the character, and very pleasant to look at.

Vanessa's outfits issues are actually very tame in comparison to what Jana Khokhlova used to wear. She looked like an eastmnancolor advertisment all the time. Did that prevent her to get the results she deserved? Not at all.

I am just igoring thse messages, as I could care less about them.

So let me see Colleen O'Neill. You don't actually know that Vanessa and Paul do not have very qualified ballet teachers, you do not know that Vanessa is not corrected for her posture, you do not know that they do not have an outside trusted advisor, you do not know whether or not Vanessa has a say in her dresses, you do not know whether or not Vanessa refused to skate at SC unless she wore that hair thingy? So in fact your comments are solely based on the fact that they have not improved fast enough or dressed well enough to suit your taste? I'm not even going to comment on the level of vitriol reserved for the coach, except to say that i hope they observe the old Hollywood adage about press cuttings:- "Don't read them, just weigh them."

Moderator’s note: Come on, guys. As you know, Golden Skate tries really, really hard to maintain a tone of civility and to provide a platform for the courteous exchange of ideas. However, it goes with the territory that different posters will like one competitor’s skating and not like another’s so much. If this were not so, we would have nothing to talk about on this board.

Skaters, their families, their coaches, etc., have to develop a thick skin if they dare to gird up their loins, charge into the lion’s den, and check out what people are saying about them on the Internet. Insulting and badgering your fellow posters accomplishes nothing and is in fact against the Golden Skate guidelines.

Yes as Robert Browning wrote in his poem, "To a Louse"

http://quotations.about.com/cs/poemlyrics/a/To_A_Louse.htm

O wad some Power the giftie gie us
To see oursels as ithers see us!
It wad frae monie a blunder free us
An foolish notion:
What airs in dress an gait wad lea'es us,
An ev'n devotion!

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The internet provides such an opportunity: public performers can exactly see themselves as anonymous others see them.

However, criticism is always hard to take. If you teach adults, you are required often to submit to an opinion survey. All your students get to criticize everything about you. At first, it is all too easy to dismiss the negative things they say and pride yourself on the good things they say, but that way, you will still be making the same mistakes next year, and not ifurther capitalizing on the things you really do well.

It is perhaps worse to take every negative thing too much to heart and become discouraged.

My solution was the following. I read all of them carefully, no matter how positive or negative. If the people that mostly liked me had negative comments, I took those especially seriously. And if those who mostly disliked me had something that they thought was positive, I believed them. In general, that provided me the best guideline I could find for doing a better job.

dorispulaski said:

Yes as Robert Browning wrote in his poem, "To a Louse"

http://quotations.about.com/cs/poemlyrics/a/To_A_Louse.htm


The internet provides such an opportunity: public performers can exactly see themselves as anonymous others see them.

However, criticism is always hard to take. If you teach adults, you are required often to submit to an opinion survey. All your students get to criticize everything about you. At first, it is all too easy to dismiss the negative things they say and pride yourself on the good things they say, but that way, you will still be making the same mistakes next year, and not ifurther capitalizing on the things you really do well.

It is perhaps worse to take every negative thing too much to heart and become discouraged.

My solution was the following. I read all of them carefully, no matter how positive or negative. If the people that mostly liked me had negative comments, I took those especially seriously. And if those who mostly disliked me had something that they thought was positive, I believed them. In general, that provided me the best guideline I could find for doing a better job.

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How very well said!

There is nothing wrong with constructive criticism. When one sees the same comments over and over from multiple people, perhaps there is at least a grain of truth that warrants addressing. I don't think anyone is attacking the person. Its about styling decisions for most of the ladies and the odd young gentleman coming out of the same club. And its about general tendencies to poor posture out of the same club. Vanessa just happens to be the most famous example. It is not the fault of the skaters. Almost all of them are really great kids. Vanessa and Paul are absolutely charming. Part of being a really great coach is to understand one's own weaknesses, and to know when to get help from people who know more in a specific area. That's the sign of true leadership. No one is perfect and knows everything. Not even really, really good coaches.

It would be nice if costumes and hair don't matter, and a paper bag should do the trick. The reality is that this is ice dance. How a team looks on the ice goes towards presentation and overall feel and perception of a program. Jana did look ridiculous on more than a few occasions, and to me it was distracting. I'm looking forward to seeing what she will look like now that she is under the influence of S/Z rink. If I say something really nice, but yell and scream the words in a harsh tone, people will hear the tone more than the words. Ice dance is a sport that also incorporates the senses - sight in how the skaters look, hearing in the type of music -and touches the mind as well as the emotions. That's why there are so many passionate opinions on this and other forums. It's a whole experience, which is why styling does matter.

Actually Skate America didn't show that. W/P had better tech marks, weirdly enough. It showed that one set of judges called it that way at one event. It could well happen that C/P and W/P meet again in the GPF-it depends on whether C/Z are second at TEB, something that is not a lock, for sure. It will be interesting to see how they both do there, if that happens.

It seems to me, as a complete outsider, that Skate Canada has stuck all their eggs in the C/P basket. Not unusual. The US tends to always go for the younger of 2 teams when it's close.

DORIS - it's the PCS marks between C&P and W&P at Skate America that tell the tale. Judges are clearly favouring C&P right now.

Also, doris, W/P had better technical marks only in the SD. They were three points back of C/P in the FD. Overall (TES for the SD and FD combined) C/P come out ahead.

...It's what Doris says about the eggs in one basket that really makes it matter to me. I have great admiration for Vanessa and Paul as committed young athletes , and have said nothing against them personally.

I respect L/R for what they do well, but I'm not shy about saying that as Emperors, they're only half clothed at best.

Politics exist in all federations to one extent or another , but I doubt that Skate Canada is anywhere near the worst in this respect. Also , all federations have, and need to have, a strategy for how best to support their skaters, promote them and bring along new talent.

Media and press people are guided by the federations' press releases and seek info. from them about what are the new prospects , what would make an interesting story, etc.,etc.

Skate Canada has had a pretty poor history ( over the 30-40 yrs. I've been watching ) of just promoting their gold medalists ( or the competitors who they think will get them the best result internationally ) to the media and press, and largely ignoring the rest , even those who are very close in ability.They have had their strategies backfire on them a number of times.. ( Remember the awful episode when L/H won Nationals and there was not only no fluff for them, even though the fans and SC knew they had the goods to potentially challenge, but they weren't even interviewed after they won.. However there was fluff prepared for the expected winners, and they were interviewed about their loss. ) Of course the TV network was guilty , but don't tell me the network didn't try to check out the lay of the land beforehand. That would only be standard practice. It doesn't seem like it can have been stressed to them that either team could win,on any given day. There have been plenty of other examples of SC outsmarting themselves, but that's just one that springs to mind off the top of my head.

I had hoped for a major change in strategy at SC from the new leadership ( and I still dare hope ),but as all the hoopla has progressed, I can't help wondering if it's a case of here we go again. I feel bad for the athletes, because there's the danger of putting too much pressure on the ones in the spotlight..setting them up for major deflation if they don't live up to expectations ,or running the risk of having it all go to their heads ; while for those just out of the spotlight, they have to start wondering if their middle name is chopped liver, as far as SC is concerned.:disapp:

I don't have a problem with C/P being marked ahead of W/P at SA - it' was a competition, after all... but I think it's possible that the size of the margin and how all the PCS scores stack up is a bit dubious.

I'm all for skaters ( and our #1 team ) getting press coverage, but I don't think we should draw comparisons with the coverage V/M recieved last year, considering that they were our champions ,considering their placement in the world at the time, and the fact that they were in contention for Olympic gold .( I would also contend that a couple with their combination of talent and skill might only appear in a given country once in a generation, but others may not agree. )

Then too, C/P are only our #1 by default. They haven't won our title...yet. Can't we wait for Canadian's before proclaiming them ?... I find it a bit unseemly to be promoting them as if they were our champions already. It may make people think it's in the bag ...And if judges are at all swayed by general perception....it's not very fair to W/P,in particular ( and perhaps others ), because there really isn't a huge difference in ability between them.

dorispulaski said:

Actually Skate America didn't show that. W/P had better tech marks, weirdly enough. It showed that one set of judges called it that way at one event. It could well happen that C/P and W/P meet again in the GPF-it depends on whether C/Z are second at TEB, something that is not a lock, for sure. It will be interesting to see how they both do there, if that happens.

It seems to me, as a complete outsider, that Skate Canada has stuck all their eggs in the C/P basket. Not unusual. The US tends to always go for the younger of 2 teams when it's close.

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It is quite obvious to me that W/P FD is not as strong as their SD. They lost ground with the FD in both their events, didn't matter if C/P were there or not. They need to add some more content. The judges sent them a clear message, as far as I am concerned.

Yes,that's true, but their SD shows they are capable of getting the technical levels needed to score quite a bit better with the FD. Whether they will improve more to that level or not remains to be seen. W/P have improved a lot between this year and last.

1. I dunno doris. The errors they make tend to be ones of execution. They had a three point headstart on base value (in the SD) compared to C/P at Skate America and saw that dropped to 1.5 when GOE were added on. Those errors in execution tend to affect base value as well (the twizzle in the NHK FD, the Rotational lift in the Skate America FD) and I think that holds them back on PCS and TES.

2. I don't know what to think about Faiella/Scali. The last time they rocketed out of the gates on the GP circuit was the 08/09 season, winning gold and silver in their two events. They made their first GPF, won their first Euros medal, and seemed primed to match their finish at the previous Worlds, but saw themselves beaten by P/B and the Kerrs. They had a slow start last season (third at CoC) and withdrew from their second event, but had a great Europeans/Olympics/Worlds. So part of me doesn't want to write them off (plus I really like them). And this season has been unnaturally cruel to Italian ice dancing - C/L having the slow start causing them to completely redo their training environment and Alessandrini/Vaturi having the injury taking them off the GP circuit. F/S have been to three Olympics, made top five at the their most recent one, won two Euro medals along with World bronze. The young teams are improving rapidly and Pechelat/Bourzat are posting the top European scores of the season - right now it's pretty clear that they'll be the top Euro team at Tokyo and I wouldn't be surprised if they won gold (provided that V/M aren't there).

3. Israel has two spots for ice dance. Do they have two teams that they'll send to Worlds? Their National Championships seem woefully underpopulated. See, if we're gonna have politicking, I wanna see the ability to trade spots. No nation should be able to trade a solo spot, but if they have two spots - trade one for a spot elsewhere.

The italians had been really cursed. Was this because they just won a world medal again? Just joking.
These numerous injuries should not be as surprising. The ice dancers have to chase the levels in their lifts and therefore the lifts became riskier and put a strain on their bodies.
This sport has changed the most since the COP introduction, but even more so since lifts became mandatory, day and night what it used to be 30 y ago. Those days the lifts were only highlights not a lot of acrobatic elements.
A new young viewer, would have hard time understanding the dances before T&D era.
As far as how the season evolves, I was expecting a 3 team race in Europe (P/B, K/K and F/S) followed by a secure 4th for B/S.
The italians and brits injuries are instead paving the way to the european podium for B/S and for P/B for the Euro title.
I am not going to anticipate what will happen at Worlds yet, to early imo.
As I mentioned before, I have a soft spot for P/B who never medaled at the Europeans, so I will be very happy for them with any medal, not to speak about gold.
For the russian leaderboard, I was right from the get go, that I/K won't be able
to match yet B/S, who were imo the most likely russian team to get in the front. Ice dance in seniors needs a lot of more experience and "skill". The junior teams tend to have less speed, ice coverage and flow, therefore the PCS's will reflect that for their first few years.