2016 US Nationals Senior Ladies SP

[topaz emerald]

Agreed. Except unfortunately Polina's jumps are eeked out. For 5'8 she is remarkable but on the international stage she gets killed because....slo-mo shows ur. She barely gets her rotations in even with with her exceptional technique. It is a shame.

I just think Polina gets picked on. Every other girls' jumps can be scrutinized closely too. It is a shame judges gave her that reputation of the girl with under-rotated jumps, when in fact, they are super clean most of the time. Because that's what they will always look at now at her next competitions. When you watch her competitions against the international ladies, they penalize every little thing about her. I really think international judges purposefully knock her down because she is seen as a threat to the russian ladies. Not too long ago, not too many ladies could do the triple lutz triple loop with ease like Yuna Kim...that was considered the most difficult combo jump....Polina does it with ease. Yuna Kim took advantage of that combo jump against the GREAT Mao Asada time and time again. A lot of the Russian ladies and even the Japanese combo jumps are shaky, except for Evgenia Medvedeva.

 

[Lexiglass]

Except ... pretty much every announcer at the all of these events says you can't afford to have major errors in the short program. I believe this was for the old and new judging systems. To the average contender, such errors are devastating, score-wise. And you can't explain those mistakes away.

Their mistakes were big and they did cost them - they should be well ahead of skaters like Mirai and Tyler, not neck and neck. If they had skated those short programs at worlds it would have taken them out of medal contention. But this wasn't the worlds level competition - and almost everyone underperformed. I'm just saying, looking at the protocols, I honestly don't think they were unfairly gifted (at least, under the current rules. I do think that the rules don't necessarily penalize mistakes suifficisntly but that's a seperate point). Do you not see a difference between Ashley and Gracie's programs (both construction and skill in delivery) and most of the rest of the field?

 

[havefun]

Let the Polina hating begin

It's just the short program folks.

On the contrary people lov her She is gorgeous, but nationally her urs don't get called which sets her up for disappointment internationally Slo-mo her jumps She has good technique, is very very good at cheating her jumps. She lands on the toe of her blade, which makes it difficult to detect the ur. it is also the reason she doest go in with speed. To a larger degree Sam Cesario had the same problem Unfortunately the IJS is unforgiving.

 

[VIETgrlTerifa]

I wasn't looking forward to reading the PBP after-the-fact because I expected to see some bitter Polina bitching, and got what I expected. All the talk about her being majorly overscored or whatever doesn't change the fact that Wagner and Gold had mental issues competing and have shown that time and time again. It's not her fault that they seriously failed to deliver. All the talk of this being the worst Nationals ever if Polina wins is just poor sportsmanship.

On a personal note, I think I'm seriously confused over why Gold and Wagner have such die-hards where they cry every time they throw away a golden opportunity (which happens regularly). I guess I don't get it because people act like they're the next coming of Michelle Kwan or even Sasha Cohen, when I don't think they're that good to warrant such blind devotion and need to tear down a "lesser" skater who brought it and deservedly beats them even if that skater isn't as skilled or talented. It's not as if their level is a Patrick Chan level of unreachable for a skater of Polina's skills to overtake. Polina is slow and telegraphs jumps, but Ashley's skating skills still need work and she's been criticized by fans for a long time about lack of transitions, which she improved this season, but it took her to the age of 25 and she still falls, URs, or double foots on jumps on the regular. Polina is 17 and has UR problems (but people overstate it a bit as she has had competitions where her combos and solo triples HAVE been called clean when she does them aggressively and well, like she did with this SP, as opposed to eeking them out), but she's not given the latitude that Wagner's been given all because she's a fan favorite and people like her diva persona or whatever. Gold has world-class quality skating skills and the goods to be competitive for the top step of the World podum but she's shown that she does not have the mental strength to compete and she's showing some technical issues with her Flip and her double axel is small can be a bit squeaky. Even if Wagner and Gold come back in the LP, it'll be the same story. Even them medaling at Worlds won't make them the pillars of competitive mental strength either as we'll be worried about the same stuff happening from now till Pyongchang.

It would be pretty sad if Gone with the Wind ends up being enough to make Polina National Champion, as I hate that program (and I loved her 2014 one and defended her Tinkerbell). That said, I don't think Ashley and Gracie's programs are all that great either nor would their programs losing to GWTW would be some sort of injustice or travesty that skating fans have to experience.

 

[da96103]

My medallists for the SP

Bronze medal: Gracie and Ashley for underperforming AGAIN.

Silver medal: Polina's great SP skate.

And Gold medal goes to:

MIRAI NAGASU'S BOOTS

 

[Maribelle]

I watched the whole short program live and came away thinking that the US doesn't not have a lot of depth in the ladies skaters. I was impressed with Tyler Pierce, Polina.. but aren't there supposed to b some up and comer breakout stars? The level of skating from most of the skaters was not so great as other nationals I have seen. I was really hoping Mirai would skate well, but she seemed a bit slow on the ice. Some of the skaters have better skating skills and speed. Overall I feel worried about where US Figure Skating is goign to go from here. I hope the top ranked ladies can do a good job.

 

[shaneb]

Kristi Yamaguchi won gold in the 1992 Albertville games, FYI. How could you confuse that with the Lillehammer Olympics in 1994? That was the year of the Nancy/Tonya saga, that for all intended purposes help propel figure skating into mainstream media resulting in some profitable golden years. Also, all this talk about over scoring and moving new talent up to give them a chance internationally....please, who?!? No one performed any better in terms of what it takes to get on the podium internationally. So it is what it is at this point. Skating is difficult, and expensive. Russian skating programs are funded by government, enabling them to harvest tremendously more talent because economic and social status factors are not taken into account. We as a country got spoiled with some very consistent and well rounded skaters in the past decade or so. Namely, Michelle Kwan. But never in the history of the new scoring system have we had any skaters with such success. Michelle didn't even score well after the 6.0 system. Even Kristi, as great of a skater she is....had a performance at the 1992 games that everyone in this chat room would ridicule today. Its just that the field overall wasn't as strong as it is today internationally on a technical standpoint back then. And in terms of Polina, its not the USFSA holding her back as much as it is the international panel of judges. She was scored infinitely higher here than she has ever been at any international competition...like ever...even with similarly performed short programs this season. So really its not our country holding her back, as much as it is for whatever reason, here skating doesn't translate as well outside of the domestic side of the sport and with the associated judges internationally.

 

[havefun]

I just think Polina gets picked on. Every other girls' jumps can be scrutinized closely too. It is a shame judges gave her that reputation of the girl with under-rotated jumps, when in fact, they are super clean most of the time. Because that's what they will always look at now at her next competitions. When you watch her competitions against the international ladies, they penalize every little thing about her. I really think international judges purposefully knock her down because she is seen as a threat to the russian ladies. Not too long ago, not too many ladies could do the triple lutz triple loop with ease like Yuna Kim...that was considered the most difficult combo jump....Polina does it with ease. Yuna Kim took advantage of that combo jump against the GREAT Mao Asada time and time again. A lot of the Russian ladies and even the Japanese combo jumps are shaky, except for Evgenia Medvedeva.

Her jumps do not rotate in the air and come down. i.e. Liza, Courtney Hicks. She (as does Mao Asada, Liptnitskaya, ) have to be reviewed as the rotation is not clear Slo mo her jumps from tonight Don't get me wrong I love her and in her case hate the ur rules She has exquisite edges, lines, technique, presentation. I could watch her all day long but there is a reason she is maxing out internationally.

 

[Skater Boy]

OMG. This competition. Pretty sure even the Canadian ladies can top this.

Okay let's don't get crazy; come on that is just pure mean. These girls are talented; there is a lot of pressure. I can't believe you would suggest such a thing since some of the Canadians can barely do the garbage triples.

 

[topaz emerald]

Kristi Yamaguchi won gold in the 1992 Albertville games, FYI. How could you confuse that with the Lillehammer Olympics in 1994? That was the year of the Nancy/Tonya saga, that for all intended purposes help propel figure skating into mainstream media resulting in some profitable golden years. Also, all this talk about over scoring and moving new talent up to give them a chance internationally....please, who?!? No one performed any better in terms of what it takes to get on the podium internationally. So it is what it is at this point. Skating is difficult, and expensive. Russian skating programs are funded by government, enabling them to harvest tremendously more talent because economic and social status factors are not taken into account. We as a country got spoiled with some very consistent and well rounded skaters in the past decade or so. Namely, Michelle Kwan. But never in the history of the new scoring system have we had any skaters with such success. Michelle didn't even score well after the 6.0 system. Even Kristi, as great of a skater she is....had a performance at the 1992 games that everyone in this chat room would ridicule today. Its just that the field overall wasn't as strong as it is today internationally on a technical standpoint back then. And in terms of Polina, its not the USFSA holding her back as much as it is the international panel of judges. She was scored infinitely higher here than she has ever been at any international competition...like ever...even with similarly performed short programs this season. So really its not our country holding her back, as much as it is for whatever reason, here skating doesn't translate as well outside of the domestic side of the sport and with the associated judges internationally.

are you replying to me?

sorry, I am getting old. Kristi did win in Albertbille. And yes, I remember Tonya Harding and Nancing Kerrigan situation.

Well, Polina did well at her first senior nationals, think she got 2nd place. But after that, I feel USFSA really held her back in favor of Wagner and Gold. She even missed the podium at one point at Nationals...Karen Chen beat her, I couldn't believe it.

 

[Crossover]

This event....

But congrads to Polina for the first place in the SP.

 

[VIETgrlTerifa]

Kristi Yamaguchi won gold in the 1992 Albertville games, FYI. How could you confuse that with the Lillehammer Olympics in 1994? That was the year of the Nancy/Tonya saga, that for all intended purposes help propel figure skating into mainstream media resulting in some profitable golden years. Also, all this talk about over scoring and moving new talent up to give them a chance internationally....please, who?!? No one performed any better in terms of what it takes to get on the podium internationally. So it is what it is at this point. Skating is difficult, and expensive. Russian skating programs are funded by government, enabling them to harvest tremendously more talent because economic and social status factors are not taken into account. We as a country got spoiled with some very consistent and well rounded skaters in the past decade or so. Namely, Michelle Kwan. But never in the history of the new scoring system have we had any skaters with such success. Michelle didn't even score well after the 6.0 system. Even Kristi, as great of a skater she is....had a performance at the 1992 games that everyone in this chat room would ridicule today. Its just that the field overall wasn't as strong as it is today internationally on a technical standpoint back then. And in terms of Polina, its not the USFSA holding her back as much as it is the international panel of judges. She was scored infinitely higher here than she has ever been at any international competition...like ever...even with similarly performed short programs this season. So really its not our country holding her back, as much as it is for whatever reason, here skating doesn't translate as well outside of the domestic side of the sport and with the associated judges internationally.

Michelle Kwan had one competition under IJS and even with not maximizing her score the way she could have or studying the system better she still placed third in the SP and LP portion and that was with what is probably her poorest Worlds LP performance ever. The women were dominating the junior circuit under IJS from 2007-2009 and scored respectively at 2010 Worlds and Olympics. Even Alissa Czisny managed a 5th place finish at Worlds (and was a fall away from bronze) and won GPF in 2011. Ever since then it's been pretty downhill for American women and things don't look like it's going up. It's odd and sad that the coaching hasn't caught up with what the international judges are looking for. There's got to be other reasons as to why the American singles program is suffering internationally (maybe it's funding as a lot of these skaters have to pay for things themselves and costs are going up and money is harder to come by).

Polina recently scored 65+ at Rostelecom Cup for her SP. With Nationals inflation and an even better performance, it was on par. Ashley Wagner scored higher for her Nats SP here than she did at GPF SP (by more than 2 points) and 2015 Worlds (by five points for a similar skate except she had a higher BV at Worlds). Gracie scored on par with what she usually did with a mistake, but she popped a jump here which was pretty bad and still got a 62+.

 

[shaneb]

"And she shouldn't be. If she has a repeat of last year's FS there's probably nothing Edmunds can do even with an 8-point advantage."

This is the kind of sentiment that leads to bad skating. If Ashley has an SP like that at Worlds, she'll be so far behind that she could cost the US a spot. If she's "The Diva" of US skating, then we're doomed. Now, If She wins the Free Program and still finishes 4th. I'd send but, that's the ONLY way she gets to go.

She did in fact perform a short program that was worse than this at worlds last year. It didn't cost the U.S. a spot. You can't make absolute statements about factors that involve, and that have the potential of human error. Ashley isn't the only skater that makes mistakes, and conversely benefits placement wise from other skaters mistakes...yes people place higher and win with a sub par performance because of the mistakes of others. It's called sport. Why condemn because they performed lower than your expectations...?? Who else would you send instead? Because most of the other options performed equally as poor or worse. Just an outside opinion responding to what I find to be flawed logic here.

 

[icellist]

Finally watching the SP:

Polina was very good and polished. Her transition PCS score was too high. Bar the twizzle, there were so many crossovers in her program. And I know she was excited to have a clean SP, but smiling during a Moonlight Sonata does not match. Otherwise, very good and should be 1st. I would have ! her 3F because the angle wasn't correct to view the jump and she was on that edge for such a short time.

The same thing about Polina's flip applies to Gold's flip. I think Tyler should have been 2nd, but was held back in PCS. Gold should have been lower because of the invalid element. Mirai shouldn't have gotten that edge call. (Gold earned almost 6 pts in GOE, Wagner earned about 2.7 (-2.1 from the fall), Mirai earned about 3.8).

I would have the order Polina, Tyler, Ashley, Mirai/Gracie (tied). Gold was held up in PCS, Mirai held down in GOE (edge call), and Tyler held down in GOE and PCS. Wagner's scored was pretty fair and am glad she chose such different SP music compared to everyone else (snoozefest today).

Too bad Tyler isn't strong in the FS. I have some feeling that Gracie and Tyler are going to tank the FS. Mirai get on the podium but be left off the team for Gold. Mirai will get 4CC as consolation and do well at Taipei like she did in 2011.

 

[havefun]

They are not. Her lutz and flip are big and effortless, with textbook picking technique. She underrotates not because her jumps are small - it's the speed of her rotation. And whoever comparing her jumps to Jennifer Robinson is quite ridiculous.

Aaaah thats what I said How ever you want to phrase it Eeking out a jump=not getting rotation in wether u jump high her low. Her long arms likely make it harder to pull in quickly She does exceptionally well for her height.

 

[topaz emerald]

Her jumps do not rotate in the air and come down. i.e. Liza, Courtney Hicks. She (as does Mao Asada, Liptnitskaya, ) have to be reviewed as the rotation is not clear Slo mo her jumps from tonight Don't get me wrong I love her and in her case hate the ur rules She has exquisite edges, lines, technique, presentation. I could watch her all day long but there is a reason she is maxing out internationally.

I think she clearly rotates her jumps. I am not seeing under-rotations. She jumps completely straight in the air, has good height, has very excellent technique, comes down, and lands them. THe only time I feel she under-rotates is when she falls, and she rarely falls.

 

[VIETgrlTerifa]

People hate reputation judging but sure want it when their established faves falter.

 

[Sam-Skwantch]

On the contrary people lov her She is gorgeous, but nationally her urs don't get called which sets her up for disappointment internationally Slo-mo her jumps She has good technique, is very very good at cheating her jumps. She lands on the toe of her blade, which makes it difficult to detect the ur. it is also the reason she doest go in with speed. To a larger degree Sam Cesario had the same problem Unfortunately the IJS is unforgiving.

Is there video for me to run thru the jumpamatron that is HD? Which jumps would you like?

 

[Sugarpova]

just came to work & saw results :eeking:
Congrats Polya tho!
Hopefully Ash will come & slay in the FS! she can!

 

[zschultz1986]

Gracie skates with much more power and speed then Polina does and it makes a big difference in the scores. Polina could be timed with a calender when she goes into her 3-3 combination jumps she telegraphs them so much. She is still slow on the ice compared to the top skaters too.

That's great, let us know when Gracie actually does a Short Program where she gets credit for all of her planned elements. Maybe then I will care. I'm a fan of Gracie's but speed across the ice and power only gets you so far, and when you can't do what is is required to get a relevant score to be in the hunt for a World medal, maybe it's time to stop talking about (the many) strengths of Gracie's skating and start asking her to skate clean short programs.

Good for Mirai for soldering through the boot issue. Jumps looked much better, and I hope they stay that way. Polina was clearly the best here. Ashley and Gracie, as usual, screw the pooch in the short. Now watch them as they pull their typical underdog routine and skate well in the free. Good on Tyler to walk through the door left open by the top names.

It's Polina's championship right now. I'm going to assume Gracie screws up one element in the Long, because she usually does. Ashley is hard to predict. If she's on, it'll be gangbusters. I don't know much about Tyler, so we will see what she's made of in the Long.

Otherwise, it was a rather poor showing from the US Ladies tonight. Please do better on Saturday. Thanks!