Are the present international judges up to the new evaluations that must take place? Should they be tested before they judge?
Will the Troika be chosen from Regional groups? Will their expertise be tested first?
Will the public be aware of any explanations of vote after the contest?
I believe if the above are not addressed, we will be reading the usual "XXX was robbed" and "YYY double footed jumps" and "ZZZ had no feelig for the music". And of course, the winner will be branded with underrotated jumps.
I notice that the prosposal to adopt the CoP must have a two-thirds majority of the entire membership. Since this includes the speedskating representatives, approval is guarenteed no matter what the figure skaters think about it.
I'm really not thrilled that a group of people who do really fast cross-overs are getting involved in the rules that govern figure skating. I also think figure skaters should keep their business out of speed skating.
As a fan of figure skating. I wish we could do something about this. Its just not right, and we shouldn't have to put up with it. I can't even imagine how the figure skaters feel about it. Yet, what can we do that wouldn't make a bad situation worse. My greatest fear is that the powers that be would stop airing figure skating events all together. I mean, we could all start complaining to the sponsors, but then they just might to decide to spend their money elsewhere, leaving us fans high and dry.
I fear we will loose this sport due to imcompetents such as "Speedy". It all goes back to the fact that no matter what rules you govern by, the dishonesty and cheating and overall behavior of the judges has ruined this sport, and until they address that fact, we all loose, especially the athletes.
Someone can correct me on the details, but as I understand it there are four "separate but equal" organizational divisions of the ISU -- figure skating (including ice dancing, although ice dancing has its own Technical Committee), synchronized skating, speed skating, and short track. Short track (Apolo Ono's forte) counts as a different sport than speedskating (big track).
On many routine matters, each sport governs itself. But on the Big Issues they all get to vote. At the last ISU congress Mr. Cinquanta pushed through, against lots of objection from the figure skating side, the idea that the CoP was one of the Big Issues that (somehow) has such a big impact on all ice skating sports that everyone should get to vote. (He also finessed th idea that what was voted on by the delegates as a "experiment," somehow when the formal declarations were written up by the ISU head office, it had morphed into official policy.)
Lots of people complained about this, but to no avail.
I am not sure how all the numbers work out, but if each of the four divisions is equally represented, then fully half of the delegates come from Speedy's own sport.
Formally, the proposal is being made to the entire congress by the three Technical Committees representing Figure Skating, Ice Dancing and Sychronized Skating (I think there is a separate CoP-type propsal for Synchronized Skating, too). Then the whole congress will vote on it.
Cinquanta's rational for this is that the CoP affects the acceptance of the ice skating disciplines in the Olympics, and so the rules changes, although they are only for figure skating, have an impact on speed skating as well.
Here is a link to the latest ISU news release about it.
I think this new system will benefit great skaters, including Michelle for various reasons. A point value is given for each successfully completed element. That is a wonderful idea.