- Joined
- Sep 22, 2010
"Winning the practices" means this. The judges attend all the official practices and take notes. The skaters that do well in the official practices become entreched in the judges' minds before the actual competition begins. Sometimes the impression is so strong that the skater who has a good practice begins the competition with a few points in the bag already in the minds of the judges.
A good example was Shizuka Arakawa at the 2006 Olympics. Irina Slutskaya built up virtually unstoppable momentum leading up to the 2006 Olympics. But she started to falter at the end, perhaps due to exhaustion and chronic illness. She lost the Grand Prix Final to Mao Asada and was starting to slip out of the favorite's seat.
When the Olympic practices began, Arakawa was landing triple-triples right and left. Slutskaya and Cohen were struggling. Arakawa established her dominance in the judge's minds. When it came to the actual performace, in fact Arakawa omitted both of the planned triple-triples that she had practiced. But it didn't matter. She was the triple-triple queen and won the gold medal.
This is why skaters show up at official practices with all guns blazing. They know that the competition has already begun.
Do the judges always attend the official practices or just for certain competitions? Do they watch most/all of the skaters or just the medal contenders?
I don't understand why this practice is permitted, since it does leave an impression on the judges that can color their judgment during the actual competition.