changes to jump rules for pairs

Thank you very much for the great analysis, hockeyfan!

I feel so unfair that ISU doing this. How can you count on pairs to have a new triple jump or a new jump combo in their grasp in such a short time right before olympics? It is so obvious who drove this. It is shameful IMO. :no: :no: :no:

I don't think Shen/Zhao would add a new triple. Although Zhao used to be able to have all 5 triples, Shen never managed that many, and there is simply no time to learn a new triple or even get one back. According to the news they might use 3T+3T, 2A. If they can pull this off, then jump wise they will be about the same with T/M (0.1 less?), and I know they've been working on spin and steps a lot. This combines with their advantage in throw and twist and artistry, I believe they still have an edge over T/M. Even with 3T+2T, they could still pull it off with a clean program or equally bobbled with T/M. I don't think they need the quadual throw, either.

They were very upset with the change of rules so close to the olympics, and greatly to their disadvantage. They had just finished their choreography when the received Communication 1319 (the infamous one IMO). It was totally out of blue to the chinese teams. But they seem to have recovered from the shock now and become even more determined to win.

Zhang/Zhang IMO might be the one Chinese pair that can take the ride.

This is going to be an interesting even to watch. To me, the Russian team lost already as even T/M could manage to win, the medals would not be as heavy as they suppose to be. If Shen/Zhao can still pull it off under such circumstances it simply adds more glories to their medals. Just my opinion.

BTW, I'm not agaist russian teams. I favoured B/S, and I think Pv/Tv have very gracious personality, it even showed a bit in their programs recently. I wish them do well this season. Poor O/S they are sacrificed. The new rule gave more edge to Zhang/Zhang over them. Anybody know O/S before they paired together? I mean how likely they can pull off a different triple? I guess a 3S. I somehow remember they tried salchow before but not sure.

Finally I wish all the skaters affected by this change can go out of the psychological shadow and do whatever they can to minimize the negative influence. My heart goes with them, each of them no matter if they are my favorite skaters or not. And what's more, for the sake of the sport, I wish nothing like this will ever happen again, not right before the olympics.

hongligl said:

According to the news they might use 3T+3T, 2A. If they can pull this off, then jump wise they will be about the same with T/M (0.1 less?), and I know they've been working on spin and steps a lot.
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Do you mean a 3T/3T sequence or combo? if combo, imo, it is too risky. How many single lady has consistant 3T/3T? Not many even in top 6. In pairs not only they need the consistancy on both of them, but also the unison. Just do what they used to, and try to milk points in other eareas.

I think all rusian cares about is the Gold. Besides they have advantage to two of their 3 top teams. They can't lose.

mzheng said:

Do you mean a 3T/3T sequence or combo? if combo, imo, it is too risky. How many single lady has consistant 3T/3T? Not many even in top 6. In pairs not only they need the consistancy on both of them, but also the unison. Just do what they used to, and try to milk points in other eareas.

I think all rusian cares about is the Gold. Besides they have advantage to two of their 3 top teams. They can't lose.

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I believe it will be a sequence jump, not combination. I think they are going to change their jumps. They are a team always strives for the best, winning the game fair and square, showing true sportsmanship.

hongligl said:

I believe it will be a sequence jump, not combination. I think they are going to change their jumps. They are a team always strives for the best, winning the game fair and square, showing true sportsmanship.

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when you say "change their jumps" are you talking about doing a different triple, or change the sequence the were doing? I think they were doing 2A-3toe sequence and later on SBS 3toes. If they wanted to keep the same scores they would have to do 3toe-3toe. However like mzheng said, they can get more points in other areas like their throws and twists. In the only section of the event they'll have inconvenience with jumps is the FS since in the short program they only do one SBS jump, right? But They are hardworking people, so I'm sure whatever they do, they'll put their heart on it.

Do you have any news on Hongbo's foot? How is he feeling?

Hikaru said:

when you say "change their jumps" are you talking about doing a different triple, or change the sequence the were doing? I think they were doing 2A-3toe sequence and later on SBS 3toes. If they wanted to keep the same scores they would have to do 3toe-3toe. However like mzheng said, they can get more points in other areas like their throws and twists. In the only section of the event they'll have inconvenience with jumps is the FS since in the short program they only do one SBS jump, right? But They are hardworking people, so I'm sure whatever they do, they'll put their heart on it.

Do you have any news on Hongbo's foot? How is he feeling?

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There is no official info. The news I cited was from an official's interview, just talking about possible stratigies. It is said they might try 3T+3T sequence and 2A. Hongbo's foot is recovered, and they work really hard to deal with the changes. In hongbo's words, he wishes that they could split a minute to two. It is a terrible thing that ISU make sudden major changes like this a few months away from olympics. Otherwise, I guess S/Z can have a SSB 3S. They do the throw salchow so Xue Shen could get it relatively easily if she didn't learn it before, and Hongbo could do all five triples before.

To answer your other question, not only triples, but jumps over 2 revolutions can not be repeated in solo jump, which means including 2A. And among the top players, I think S/Z and Pang/Tong are the only victims of this 2A rule. Funny that for singles, no restriction for 2A, only triples and quaduals. make me think...

I so hope S&Z can skate the skate of their life in Turino, and to heck with the jumps! I actually have grown to like T&M more, but they are still miles behind S&Z with their presentation, IMO. I just pray it will all work out. It just stinks changing the rules like this now. That's a huge change, and to do it in an Olympic season is just criminal if you ask me. I hope they can rise above it.

hongligl said:

To answer your other question, not only triples, but jumps over 2 revolutions can not be repeated in solo jump, which means including 2A. And among the top players, I think S/Z and Pang/Tong are the only victims of this 2A rule. Funny that for singles, no restriction for 2A, only triples and quaduals. make me think...

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Because Rusian thought S/Z and Pang/Tong are T/M's majore competetor. Read a translated Rusian article shortly after the 2004 Worlds. According to it T/M almost lost to Pang/Tong, the most artistry chinese pairs.....No supprise here again.

Now I see it is truely very difficult to break Rusian or European dominate. Sine ISU CoP specialists need OGM (or at least medals) credential. If Chinese or other Asia country (Japan) never win OGM, it is kind difficult for them to have their own specialist/expert serving ISU, therefore there is no voice from them when changing rules.

Thus the cycels goes on... no OGM, no ISU specialist/expert, rule changes against you at the Olympics year; .......repeat N times.... How is that?

btw, When I read china-ice, they kind expecting some rule changes, but I guess they diddn't expect this dramatic change aimed to them.

nymkfan51 said:

Bielmann's are now a level 4? How did I miss that?

This whole thing is starting to majorly stink! :scowl:

I'll tell you what ... if the Russians end up winning all 4 disciplines with questionable performances, it will make the last scandal look like a kindergarten spat!

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It's the pressure will get into every skater and team. Just a little help knowing the rules in your favore would build up huge confidance to perform well enough to win without creating majore scandal.

mzheng said:

btw, When I read china-ice, they kind expecting some rule changes, but I guess they diddn't expect this dramatic change aimed to them.

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mzheng,

I know the china-ice has more in-depth discussions in the general sense. But as far as I observe people there are fans who don't have direct connection with the skaters or the coaches. At S/Z's own website, there is more direct info, often from S/Z themselves and their webmaster who go visit the teams often. So I'm pretty sure they didn't expect the changes at all. Xue even cried and Zhao was in bad mood for a while. Yao was very very upset. No news about P/T. There are quite a few articles talking about the changes. One can see the shock, the anger and the helplessness they felt as their fate is to some extend controled by others. But they are recovering from it... at least Hongbo showed that clearly.

The Rule change is similar to the Zayak Rule in singles

I dislike comparisons of Pairs Skating and Singles Skating as the basis of making discussions or having dialogs directly comparing the two because, in reality, they are very different activities entirely. We can mention sbs jumps and sbs spins and footwork as being moves you see in both events, but jumping sbs, spinning sbs and doing pair footwork demand different techniques to learn and execute.

However, that being said, this rule change, so close to the Olympics, is a modified variation of the singles' Zayak Rule. It probably came as a result of several factors within the sports' governing body.

1. Influence of SLC Scandal. Not only do we have a NJS similar to gymnastics in our artistic sport as a result, we have constant modifications to the NJS to avoid a potential scandal. With two teams so evenly matched like S/Z and T/M, the ISU wants to expand the demands on the teams as to be able to clearly differentiate these two teams' performances, especiallyif both skate perfection.

2. Is this the "Obertas/Slavnov" Rule? They abused the current rules this year and did three triple toe loops sbs in their program. The ISU has always had a disdain for repeating elements more than two times simply to get the points. So, tradition may be in play here. O/S are hurt by this rule a lot because they don't do sbs 2A very well. Actually, T/M never did sbs 2A due to very different technique as singles skaters of the two members of the team. This is why they have always done sbs 3Sal instead.

3. The NJS itself was discussed and had to be ratified by ISU congress, which was held at its traditional time, with Olympics being earlier in the season than Worlds usually is makes the timing unfortunate for all teams who do not have triple jump variety at their disposal. The rules always change before Olympics that demand more variety and difficulty to win. This is the influence of gymnastics and how it operates. FS is becoming a sport judged like gymnastics, which to me is a personal sadness.

Just my two pennies.

As an outsider looking in, not really KNOWING/understanding what it takes to learn the range of elements the top skaters have to learn, I can imagine reading this (re: rule changes moving in the direction of gymnastics) and thinking: well, that will - OVERTIME- force all the up and coming teams to master all the possible basic elements so that with each season, with a change in the rules here or there, they will have use some of the elements and not others, meaning no developing a comfort zone, no developing a pattern of performing the elements, new programs each year. And as a result, the most well rounded, with the widest range, will rise to the top.

But i suspect that figure skating and gymnastics are really different (i'd love to learn more from Rgirl or others who could explain these differences)....and I suspect that for a team like S/Z who have been known for so long for their technical skill that the phsychological blow alone of this change (which in a sense questions their technical skill) could be terribly detrimental. I hope it is not...and that they and others just skate, skate, skate! Although this particular rule change (and the bielman thing) so close to the Olympics leaves me really unsettled and curious about the politics of it all, I'm not opposed to CoP per se, and don't think it's the worst thing to happen to skating....I do think, though, that it is much harder for the older competitors and some choreographers to make the adjusments, though, and i can only imagine how frustrating these more recent changes must feel to them on top of the already huge change of the NJS.

I can only imagine that for a team like S/Z anything less than gold will feel terrible...and I guess fans saying they are already golden to us (me, at least) won't help much....but here's wishing it helps and that they reach all of their goals!

Hokeyfan said:

Yes. There are so many other things the ISU could have tweaked with. This kind of major change in gymnastics is made after the Olympic cycle.

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ChiSk8Fan said:

The rules always change before Olympics that demand more variety and difficulty to win. This is the influence of gymnastics and how it operates. FS is becoming a sport judged like gymnastics, which to me is a personal sadness.
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Am I read right? Which one more likely happen in reality?

hongligl said:

So I'm pretty sure they didn't expect the changes at all. Xue even cried and Zhao was in bad mood for a while. Yao was very very upset. No news about P/T. There are quite a few articles talking about the changes. One can see the shock, the anger and the helplessness they felt as their fate is to some extend controled by others. But they are recovering from it... at least Hongbo showed that clearly.

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I read, in past that they always knew that in a western dominated sport, if they want to win they have to skate head and shoulder above their competetor (not just slightly better or can go either way, the favor would never tilt to their side). But after they won 2 WC titels, Shen was asked in a interview that if Judges would mark them down intentionally, she answered "For now, I don't think that would happen". With that mentality, I guess she might not prepare for this big change in rules their disadvantage.....Now they are aimed on level 4 moves in all other elements. Bin Yao said they still contact ISU for the confusion of level 4 spin spec. They are aiming for meeting the top requirements in each designated level not just the cross boundary requirements in each level. Otherwise the caller may not call the level that they designated, that would be a disaster......Yeah, go back to that old mentality, work harder. The things I worried about them are Zhao's injury and endurance which leads to his consistance....He is older, physically easy to get tired, when you tired, focus gone, slip happens...I saw he slipped a couple of times in lifts during 2004 COI tour.