What do audiences want to know about the IJS?

I changed my mind. I like the IJS and I think that it is to the benefit of figure skating in general to educate the live and television audiences about it.

On the Grand Prix threads on this board Mrs. P kindly provided a summary of scores that I think is perfect for this purpose. Total points for jumps. Total points for spins and steps. Total Program Component scores.

I think this is just the right amount of information to help the public understand the scoring and enjoy the competition.

Like the announcers could say, in the case of a close fight between two competitors, “Here are how the scores came down: Skater A scored 40.23 on jumps compared to 37.39 for skater B. Skater B was penalized because she did not get full revolution on her triple loop.

“In non-jump elements, Skater B had all level fours on her spins and was able to make up ground, 18.76 to 16.11.

“Judging the effectiveness of the program as a whole, separate from the points gained by individual elements, the judges gave skater A a total of 63.02, to skater B’s 60.33. Skater B had lovely choreography, but Skater A’s speed and ice coverage carried the day.

“Adding these up, that’s 119.36 for Skater A and 116.48. Skater A wins the long program by 2.88 points — Not quite enough to overcome the lead of 4 points that Skater B carried over from the short program.”

Opinions? Too much information? Too little?

I think it would be interesting if we had some kind of analysis portion of the broadcast after each group of skaters, where 2-3 commentators with one of them being a former skater could go through the protocols with the audience. They could repeat each skater's element in slow motion (maybe putting them in groups, like all the jumps first, then all the spins, etc.) displaying at the same time the base value of the element, any deductions, and GOE. It will probably be time consuming but maybe it could be very interesting for viewers who are not the specialists?

Mathman said:

I changed my mind. I like the IJS and I think that it is to the benefit of figure skating in general to educate the live and television audiences about it.

On the Grand Prix threads on this board Mrs. P kindly provided a summary of scores that I think is perfect for this purpose. Total points for jumps. Total points for spins and steps. Total Program Component scores.

I think this is just the right amount of information to help the public understand the scoring and enjoy the competition.

Like the announcers could say, in the case of a close fight between two competitors, “Here are how the scores came down: Skater A scored 40.23 on jumps compared to 37.39 for skater B. Skater B was penalized because she did not get full revolution on her triple loop.

“In non-jump elements, Skater B had all level fours on her spins and was able to make up ground, 18.76 to 16.11.

“Judging the effectiveness of the program as a whole, separate from the points gained by individual elements, the judges gave skater A a total of 63.02, to skater B’s 60.33. Skater B had lovely choreography, but Skater A’s speed and ice coverage carried the day.

“Adding these up, that’s 119.36 for Skater A and 116.48. Skater A wins the long program by 2.88 points — Not quite enough to overcome the lead of 4 points that Skater B carried over from the short program.”

Opinions? Too much information? Too little?

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Glad that you appreciated them! A few thoughts:

1. They do show the importance of levels on non-jump elements. The point difference is so minimal that you can't see it by just looking at the protocols itself. But when you break them down for each skater. For example, Richard Dornbush had a terrible program to most because he did not do all the jumps, but yet he scored the most points in his non-jump elements. In contrast, Christina Gao in the FS did really well with her jumps, but scored in the lower half for the non-jump elements because the levels were not there.

2. I think the breakout of PCS is especially beneficial. I did that for the men and it was interesting to see how the low and high scores contrasted with each other. Nobu scoring the highest in skating skills than Jeremy. That makes total sense. Jeremy beating Nobu in everything else -- yep. I think, judging from the debates in this competition, that people want a more detailed understanding and analysis of each PCS. I think you're better off debating from an analysis of the individual judges' PCS then the PCS average as a whole. For example: You can see that the judges view of B/S and S/S actually was just as varied as the people on this very skating board:

B/S did not get all 9s from any judge. They got a mix of 8/9 from judges 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 8; 8's from judge 4 and 9; a mix of 7s and 8s from judge 7 and all 7s from judge 3
S/S got all 9's from judge 2; 8's from judges 1, 4, 5, 9; a mix of 7/8 from judges 7 and 8, 7s from judge 6 and a mix of 6s and 7s from judge 3.

So obviously judge 3 was a real critic and marked both down, though liked B/S better
judge 2 like S/S better giving them the edge on everything except performance.
Judge 7 liked them about equally: They got the same score in skating skills, footwork and performance, though B/S got a slight edge in choreo and interpretation.

So what does that tell me? That the debate everyone has on these boards isn't really that far off from the judges.

3.) It also really help me respond better to "Carolina was gifted or Nobu was overscored" or other broad statements posters made based on a rough look at the score sheet I defended Nobu, because the breakdown showed that he did a lot WITHOUT a quad. Likewise for Carolina, despite the fact she didn't do the tougher jumps, the jump breakdown showed she actually scored better than Mirai.

Mathman said:

Opinions? Too much information? Too little?

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Pretty much perfect, in my opinion, but I think that they should also cover skating skills separately. Not just the SS mark in the PCS, but also enough to start educating audiences on the basics, because to me it seems like the one technical area that's completely opaque to non-skaters unless they've bothered to educate themselves, but is extremely important in how the sport is judge. Not just in the new judging system, but always. A lot of the more opinions of certain factions of fans, as far as I can tell, comes from years of being fed bad commentary that just didn't present the actual skating as a factor in competition. Whether it was originally intended as it's mission, IJS is clearly being structured in a way that's intended to revive a lot of the art of skating that kind of got left by the wayside between the loss of figures and the rise of high-end triples/quads/triple-triple combos. So I think it's going to be important to let audiences know that, for example, Skater A was much faster than Skater B, but used a lot of crossovers to build speed and the turns and moves she used in her transitions were easier and not done as well, while Skater C was much slower and had weaker MITF and footwork than both of them.

Also, you ought to change the title of this thread to "What do American audiences want to know about the IJS?", because as far as I can tell, most of the rest of the world either knows a lot and is basically happy with the IJS, or would probably never be happy with a fair, sport-centric, analytical system anyway. I think it's mostly just Americans who are really annoyed by it.

doubleflutz said:

...I think that they should also cover skating skills separately. Not just the SS mark in the PCS, but also enough to start educating audiences on the basics, because to me it seems like the one technical area that's completely opaque to non-skaters unless they've bothered to educate themselves, but is extremely important in how the sport is judged...

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I think it would help if they changed the name of the component "Skating Skills" to something like "Stroking and edging." To say that a skater has good "skating skills" seems like saying a baseball player has good "baseball skills."

Mathman said:

I think it would help if they changed the name of the component "Skating Skills" to something like "Stroking and edging." To say that a skater has good "skating skills" seems like saying a baseball player has good "baseball skills."

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I disagree! I think using "skating skills" to cover those areas is important, because stroking and edging are skating. Jumping high, the ability to rotate fast, extreme flexibility, extreme extension, pretty arm waving, ballerina fingers, dramatic facial expressions: these are not skating. They may enhance skating, they may make certain aspects of skating more difficult (or easier...), but they are not skating and are only valuable if they are combined with good skating to make it better or harder, and they should never ever ever ever be valued over real skating on their own merits. And for the most part, for hundreds of years, they haven't been. It's too bad that a very short period of about a decade and a half led people to form the wrong impression, helped along by some bad commentary and even worse judging, but the Dark Ages are over.

Basically, I want everyone who doesn't understand how you can fall three times and still be judged to have the best skating skills of a competition to either learn what's what and get over it, or shut up and go watch some non-competitive interpretative underwater ski-ballet. Catering to a misbegotten view of the sport is silly.

Still, telling people to get over it, shut up, etc. -- to me that sends the wrong message to the very folks that we would like to recruit or retain as friends of figure skating.

Here is an example. At 2010 U.S. Nationals Rachael Flatt and Mirai Nagasu both gave the best skates of their young lives. Rachael was outstanding. But it was Mirai who brought the house down. Everyone watching thought Mirai had won, but when the scores came down, Rachael prevailed.

The commentators contributed little besides, "I thought Mirai should have won, too. I guess she got some downgrades. Oh well, that's skating under this new judging system."

The point is that the scores let the air out of the building. The audience did not leave the arena in jubilation over having seen a great sporting event (where can I buy tickets to the next one!) Instead they filed out scratching their heads and muttering under their breath.

doubleflutz said:

Basically, I want everyone who doesn't understand how you can fall three times and still be judged to have the best skating skills of a competition to either learn what's what and get over it, or shut up and go watch some non-competitive interpretative underwater ski-ballet. Catering to a misbegotten view of the sport is silly.

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I think the bigger issue isn't that someone who falls can get high SS scores, it's that the system doesn't punish glaring mistakes enough to where someone who falls multiple times can win a competition over someone who doesn't fall but has pretty darn good skating skills. To me there is just too big a spread between the PCS marks of an amazing skater and those of a very good skater.

The other big problem is the inconsistency of the judging. How many times has Kostner won a competition after several falls but wins on PCS, and the casual fan is scratching their heads while the commentators are saying "trust us, she's good". Then when she does skate clean she loses to someone who didn't. It's confusing for me, much less someone who watching skating a couple of times a year.

While I don't think the sport should cater to a misbegotten view, the judging is not easy to understand and if the sport isn't more approachable to the casual fan it could continue to decline in popularity and become a niche sport we see televised only at the Winter Games.

Mathman said:

Still, telling people to get over it, shut up, etc. -- to me that sends the wrong message to the very folks that we would like to recruit or retain as friends of figure skating.

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If they want judging systems that reward the wrong things and want their favorites held up for the wrong reasons (or at all, really), then I don't really see them as friends of figure skating, to be completely blunt. People seem to be confusing "in the United States, the popularity of figure skating is waning from the days when skaters had million-dollar contracts, TV broadcasting rights were highly valuable, and there was a lot of TV coverage" with "figure skating is dying". I'd love to see a ressurgence in the U.S., but not if it brings more shenanigans along with it, and I feel like in a lot of ways, the popularity of the "skating boom" was responsible for a lot of the shenanigans in that era and directly proceeding it.

Here is an example. At 2010 U.S. Nationals Rachael Flatt and Mirai Nagasu both gave the best skates of their young lives. Rachael was outstanding. But it was Mirai who brought the house down. Everyone watching thought Mirai had won, but when the scores came down, Rachael prevailed.

The commentators contributed little besides, "I thought Mirai should have won, too. I guess she got some downgrades. Oh well, that's skating under this new judging system."

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Well, the thing is, I think that's a good example of shenanigans in and of itself. The commentators just gave up and blamed the system, instead of being honest and saying: Rachael was held up in the PCS, as she always is and as certain other Americans have been, because she is reliable and not a headcase. She rightfully beat Mirai on tech, but it was a bad result anyway, because her speed, edging, extension, carriage, posture, etc, were all inferior to Mirai's, and they were closer in the second mark than they should have been. NBC wanted Sasha to come back for ratings, USFSA very much wanted Rachael on the team because of her reliability and because she was in favor with them at that point, and even though Sasha didn't deliver enough for a berth in the Olympics to be justified, Mirai probably got screwed out of a National title because of it. But no, it's the Eville Kommunist Block Judges who fix things and play favorites, not the good honest fair-playin' Americans! Look, over there, artistry!!!!

Most of the problem with the commentary in the US has been that, basically, the commentators aren't willing to let the audience know how the sausage is made. A lot of fan favorites in the US, or skaters that the USFSA wanted to become fan favorites, have been held up in ways that distorted the results and the skating, and the commentators had to make up a lot of garbage to cover it up and "explain" the results in a way that was palatable to the audience. But it's ultimately a false foundation.

The point is that the scores let the air out of the building. The audience did not leave the arena in jubilation over having seen a great sporting event (where can I buy tickets to the next one!) Instead they filed out scratching their heads and muttering under their breath.

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Ironically, I think it happened because certain parties in the USFSA and NBC were trying to "increase the popularity of figure skating", more than running an honest figure skating competition. I'm just glad they didn't figure out a way to hold Sasha up, but I bet if she'd followed through on her end of the bargain and skated in her GP events, particularly Skate America, they'd have found a way to put her on the team.

Ask the audience to grab a protocol printout as lots of IJS fanatics only suggest?

For TV audiences, what we want is for TV commentators to look at the detailed protocols and summarize the detailed numbers into three or four categories for two or three of the top skaters in the event? That sounds doable. The networks often do something along these lines in controversial decisions, if there is time left in the broadcast or if there is another broadcast the next day.

Should they be encouraged to schedule their live broadcasts to allow the commentators a few minutes to analyze during commercials and then sum up with this kind of analysis. While the event is in progress there usually won't be time for commentators to figure out exactly why each skater ranked where s/he did in relation to all of the relevant previous skaters.

For live audiences (who are likely to be more knowledgeable on average to begin with), there might be better ways to announce and display scores in the arenas, but analysis or commentary of the sort suggested in the original post would not be an appropriate part of the announcements. The Skatebug earpieces, or whatever they may be called, that offer technical commentary as an option for live audiences is very useful, but it's not an official explanation.

I would love to see some kind of official debriefing after important event, for the press and maybe open to the public, where officials could summarize the decisions the panels actually made. I think this would have been even more useful under 6.0 when there were no detailed protocols. But it couldn't be part of reading the scores while the event is in progress.

In both cases, telling people where to find the detailed protocols would be very useful, for those who are interested. Most won't want to go online (or pay a few dollars for a hard copy in the arena) to pore over them, but knowing that they are readily available, not secret, and that the information is there for those who are interested would help IMO.

I think the commentators have to be careful about saying that judges should rightfully have scored skater Z higher than skater Q on components if the judges did not in fact do so. It may be that the commentators are correct and all or most of the judges were completely wrong and holding up skater Q for all the wrong reasons.

But more likely the judges were applying guidelines that the commentators are not as familiar with as the judges (unless the commentators are themselves trained as judges), or the balance of skills and strengths each skater demonstrated was complex enough that different judges (or other equally knowledgeable observers) could arrive at different reasonings for different relative scores.

Some commentators are trained as tech specialists, so they can do a better job of explaining some of the specific calls, especially if they have access to the official video feed.

So I think it's valid for a commentator to say "I would have scored Z higher on these components for these reasons," but not "The judges should have scored Z higher. They didn't. They were wrong and I'm right."

Even better would be if a commentator who is more attuned to analyzing than to cheerleading for favorites can say "I would have scored Z higher for these reasons. But I can see why some judges might have thought otherwise, for these other reasons. I personally disagree, but that could be the explanation." Or get at least two knowledgeable commentators with very different preferences and other biases to offer different points of view and debate each other about controversial decisions.

What would be most useful, of course, would be if the actual judges would come out and explain their specific reasoning on specific decisions. But historically the ISU has been the opposite of willing to do this, and unfortunately I don't see them starting any time soon.

So the best we can hope for may be encouraging TV networks to hire commentators who are well trained in judging standards (whether they are actually qualified judges or not), and encourage them to analyze with their heads and not just their hearts.

There is a place for heartfelt commentary. But it will be heavily driven by the commentator's personal biases. It does a real disservice to audiences for their main point of entry into understanding the judging to be more biased than the judges.

I think another way for the commentators to be better is to have them go through the tech call and judges training. Judy Blumberg is SO helpful because she's actually sat there and called events. Paul Wylie, IIRC, has studied it. A lot of well known skaters have been used as tech callers, it wouldn't be hard to steal a few for the broadcasts...

And, I think the negativity has to be left out of the actual competition commentary. Bezic - for example - is so preoccupied with why she hates the scoring system that all she does is get you to hate it, too. I'm not saying it has to be all roses, but do like they did with the whole Evan Lysacek debacle. Do a session before or after the event with a meeting of the heads as to why the judging isn't 100% amazing, etc...

remember when ABC did the little tutorials with Paul - they could do that, but with someone less monotone lol

I personally would like to see three sets of scores:

1. Jumps
2. Non-Jumps (Spins, field moves, footwork, transition)
3. Presentation (Performance, Choreography, Interpretation)

The execution (the quality of movement and precision in delivery) of each element (including both jump and non-jump elements) is evaluated through GOE and therefore will not be included in the Presentation or Performance category. One of the problems I have with the current system is that Performance and Execution are combined together as one category. One with an average performance (the physical, emotional, and intellectual involvement of the skater to translate the intent of the music and choreography) can get a high performance score due to his/her excellent execution of elements, which has been rewarded in categories such as GOEs, skating skills, transitions, etc.--Double reward, in other words. Similarly, skating skills have been assessed in the field moves, footwork, transition and so on, and thus it is redundant to have a separate category for it.

I would like to see field moves (e.g., spirals, spread eagles, Ina Bauers, hydroblading, and so on) being encouraged and credited more. The current system feeds busy programs for the sake of being busy. I miss those long glides during the slow section of a music.

skatinginbc said:

I personally would like to see three sets of scores:

1. Jumps
2. Non-Jumps (Spins, field moves, footwork, transition)
3. Presentation (Performance, Choreography, Interpretation)

The execution (the quality of movement and precision in delivery) of each element (including both jump and non-jump elements) is evaluated through GOE and therefore will not be included in the Presentation or Performance category. One of the problems I have with the current system is that Performance and Execution are combined together as one category. One with an average performance (the physical, emotional, and intellectual involvement of the skater to translate the intent of the music and choreography) can get a high performance score due to his/her excellent execution of elements, which has been rewarded in categories such as GOEs, skating skills, transitions, etc.--Double reward, in other words. Similarly, skating skills have been assessed in the field moves, footwork, transition and so on, and thus it is redundant to have a separate category for it.

I would like to see field moves (e.g., spirals, spread eagles, Ina Bauers, hydroblading, and so on) being encouraged and credited more. The current system feeds busy programs for the sake of being busy. I miss those long glides during the slow section of a music.

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Yes, exactly so. I especially agree with the last part; skaters are so busy changing edges that nobody ever seems to hold an edge.

Mathman said:

I think it would help if they changed the name of the component "Skating Skills" to something like "Stroking and edging." To say that a skater has good "skating skills" seems like saying a baseball player has good "baseball skills."

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Just say it's a five-tool skater.

skatinginbc said:

I personally would like to see three sets of scores:

1. Jumps
2. Non-Jumps (Spins, field moves, footwork, transition)
3. Presentation (Performance, Choreography, Interpretation)

The execution (the quality of movement and precision in delivery) of each element (including both jump and non-jump elements) is evaluated through GOE and therefore will not be included in the Presentation or Performance category. One of the problems I have with the current system is that Performance and Execution are combined together as one category. One with an average performance (the physical, emotional, and intellectual involvement of the skater to translate the intent of the music and choreography) can get a high performance score due to his/her excellent execution of elements, which has been rewarded in categories such as GOEs, skating skills, transitions, etc.--Double reward, in other words. Similarly, skating skills have been assessed in the field moves, footwork, transition and so on, and thus it is redundant to have a separate category for it.

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I understand what you're saying. The Performance/Execution is very much a catch-all category that includes several different kinds of qualities that aren't directly related to each other, which makes it confusing if a skater is really good at some of them (say, emotional involvement and projection) and really bad at another (say, clarity of movement and body line) (or vice versa).

So it would make sense for a different way to divide the rewards for the skills currently lumped together under Performance/Execution.

But I'm not sure the way you have it divided in categories 1 and 2 makes sense, because your current category 2 includes both elements that earn base marks and global qualities that apply across the whole program.

Are you suggesting that the ISU change the breakdown of how the judges award the scores or that they should change the grouping of how they report the current scores in the quick announcements right after the skate?

Do you want to stop giving individual element marks for non-jump elements? Do you want only one score for technical components plus spins, steps, and field moves and only one score for "presentation" including everything that's now in Performance/Execution (except for technical execution aspects), Choreography, and Interpretation?

Or should the judges continue to do pretty much exactly what they're doing now (with some rewriting of the P/E guidelines and maybe put carriage and extension into Skating Skills), and then add them up differently for announcing in the Kiss-and-Cry? That would give audiences, and skaters, a different understanding of how general categories broke down, but the detailed protocols would still show the existing breakdown of elements vs. global qualities.

I would like to see field moves (e.g., spirals, spread eagles, Ina Bauers, hydroblading, and so on) being encouraged and credited more.

The current system feeds busy programs for the sake of being busy. I miss those long glides during the slow section of a music.

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Any suggestions how to encourage this? Currently the choreo spiral sequence for senior ladies allows them to get points for a single spiral position held for at least 6 seconds, or two held for at least 3 seconds each, no more official points for difficulty. So we should already be seeing more sustained spirals in senior ladies' long programs. Maybe include other kinds of field moves held for the amount of time as also constituting a choreo sequence, and make that element option available to men (and once again to juniors)?

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skatinginbc said:

The current system feeds busy programs for the sake of being busy. I miss those long glides during the slow section of a music.

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Maybe just set requirement for, let's say, 5 transitions, and set up transitions in different levels like spins and steps have? Then the rest of the places were free for skaters to express themselves according to the music.

In Canada, the commentators will often make a comment to the effect that a jump may have been under-rotated or there may be an edge call as soon as the skater lands it so that the viewing audience is aware that, all appearances to the contrary, that jump may not have been technically "clean" and therefore subject to deductions. When the marks come up, they will confirm any under-rotations or edge calls in the scoring. CTV used to do a bit at the beginning of the SP where they would go through the list of required elements using video clips to demonstrate each element, and then point out what the judges will be looking for in each element.

I have had the very interesting experience of watching some skating this fall with my daughter's boyfriend ("DBF") who knows absolutely NOTHING about figure skating. What I have noticed is that DBF has no trouble whatsoever discerning who the best skaters are even with knowing nothing about the sport. After watching Charlie & Meryl skate at SA he asked me "Was that as good as I thought it was?" and then commented that they looked to be in a whole other class to the rest of the skaters. Again, last weekend watching Kawaguti & Smirnov, he could easily see that they were the class of the field, without anyone telling him.

I think what is particularly unhelpful is when a commentator utterly trashes the skater who won, such as Dick Button and Plushenko. I'm not a Plushenko fan either but not once ever did Dick ever mention how strong Plushenko's basic skating was, how he powered around the rink with absolutely no effort all and his jumps were huge and covered enormous distance and that's why he won. To hear Button rant about flailing arms and nit picking every little thing without saying anything positive about the guy at all, made it sound like Plushenko was winning on reputation when nothing could have been further from the truth.

The other issue is that American commentators have been ignoring flutzing and under-rotations for years. Added to which, the USFSA has been way too lenient about under-rotations and edge calls at Nationals, so skaters aren't called for flutzes at Nationals, deluding fans into thinking they've fixed their flutzes. These same skaters go to international events and get nailed for wrong edge take-offs and it looks fishy.

Last but not least, commentators at both NBC and ABC seem to have no interest in learning anything about the scoring system, or for informing the public about the scoring system. The ISU refused to allow Dick Button to commentate at Worlds and other ISU Championships, and made that a condition of their deal with ABC because of his involvement in the World Figure Skating Association, and his endless rants against the NJS. Certainly his rants against the system were not helpful in helping the public understand the scoring. Hamilton and Bezic don't rant, but they seem to revel in their ignorance of the system - I don't know and you can't make me learn. The producers cut Tracey Wilson off whenever she tries to interject anything helpful in regards to the judging system. It makes it looked like it's all cooked because no one will explain it for them.

gkelly said:

But I'm not sure the way you have it divided in categories 1 and 2 makes sense, because your current category 2 includes both elements that earn base marks and global qualities that apply across the whole program.

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There are many ways to divide a layer cake (C). We can slice it horizontally and have toppings (T), first layer vanilla flavored (F), second layer chocolate flavored (S), third layer almond flavored (A). Thus we have: C = T + F + S + A.
We can also take out the toppings (T) first, and then cut the cake vertically into halves: the right half (R) and the left (L). Thus we have: C = T + R + L
Though we can cut a cake from various angles, the combination of all angles does not equal to one cake: C ≠ T + F + S + A + R + L. And this is the main problem of the current judging system, which includes “global quality” categories (skating skills or “chocolate layer”) as well as segment categories (footwork or “right half of the cake”), superficially logical but fundamentally flawed. Certain skills (e.g., stroking and edging) are measured twice.
My proposal is C (the whole program) = T (Presentation) + R (jumps) + L (non-jumps). The concept of a “global quality” (e.g., skating skills) pertains to a different equation and should be kept aside.

Dragonlady said:

Last but not least, commentators at both NBC and ABC seem to have no interest in learning anything about the scoring system, or for informing the public about the scoring system. The ISU refused to allow Dick Button to commentate at Worlds and other ISU Championships, and made that a condition of their deal with ABC because of his involvement in the World Figure Skating Association, and his endless rants against the NJS. Certainly his rants against the system were not helpful in helping the public understand the scoring. Hamilton and Bezic don't rant, but they seem to revel in their ignorance of the system - I don't know and you can't make me learn. The producers cut Tracey Wilson off whenever she tries to interject anything helpful in regards to the judging system. It makes it looked like it's all cooked because no one will explain it for them.

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I think Scott was interested early on. In 06 he was shooed away from the judges area during a junior event because they didn't want him to see the judges computers...

American commentators are like most Americans - we don't like change.

NBC's problem is they're still living in the 1950s, they didn't get the memo that the Cold War is officially over. Anytime a Russian or former Soviet skater takes the lead it's a huge conspiracy, and anyone who suggests otherwise (including Hamilton) will be silenced. They also had - until Terry Gannon was contracted - the most moronic non experts who didn't even try to appreciate teh sport. Terry sounds like he's followed the sport in the years since ABC covered it, and that not only amazes me, but it allows him to do his job correctly.

I think the best skates are more marbled cakes then layered cakes, with elaborate decorative frosting instead of a layer of creamed sugar.