Full blade takeoff discussion

[ju2de2]

Lurking through the discussion and I think all they need to do is add to the hand book that a jump must not be assisted by the blade when its supposed to be a toe jump (this is my pet peeve with the quadsters). It just doesn't make sense when they're attempting a "toe jump" with more than half of their blades touching the ice on take off. That should atleast eliminate overly pre-rotated jumps. If they want to do quad jumps with full blade assist with front take offs that uses the lutz/flip/toe edges/techniques then they should be called a different jump with a totally different base value. Before these additions are made to the rules, russians will keep attempting fake quads (fake in terms of elements that are currently in the hand book) with bad technique.

They are not rotating beautifully because of their strong technique, they are "rotating" the jumps because they are jumping elements not yet recognized by the handbook. A "Quad lutz with edge take off" for example could be added as "triple lutz with edge and front take off" and have the same bv as a 3A. This will both acknowledge their effort and at the same time wont reward them for doing the jump wrong.

 

[wakuwaku]

Everyone could see there was something wrong with her technique, yet she was fully rewarded for her tiny, efficient jumps, because she didn't underrotate as much

She URed constantly and her jumps is tiny - therefore they didn't get high GOE even if judges didn't nortice her URs. I wouldn't call that 'fully rewarded'.

But since the judges don't pay attention to the take-off, I think you are right, it would be stupid to teach real toe-pick technique these days, seeing that the other technique is more efficient.

Exactly.

Satoko's landings on underrotated jumps (UR on the landing) were always beautiful. That's probably why she escaped calls so much times.

Not all underrotated jumps (on the landing) are ugly.

No, I don't agree. As I said above - her jumps are too tiny exactly because they are URed. And because of low height - they never were getting high GOEs. Contrary to prerotated Trusova's 4Lzs, for example. While I agree that landing is most important - height and distance is important to almost the same degree. Which can't be said about take off. Why bother with it if it results in huge jump? Do not mix means of attaining result (take off technique) with the result (high beautiful jump). Result is what matters - not means to attain it.

They are not rotating beautifully because of their strong technique, they are "rotating" the jumps because they are jumping elements not yet recognized by the handbook.

There aren't any definitions of jumps in the handbook. Classic lutz is 'not yet recognized' by it just as well, for example.

russians will keep attempting fake quads (fake in terms of elements that are currently in the hand book) with bad technique.

Why russians? Alysa Liu and Mia Kalin are jumping even 'worse' quads in terms of technique. What about men's quads? Do you claim only russian men are jumping 'fake' quads? What about first officially recognized by ISU quad lutz by Brendon Mroz - did you see it? How they can recognize such fake quad - and if they did - maybe it's not that fake after all?

Lurking through the discussion and I think all they need to do is add to the hand book that a jump must not be assisted by the blade when its supposed to be a toe jump (this is my pet peeve with the quadsters). It just doesn't make sense when they're attempting a "toe jump" with more than half of their blades touching the ice on take off.

Enforcing any kind of technique in rules is an extremely bad practice and almost never being done in all kinds of sports - for a reason. It's akin to forbidding sprinters to run from crouched position or forbidding going over plank by backside in high jumping - because classic technique in those kinds of sport was different. All that minutiae pickiness will do is hinder any progress - that's all.

But I don't see the exact distance of a jump performed by a long jumper either, and yet I care about every centimeter and so do the judges.

Judges don't care - in figure skating. Why do you care then?

. But I'm not going to accept the same for lutzes and flips when 40% of male skaters show us that these jumps can be performed with substantially less prerotation.

Are you sure that exactly 40%? What about female skaters triples? Doubles? How many skaters of both genders are jumping prerotated 3Lzs? I believe that number is close to 90% or higher. If so - should the rules be oriented on minority instead of majority? As I said before - personally I believe rules should reflect what's going on with contemporaries here and now - not what was standart 30 or 100 years ago. You can say that it was going to teach (forcibly) modern skaters better technique - but you can't prove why it's exactly better either. It's not like it will make jumps higher - see Trusova's or Samarin's quads - they are huge. Better for what? Making performances more consistent or filled with falls? I think rather than being concentrated on single elements - rules should address more actual problems affecting the whole picture. Making figure skating more interesting to watch (for example allowing quads in short for women) and performances more clean. And falls is definitely not going to do it.

 

[YuBluByMe]

I can’t pay my bills so I’m going to go rob a bank. Yeah yeah don’t give me no sass! It doesn’t matter how I got the damn money! The only thing that matters is that I can now make rent!

 

[ju2de2]

Why russians? Alysa Liu and Mia Kalin are jumping even 'worse' quads in terms of technique. What about men's quads? Do you claim only russian men are jumping 'fake' quads? What about first officially recognized by ISU quad lutz by Brendon Mroz - did you see it? How they can recognize such fake quad - and if they did - maybe it's not that fake after all?

Read the title of the topic. Its about Russian Women. Not Russian men? Why should I talk about men in a topic about "who can beat the Russian women"?

Enforcing any kind of technique in rules

You lost me at this. At this point, full blade assist is not just wrong technique, its changing the jump itself. So changing the BV and calling it another jump is the best way to go if russian girls and ANY GIRL wants to jump that way. Call it the 4 Trusova and 4 Scherbakova and make them part of the official jumps. If someone is jumping a jump closer to a 4s or 3a and getting bv's for a quad flip/lutz + getting goe for that wrong jump then there is something wrong with the judging.

forbidding sprinters to run from crouched position or forbidding going over plank by backside in high jumping

Why are you even comparing it to sports where technique/body position has no written base values/difficulty level? Compare it to sports such as gymnastics or diving where every body position has a corresponding difficulty point.

 

[wakuwaku]

Why should I talk about men in a topic about "who can beat the Russian women"?

Because potential rule changes which you proposed will affect both genders and making statements proving your point - based on data belonging only to half of skaters is logical fallacy? For fairness sake though this whole discussion about jumps do not belong here at all - but it's hard to stop when you constanty read statements you know how to refute )

Why are you even comparing it to sports where technique/body position has no written base values/difficulty level? Compare it to sports such as gymnastics or diving where every body position has a corresponding difficulty point.

The only problem is - there aren't 'body positions' in ISU rules concerning jumps (definitions of jumps aren't there). They are pretty much free to interpret. Noone knows how Alois Lutz jumped his jump exactly - it was only vague description. If we omit the fact that it doesn't even matter in modern skating since those first jumps were created as single jumps only - they never meant to be multirotational.

You lost me at this. At this point, full blade assist is not just wrong technique, its changing the jump itself. So changing the BV and calling it another jump is the best way to go if russian girls and ANY GIRL wants to jump that way. Call it the 4 Trusova and 4 Scherbakova and make them part of the official jumps. If someone is jumping a jump closer to a 4s or 3a and getting bv's for a quad flip/lutz + getting goe for that wrong jump then there is something wrong with the judging.

About so called 'full blade assist' artificial term - I remember I've read very detailed analysis about it here year or two ago. So I bothered to search - and here we are:
1) https://www.goldenskate.com/forum/t...s-figure-skating.80152/page-1039#post-2577405
2) https://www.goldenskate.com/forum/t...ow-quads-in-the-sp.85030/page-11#post-2582040
with pics and video examples. There is only clause 3 I agree with though. The guy is definitely dedicated Anna's fan - so all that edges discussion would be beside the point. Nevertheless, he answered concerning 'blade assist' better than I would - so I decided to just quote him. Indeed it would be very much hypocritical of ISU judges to take responsibility of physicists in making assumtions about exact force points distribution in skate blade during take off analysis. Because when something touching the ice - it doesn't mean it transfers its weight on it. Meaning that difference between toe jumps and edge jumps in relation to what part of blade just touches the ice and what part uses it as point of force to generate lifting moment -can be determined by physicists in laboratory environment - not judges, who just don't have time to analyse take offs anyway. Because toe touches the ice very noticeable during axels and loops take off - does it mean that they are toe jumps? By your logic - it does. Anyway - that's only matters if you don't take into account the fact that majority of jumps labeled as 'blade assisted' do not touches the ice by blade at all - there is just very little distance between blade and ice which those who calls it as 'fake jumps' - prefer to not notice.
If you are still not convinced - that's fine. We will agree to disagree then ) But similar rule changes ISU already tried to implement last season silently (if you didn't know) - after which those changes were reverted quickly and transferred to voting part of congress. Which means there are enough doubts among ISU members/officials about these rule changes validity. In other words - it's not only my opinion )

Because in general I care about the boundaries of what is possible for humans to do. I care about how far can humans jump, how high they jump, how fast they run, how fast they swim, etc. I wish measuring the exact number of rotations performed in the air was a part of the judging process for jumps in FS.

Ok, fair enough. Still, I hope you realize that there are lots of people who do not care about 'air rotations' nor think they are that important.

 

[ju2de2]

About so called 'full blade assist' artificial term

As many people have stated, if thats how its look at then why bother classifying the jumps and giving them different base values? What is the difference between all the jumps then? Isn't it body positions? The part of the blade used to take off, inside/outside edge, how many rotation they do, how they land. Toe jumps vs. edge jumps? Or is that artificial too and only made up by the coaches? Obviously you are too sentimental about your favorites to think that whichever change is suggested, it will be for everyone (not a plot against russians). And yes they can add the same "new elements" for the mens, nothing wrong with that.

6 recognized jumps is too limiting anyway for the sport specially in the long program. The sport is evolving in the sense that new types of jumps are being utilized. Up to you if you want to accept that or not. I dont understand why that is so difficult for you to accept, when the basic things taught in jumping is edge vs. toe jumps.

 

[wakuwaku]

As many people have stated, if thats how its look at then why bother classifying the jumps and giving them different base values? What is the difference between all the jumps then? Isn't it body positions? The part of the blade used to take off, inside/outside edge, how many rotation they do, how they land. Toe jumps vs. edge jumps? Or is that artificial too and only made up by the coaches?

Only the term "full blade assist" is artificial. And it's made by fans, not coaches. Everything else you mentioned is valid. I just pointed out false information, that's all.

Obviously you are too sentimental about your favorites to think that whichever change is suggested, it will be for everyone (not a plot against russians).

You don't even know what my favorites are, do you? ) No, I am not sentimental - I just don't like ideological lies. And in term "full blade assist" - only one word is true. Blade. Some part (less than half) of it definitely touches the ice during prerotation. That's all. 'Full' is blatant lie as I've never seen any toe jump - be it prerotated or not - utilizing the whole blade surface during take off. There is always noticeable air gap between blade and ice during prerotation on toe jumps. 'Assist' is just an assumption - not a fact. Part of blade touching the ice is unavoidable consequence of prerotation. Whether blade assisting to toe force point or not - I very much doubt people who made up that term are qualified physicists to make such claim. And even if there is assistance - people have the same right to call triple axels 'toe assisted' since toe catching on ice plays important role in triple axels take off (and that technique is very different from classic double axels utilizing mostly edge - i.e. it's also modern optimized technique). Yet we didn't hear the term 'full toe assisted' or 'fake' triple axels, didn't we? Maybe because the reason for such labeling is political/ideological and have nothing to do with objective technique critique or desire to preserve presumably important 'classic' ways of jumping?

basic things taught in jumping is edge vs. toe jumps

Ah, that's why I often hear that salchov is very similar to toeloop? Ok )

6 recognized jumps is too limiting anyway for the sport specially in the long program. The sport is evolving in the sense that new types of jumps are being utilized.

If prerotated more than it was in old times jumps qualifies as new type of jump in your book - than ok, there are definitely lots of new jumps can be made. I doubt ISU would want it, though ) They allowed to jump salchov with two legs instead of one, for example, (basically admitting optimization of classic technique) and didn't make any new type of jump from that. And jumping with two legs or with one - is definitely more radical change in my book than any degree of prerotation.

 

[Lzbee]

I know there's a lot of people including skaters saying that full blade assist doesn't exist and it's true the usual targets of the pre-rotation discussions don't do this but look at the screenshot below. That's not an axel jump or a loop or a Salchow but her blade looks pretty parallel to the boards to me. (I think it's a flip but it could be a bad Lutz)

Whether this actually makes the jump easier is a different discussion but some skaters do drop the whole blade onto the ice on toe jumps.

 

[AxelLover]

Only the term "full blade assist" is artificial. And it's made by fans, not coaches.

I think you're right about this, the term "full blade assist" is misleading. But the technique that this term is used for is not an artificial problem. I remember at least two famous coaches talking about this. Doug Haw said on TSL that Plushenko's lutzes were actually loops. Evgeni Rukavitsin talks in this interview about lutz techniques and uses the term "hidden loop".

 

[wakuwaku]

Whether this actually makes the jump easier is a different discussion but some skaters do drop the whole blade onto the ice on toe jumps.

Interesting. Who is this skater, at what competition and timecode in video the shot was taken from?

I remember at least two famous coaches talking about this. Doug Haw said on TSL that Plushenko's lutzes were actually loops. Evgeni Rukavitsin talks in this interview about lutz techniques and uses the term "hidden loop".

And if we are going to quote opinions of people with authority - it means there aren't any other arguments left besides that. I can quote Mishin's book on jumps technique also - where he claims that having halfturn prerotation is natural for all jumps - and what next then? Which prestige is higher?
Coaches are still not judges or technical specialists. Some even don't know the rules properly. They can have their own strong opinion - which still can be different from judges opinion. Even among judges there are different opinions about the same topics. One monogenous canonical view of all skating issues do not exist even within ISU - that's why they have periodical congress with voting system. So one's authority doesn't mean much in that constantly changing environment.

 

[nussnacker]

Coaches are still not judges or technical specialists. Some even don't know the rules properly. They can have their own strong opinion - which still can be different from judges opinion.

Would also add that athletes themselves sometimes say how “there’s prerotation of some athletes that isn’t addressed by the judges”, while it’s themselves who are “guilty” of having said prerotation.
For example, Javi. I remember Daniel Grassl said that he agrees that prerotation needs to be punished, but he himself isn’t worried since he doesn’t have that problem.
Like… to me it looks like they all understand something completely different under that term compared to internet fans.

 

[Lzbee]

Interesting. Who is this skater, at what competition and timecode in video the shot was taken from?

The skater is Maiia Khromykh and I think she was skating at the Russian cup. Video is below. Screenshot was taken from 5.03 in the slow mo section.

 

[ju2de2]

She didnt even try. Scherbakova does the same with her lutz/flip.

 

[icetug]

I can quote Mishin's book on jumps technique also - where he claims that having halfturn prerotation is natural for all jumps - and what next then?

Please do it. I wish to know his exact words, in Russian.

Coaches are still not judges or technical specialists. Some even don't know the rules properly.

Seriously? It's rather bold claiming, especially for those who coach the highest-level skaters. If a coach doesn't know basic rules - and those for jumps are the most basic - they should stop coaching.

Of course, some coaches prefer to NOT stick to the rules. Some prefer to stretch the rules as long as it's tolerated by judges. A pick in lutz jump should be used to vault into the air, like here: https://youtu.be/Gi7vzRlGJ5g?t=231. When a skater uses a pick only to pretend a take off while in fact slides on a full blade, turns forward and takes off after that - it's an error and should be considered as so. I don't know if taking off from a full blade is easier than from a pick, but I'm sure it's easier to make a half turn less in the air.

 

[nussnacker]

She didnt even try. Scherbakova does the same with her lutz/flip.

This is the attitude that I consider to be really gross. “She didn’t even try”. Do you know that?
It’s the attitude of people who don’t understand how sport works, how athletes are trained and drilled into certain things since childhood.

listen, I’m not going to pretend that Maiia is an excellent jumper. Her jumping leaves a lot to be desired.
I’m pretty sure when a kid is enrolled into his first figure skating classes at 3-4 years old, when the kid starts learning singles and doubles, not every coach that takes them is thinking “I’m coaching a future Olympic champion, I have to diligently correct every mistake or imperfection they have”. Most coaches of those beginner levels don’t care as much about the canonical technique, and they don’t think this might an issue, because 99% of the kids they teach don’t end up ever competing at such high level, where it is an issue. “The kid’s jumping is a little weird? He doesn’t take in my advice the first time I said it? Well, whatever, don’t want to repeat it again, it is what it is.”

Have you ever taken any classes ever? I have, and I can tell, that most teachers aren’t very dedicated to correct everything you do wrong, they just let it happen. When learning piano, my teacher used to correct my fingers at first (since I didn’t follow what’s in the book as a kid), but she quickly gave up, and I kept playing with wrong finger placement for a long time, which became a problem in higher levels for me. But fixing that is not comparable to trying to fix various technical issues in sport.


Later on, for jumping specifically, those issues become a lot harder to fix, practically impossible because of muscle memory over 10 years of jumping a certain way. There are very rare cases where significant changes happen, but saying it is a change that is easy and could happen for everyone is false.

Here is where a coach at a high level and an already elite athlete have to make a choice: spend years and invest a lot of time into something that isn’t even punished by the rules simply because of fans on the internet or for aesthetic purposes, put your career back several years and risk everything, knowing this adventure might not even lead to any success
OR
work with what we have and try to make the most of it, fix what it is possible to fix without putting other elements of their skating into detrimental state.

P.S. side note, even if coaches are super dedicated to teach a kid that canonical technique, it still might not happen. Depends on physical and mental factors, depends on raw talent and connection between an athlete and a coach. Good example of this is Alferova, mom of Veronika and Aliona Zhilina. These girls don’t have the same jumping technique and Veronika’s is superior, but you could hardly blame the mother that she didn’t try enough for her other daughter. Clearly she did, and it still didn’t help.

I can’t stress enough how wrong it is to judge athlete’s character and personal qualities or motivations based on their technique. There’s no malicious intent or an attempt to “cheat” behind their techniques. Maiia is clearly a very hardworking girl, she had so many upsetting performances over the years, even humiliating words thrown at her by journalists, but she never gave up and kept going. She’s one of Russia’s top ladies precisely because she’s a hardworking girl. She’s not perfect, and further from perfect than some other athletes, who have perfect technique. But it isn’t fair to put blame and character flaws on her for “not trying”.

 

[Lzbee]

Yeah I knew reactions may not be the kindest when I posted the screenshot hence why I didn't initially put a name to it. Just to be clear, I don't want any hate towards Maiia. Her technique may not be the best but this kind of thing is not even hinted at in the rules anywhere so I'm sure you'll see much more of this as you go lower down the ranks.

(Also, I don't think Anna used to do this. Her recent jumps have been looking slightly more iffy but previously, she dropped her blade quite low but you could always see a gap between the back of her blade and the ice.)

 

[ju2de2]

We are not talking about some skating rink in a little russian town. She is competing at a nationals level and getting merits for this type of jump. How do you expect her to try when her scores reflect the opposite of her element? That is what's gross here. As many have said, theres endless Russian women who can replace the current top women. It won't hurt their national team if they demerited jumps like this and gave merits to women with better jump techniques.

I never talked about her personality or her character and i don't have some kind of vendetta against her. It's not that deep.

 

[nussnacker]

We are not talking about some skating rink in a little russian town. She is competing at a nationals level and getting merits for this type of jump. How do you expect her to try when her scores reflect the opposite of her element? That is what's gross here. As many have said, theres endless Russian women who can replace the current top women. It won't hurt their national team if they demerited jumps like this and gave merits to women with better jump techniques.

I never talked about her personality or her character and i don't have some kind of vendetta against her. It's not that deep.

I tried to explain how she, or Shoma, or Daniel Grassl, or any other athlete with such flaws arrived to where they are. That it isn’t due to “not even trying” or anything else of that sort.
Her scores don’t reflect the opposite of her element, that’s the point. She’s getting merits because it is allowed by the current rule set up. Please point a finger when any skater ever in history of figure skating was punished for prerotation or full blade. Keep in mind, this isn’t a problem that appeared with her, this has been something we’ve seen for decades.
Has it ever happened that someone got a prerotation call? Does a case like that even exist? If not, why should she be singled out?
If punishing prerotation and full blades was a common practice and she was the one, who’s not punished at all, then yes, I would agree that she should be held to the same standards as everyone else. That’s not the case here.

I don’t mind if the rules change and it becomes punishable. If ISU sees this as necessary, then it’s only fair to do so. But until it is, there’s no case to label this as unfair treatment.

 

[wakuwaku]

Scherbakova does the same with her lutz/flip.

No, she don't. Or are you implying that Lzbee

I know there's a lot of people including skaters saying that full blade assist doesn't exist and it's true the usual targets of the pre-rotation discussions don't do this

is a lier too?

The skater is Maiia Khromykh and I think she was skating at the Russian cup.

I see. Well, that's isn't looking good - I admit. I didn't expect to see it - so consider me surprised ) Still, it didn't cancel the fact that usual targets of 'full blade assist' rant like Trusova or Shscherbakova - don't do it like Maia at all. If they focused their critique on real offenders - I wouldn't be so opposed to it. I really hate lie, that's all.

Please do it. I wish to know his exact words, in Russian.

В однотипном тройном прыжке на долю безопорной фазы приходится около 2,25 оборота, оставшиеся три четверти оборота распределяются между толчком и приземлением приблизительно так: 180° при отрыве и 90° при приземлении.
https://www.tulup.ru/articles/35/tehnika_troynih_prigkov.html
It's about typical triple jumps. For quads he wrote mostly theory since it was written many years ago (1976). I remember there was more about air rotations - but it's hard to search in all these walls of text. Pics of lutz there as examples, - is obviously displayed in classic technique though - since most skaters then jumped like this. But he didn't write about lutz number of rotations. However Mishin was the coach who gave prerotated lutz technique to Plushenko - so he obviosly based that on his own theory.

 

[AxelLover]

However Mishin was the coach who gave prerotated lutz technique to Plushenko

I'm not saying this is not true, but are you sure about this? Mishin wasn't Plushenko's first coach, I believe Plushenko went to Mishin when he was already 11 or 12 years old. I'm just curious to know.