What are Yuna Kim's strongest points as a skater? | Page 16 | Golden Skate

What are Yuna Kim's strongest points as a skater?

gkelly

Record Breaker
Joined
Jul 26, 2003
Thanks, guanchi. That aspect of ice coverage is hard to see on video, but it would be much more apparent in the arena.
 

guanchi

On the Ice
Joined
Mar 31, 2012
Yeah, I've never had the pleasure of seeing her live, gkelly, only video clips. But this is what I see, esp. when she does her 3-3's and flip, plus earlier on when she did her ss- a few crossovers, and then it looked like she was only an inch away from the boards flying across the ice. Amazing!
 

YunaBliss

On the Ice
Joined
May 11, 2010
Her 3-lutz-3-toe. If Yu Na couldn't pull off that 3-3 so beautifully time and time again, she would be in the mix of top skaters but would not be so far ahead of her rivals. The rest of her skating is good but her 3-3 is really her calling card in my opinion.

No one does 3-3 better than Yuna, but IMO, that is not her greatest attribute. As many said before, what makes Yuna truly special is her innate musicality.
 

aftertherain

Record Breaker
Joined
Jan 15, 2010
That was my reasoning as well. What makes a strong skater is a lack of weakness. You don't have to be the absolute best or even excellent at everything. As long as you do everything well and can do it well consistently, you are ahead of the game.

Agree 100%. I think that's Yuna's greatest strength as well. Lack of "real" weakness. Plenty of things she can work on, sure, but none of those completely take away from her overall skating.

Well, that and she's a reincarnated mermaid (as Krislite and I have agreed upon).
 

lcd

Match Penalty
Joined
Mar 11, 2007
Jump technique - far and away. It is mind blowing - the speed, height, flow.

I have ALWAYS been quite baffled by how weak her foot position is - especially glaring in spirals (accentuated by her preference for leggings over her boots), and layback (would have never passed muster in the Kwan/Cohen/Hughes/Nikodinov era, where Kwan's interestingly enough was the weakest).
 

kwanatic

Check out my YT channel, Bare Ice!
Record Breaker
Joined
May 19, 2011
Jump technique - far and away. It is mind blowing - the speed, height, flow.

I have ALWAYS been quite baffled by how weak her foot position is - especially glaring in spirals (accentuated by her preference for leggings over her boots), and layback (would have never passed muster in the Kwan/Cohen/Hughes/Nikodinov era, where Kwan's interestingly enough was the weakest).

It's always about working with what you've got. Michelle didn't have the best attitude position in her layback. Next to Sasha, Sarah and Angela, her position was the weakest. She worked on it for a bit in 2000 and it improved. But eventually she found a way to make the spin unique and beautiful without the extended leg and it became a signature for her.

Yu-Na's back position in her layback is gorgeous...it's just the foot she needs to work on. And ITA about the tights; it's time she ditches them. They do nothing for her lines. If anything they make her feet look worse. And as for her spiral, I always thought she'd benefit from going the Nancy Kerrigan route.
 
Joined
Aug 16, 2009
It's always about working with what you've got. Michelle didn't have the best attitude position in her layback. Next to Sasha, Sarah and Angela, her position was the weakest. She worked on it for a bit in 2000 and it improved. But eventually she found a way to make the spin unique and beautiful without the extended leg and it became a signature for her.

Yu-Na's back position in her layback is gorgeous...it's just the foot she needs to work on. And ITA about the tights; it's time she ditches them. They do nothing for her lines. If anything they make her feet look worse. And as for her spiral, I always thought she'd benefit from going the Nancy Kerrigan route.

Michelle seems to have had the least back flexibility of the ones mentioned along with her (Cohen, Hughes, Nikodinov). Nikodinov's layback was especially gorgeous. The other day I was watching an old video of Gordeeva, one of her first solo skates, and she did an Ina Bauer that was almost vertical, a position Michelle also seemed to take for that move. Yet despite that lack of flexibility (in that move at least), to me Katia and Michelle were possibly the two most graceful skaters ever (I speak subjectively). I guess that's an example of irony. But it does prove that flexibility in and of itself isn't a requirement for graceful skating. Similarly, I don't think of YuNa as unusually flexible, but she is graceful.
 

kwanatic

Check out my YT channel, Bare Ice!
Record Breaker
Joined
May 19, 2011
Michelle seems to have had the least back flexibility of the ones mentioned along with her (Cohen, Hughes, Nikodinov). Nikodinov's layback was especially gorgeous. The other day I was watching an old video of Gordeeva, one of her first solo skates, and she did an Ina Bauer that was almost vertical, a position Michelle also seemed to take for that move. Yet despite that lack of flexibility (in that move at least), to me Katia and Michelle were possibly the two most graceful skaters ever (I speak subjectively). I guess that's an example of irony. But it does prove that flexibility in and of itself isn't a requirement for graceful skating. Similarly, I don't think of YuNa as unusually flexible, but she is graceful.

Yu-Na's back flexibility is excellent. The rest of her flexibility is decent but not remarkable. Her main problem is not flexibility, but extension...that is what's lacking particularly in her spirals and spins. It's possible to be flexible but lack extension and vice versa. Michelle was a good example of that: she was not very flexible but she had beautiful extension.
 

Ven

Match Penalty
Joined
Mar 17, 2013
The tights over her boots look better. Unless she's wearing some different outfits in exhibitions that don't match well, they just look better.
 

Robeye

Final Flight
Joined
Feb 16, 2010
Tights over boots make you look like you have some sort of horrible bone disease in your ankles.

http://images2.fanpop.com/image/photos/10500000/KIM-yuna-kim-10541425-500-673.jpg
Much as I love Yuna, I gotta say that I personally prefer the white boot look as a general rule.

But at a certain point in a career, particularly after a certain amount of success, I'm thinking it becomes more about physical familiarity and psychological comfort than anything else.

Athletes are probably among the most deeply and reflexively superstitious people on earth, right up there with, ah, Haitian practitioners of decidedly alternative medicine ;). (I'm trying to be politically correct, and finding it doesn't suit me :p)

They all adhere to the venerable motto: Don't fix what aint broke. And if it pisses off some people on skating boards, the hell with 'em. :)
 

RABID

Final Flight
Joined
Mar 17, 2013
Much as I love Yuna, I gotta say that I personally prefer the white boot look as a general rule.

But at a certain point in a career, particularly after a certain amount of success, I'm thinking it becomes more about physical familiarity and psychological comfort than anything else.

Athletes are probably among the most deeply and reflexively superstitious people on earth, right up there with, ah, Haitian practitioners of decidedly alternative medicine ;). (I'm trying to be politically correct, and finding it doesn't suit me :p)

They all adhere to the venerable motto: Don't fix what aint broke. And if it pisses off some people on skating boards, the hell with 'em. :)

Agreed. Such a non issue. And just like in football; it is amazing how good a bad uniform looks when the team wearing them are the best at playing the game.
 

jenaj

Record Breaker
Joined
Aug 17, 2003
Country
United-States
No one does 3-3 better than Yuna, but IMO, that is not her greatest attribute. As many said before, what makes Yuna truly special is her innate musicality.

Without the 3-3, Yu Na would be on a par, at best, with her closest rivals. I don't see her exhibitions, without her 3-3, as that special. Her 3-3 is the best, and that, with her amazing consistency in doing the difficult combo, is what really sets her apart.
 

Robeye

Final Flight
Joined
Feb 16, 2010
:eek: They look dressed for an insect killer commercial.
:laugh: Based on the look, I think that "Killer Bees" would suit them much better. Also sounds more ferocious.

The West Coast has a lot of odd mascots, I've found. Pomona College are the "Sage Hens". :p I mean, how is this supposed to strike terror in opponents?
 
Joined
Aug 16, 2009
Hey, I once heard of a university whose color was violet, so its basketball team was called The Violets. Could I have dreamed that? *goes to look* Yes, it's NYU, and by Jove, all their sports teams are nicknamed Violets. This is the kind of thing I'd expect of, say, Vassar or Bryn Mawr.
 

Robeye

Final Flight
Joined
Feb 16, 2010
Without the 3-3, Yu Na would be on a par, at best, with her closest rivals. I don't see her exhibitions, without her 3-3, as that special. Her 3-3 is the best, and that, with her amazing consistency in doing the difficult combo, is what really sets her apart.
Agree that her 3lz-3t is special. So was her 3F-3t, as well as her 2A-3t.

Disagree on the rest. IMHO, Yuna is not only one of the most musically gifted skaters I've ever seen, but one whose style of movement is uniquely and immediately recognizable as her own. Jeff Buttle calls her "hypnotic".

I'm not the only one that says so. Just about every major expert commentator I know says something along those lines. Great minds, and all that...
 
Top