But, I still class the Europeans and the Worlds at a level above the Grand Prix Series and the Junior competitions.
Well that's how you perceive it from the outside. I highly doubt that cognitively Europeans is something that the skaters conceive very differently than other major events like Junior Worlds or GPF.
Especially when you consider that at a certain point those events were the most prestigious events that Tuk and Sotnikova could enter. So at that point in time, that event was conceived in their minds as "the most important".
They've been through this many times. Euros will just be a different setting but a very comparable amount of pressure.
But, I still think Polina K is much better at the moment than you are giving her credit for. And I would definitely not use the word “mediocre” to describe somebody that was the “best of the rest” behind Adelina, Liza and Elena Radionova after the SP at Russian Nationals. As I say, she was just unfortunate to have a bad FS on the day.
No, she wasn't 'just unfortunate to have a bad FS on the day'. As has been said already, she hasn't had a single good competition since 2012 Euros.
Leonovas pcs didn't help leonova medal or anything but her scores would've been lower. Mao did two kinds of triples to win an event - four in total so pcs does matter most.
Leonova isn't Asada and she isn't Kostner either. Leonova is Leonova.
Kostner abandoned lutz.
Because of injury. It's back now and she has landed it at Italian Nationals.
Pcs does matter a lot and is most important and because it's a guarantee leonovas pcs would be better than gosvianis that should have mattered more. If you have two people and one will get lower pcs even if they land all their jumps and another could land similar jumps but higher pcs the second person should be sent.
Yes, let's send somebody who didn't deserve it just because they generally get higher PCS. Can't you see how doing something like this is not only fundamentally unfair but also a motivation killer for the other skaters?