Effects of Growth Spurt on Promising Young Stars

christinaskater · Nov 18, 2011

Growth spurt has been truly a major obstacle for so many World Junior medalist and rising stars like Caroline Zhang. What do you think will be it's effect on young stars like Kanako Murakami, Rissa Shoji, Adelina Sotnikova, Elizaveta Tuktamysheva, Julia Lipnitskaia, Gracie Gold, Courtney Hicks among others.

Who do you think will adjust really well to the onset of body changes and increase in height?

drivingmissdaisy · Nov 18, 2011

Those with good technique like Liza and Adelina should be fine. I would also think Kanako would adjust well, if for no other reason than the growth spurts don't seem to impact Japanese skaters as much as American skaters. It might have something to do with the American (or Western) diet because even our skaters of Asian descent don't seem to fare well either.

skateluvr · Nov 18, 2011

Do you mean Mirai, and Caroline, daisy? How about Chin, Yamaguchi, Kwan? Fared extremely well, very petite, tho. Not every asian girl is tiny, flatchested, no hips.

Liza will not be tall, so she may stay Tara sized Adelina and the others, i don't know. Mirai's figure has changed and I'm not sure we know why. Her skating looks less effortlesss, but I'm not sure what it is. She may not like her program or maybe she is frustrated with skating. Who knows? Obviously tiny has the advantage and never gets criticized.

drivingmissdaisy · Nov 18, 2011

Yeah Kwan and Yamaguchi are obvious exceptions, but Mirai, Caroline, Bebe, NNN, APMcD, Kwon and others seemed to struggle a bit more. But Kwan and Yamaguchi also had solid jump technique, and were among the most consistent jumpers of each of their eras. The others (for the most part) had the full array of triples before puberty but really struggled with them after. I wasn't trying to pick on anyone of any background, but there are generally differences in body types across cultures (and there are exceptions to those generalizations). I guess what I'm saying is good technique helps after a growth spurt, but not having your body change much also helps

skateluvr · Nov 18, 2011

Mira is more womanly now. As for jumping, even 5 pounds can make a difference, but Mirai is certainly petite still. She is not 14 anymore. I still love her skating, so much quality. She looked so sexy in her costume in Mao's show this year and her skating was delightful. Mirai is far from done.

evangeline · Nov 18, 2011

drivingmissdaisy said:
Those with good technique like Liza and Adelina should be fine. I would also think Kanako would adjust well, if for no other reason than the growth spurts don't seem to impact Japanese skaters as much as American skaters. It might have something to do with the American (or Western) diet because even our skaters of Asian descent don't seem to fare well either.

Kanako's jump technique isn't exactly optimal.

skateflower · Nov 18, 2011

christinaskater said:
Growth spurt has been truly a major obstacle for so many World Junior medalist and rising stars like Caroline Zhang. What do you think will be it's effect on young stars like Kanako Murakami, Rissa Shoji, Adelina Sotnikova, Elizaveta Tuktamysheva, Julia Lipnitskaia, Gracie Gold, Courtney Hicks among others.

Who do you think will adjust really well to the onset of body changes and increase in height?

Here's my guess.
Kanako is toast due to her bad jump technique.
Rissa is toast and will get lots of UR calls as her jumps are very small to begin with.
Stonikova will become another Kostner with consistency issues as she will likely grow quite tall. But her jumps will be fine when she's on.
Tuktamysheva will become another GEDEVANISHVILI struggling with jumps.
Julia, hard to say at this point of time. She'll probably be one of few who can survive the growth spurt.
Gracie Gold will only get better and stronger as she's almost done with growth spurt. Her jumps will flourish.
Hicks is toast due to bad technique.

evangeline · Nov 18, 2011

skateflower said:
Here's my guess.
Kanako is toast due to her bad jump technique.
Rissa is toast and will get lots of UR calls as her jumps are very small to begin with.
Stonikova will become another Kostner with consistency issues as she will likely grow quite tall. But her jumps will be fine when she's on.
Tuktamysheva will become another GEDEVANISHVILI struggling with jumps.
Julia, hard to say at this point of time. She'll probably be one of few who can survive the growth spurt.
Gracie Gold will only get better and stronger as she's almost done with growth spurt. Her jumps will flourish.
Hicks is toast due to bad technique.

Of course one can never be sure, but I read somewhere that Mishin actually checked out the size of Liza's parents before taking her on as a pupil. So perhaps Liza will stay fairly small as she grows.

skateflower · Nov 19, 2011

evangeline said:
Of course one can never be sure, but I read somewhere that Mishin actually checked out the size of Liza's parents before taking her on as a pupil. So perhaps Liza will stay fairly small as she grows.

Of course this is just my wild guess which may not pan out at all. To me, the problem with Tuktamysheva's future growth is not much about her height but weight. She will probably remain petite but add lots of weight as GEDEVANISHVILI did. That will definitely throw her jumps off.

ordinary person · Nov 19, 2011

I agree with skateflower but Adelina certainly seems to be changed.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wuupXk1vcxc&feature=related 3rd Cup of Russia she almost had a clean skate if she didn't fall at 2:52

http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&v=eiPMJx6onm0 SP COC

A fall at 4:42 as though she she seems to be struggling with her weight and longer legs hence the growth spurt

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UKF5Lbz9Kec&feature=related LP COC

At 1:40 you can see there's not enough height in her jumps thus it gets worse after following 1:57 with a failed jump.

You can really see the growth spurt at work at 2:38 with another jump not having enough speed, strength nor height in it.

Once again at 3:04 we see her struggling with her balance and weight.

bekalc · Nov 19, 2011

skateflower said:
Of course this is just my wild guess which may not pan out at all. To me, the problem with Tuktamysheva's future growth is not much about her height but weight. She will probably remain petite but add lots of weight as GEDEVANISHVILI did. That will definitely throw her jumps off.

Mishin apparently checked to see if the parents had a tendency to grow "out" as well. I think if you look at pictures of Elene when she was younger she was always "bigger boned" than Elizaveta http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AqMOaQyNcpk&feature=results_video&playnext=1&list=PL781BE34C7D81D758

skateflower · Nov 19, 2011

Sorry that I mistakenly mixed up Risa Shoji(JPN) with another tiny young American skater(name please??) with very tiny jumps. I don't think Risa will grow much. Her problem is that very weird jump technique. She has no speed going into each jump, leaninig heavily in the air with Zhang-like 'hammer toe' pick. She jumps like Mira Leung. There is no way she can succeed with that techniquehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cpdp11N8hYg

brightphoton · Nov 19, 2011

Vanessa Lam? She jumps so low, but spins so fast! Very bendy for spins. Her jump technique looks fine though.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mUgmwpeq_Is&t=1m23s

Jaana · Nov 19, 2011

evangeline said:
Of course one can never be sure, but I read somewhere that Mishin actually checked out the size of Liza's parents before taking her on as a pupil. So perhaps Liza will stay fairly small as she grows.

Yes, but these days the children do grow taller than the parents quite often.

skateflower · Nov 19, 2011

brightphoton said:
Vanessa Lam? She jumps so low, but spins so fast! Very bendy for spins. Her jump technique looks fine though.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mUgmwpeq_Is&t=1m23s

Vanessa as well, but I was referring to a young skater from Boston club? She went to one JGP event but withdrew from another one. She got huge score at the Sectionals.

ayayukiituka · Nov 19, 2011

skateflower said:
Vanessa as well, but I was referring to a young skater from Boston club? She went to one JGP event but withdrew from another one. She got huge score at the Sectionals.

That's Yasmin Siraj for sure!

skateflower · Nov 19, 2011

ayayukiituka said:
That's Yasmin Siraj for sure!

Yes.

blue_idealist · Nov 19, 2011

I'm not sure if Mirai's body really changed besides the fact that she put on weight. If she could get her weight back down again she might look like she did a couple of years ago.. her SHAPE may not really have changed.

Who is Gracie Gold, btw?

skateflower · Nov 19, 2011

blue_idealist said:
Who is Gracie Gold, btw?

JGP gold medalist. She can do 3f+3t, 3lutz+3t, 2t+3t in a sleep. Excellent jump technique, good basic skating skills and very powerful but still elegant. She will likely beat all the Russian wonder kids in the long run.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D04eVuX_mbI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=enfbO9TTbU8

bekalc · Nov 19, 2011

skateflower said:
JGP gold medalist. She can do 3f+3t, 3lutz+3t, 2t+3t in a sleep. Excellent jump technique, good basic skating skills and very powerful but still elegant. She will likely beat all the Russian wonder kids in the long run.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D04eVuX_mbI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=enfbO9TTbU8

I think that's saying a bit much. Those Russian junior wonder babies are more consistent than Gracie is. There's a reason Gracie didn't make it to Nationals the year before (she's what 17). Gracie may (and the key word is MAY) be done with puberty but right now I wouldn't say she's a better competitor than the wonder babies.

Effects of Growth Spurt on Promising Young Stars

christinaskater

drivingmissdaisy

skateluvr

drivingmissdaisy

skateluvr

evangeline

skateflower

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evangeline

skateflower

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ordinary person

bekalc

skateflower

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brightphoton

Jaana

skateflower

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ayayukiituka

skateflower

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blue_idealist

skateflower

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bekalc

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