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- Feb 17, 2010
What time do practice sessions start at worlds when the skaters perform in the morning?
2018 Olympic Figure Skating in the Morning
- Thread starter brens78
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What time do practice sessions start at worlds when the skaters perform in the morning?
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- Nov 29, 2015
Ah exceptionalism. I wonder if the next time there're OG in Europe if they'll demand the event be held in the dead of the night? At least it's the same for all athletes and they know in advance so they can try and adapt.
around 6:30 / 07:00 in the morning according to the schedule they had in Boston this year
The morning practices at Boston started between 6.30 and 7.30. The earliest I can remember ever is back before minimum scores were introduced and fields were bigger, and sometimes practices had to start at 5.30~. So if you factor in 5 or 6 warm up groups, that's 3 hours for practice, plus an hour for ice resurfacing during practice, then at least an hour for turnaround between the end of practice and the start of the event (clearing the building of anyone watching practice, and then admitting all the spectators, which will take a while due to security checks). So if they want a 10am start for the competition, practice has to be done by 9am, which means that it must start by 5. But of course, for the skaters in the first warm up group, they have to be at the rink long before that, because they will be warming up for at least 30 minutes before practice starts. Plus then there is travel time from the village to the rink (no idea how long to count for this...), but realistically if you are in the first warm up group, you have to be waking up at 3am. I've seen all the comments that they are already adjusting to a new timezone, but even with that, it's super hard to get your body to override its natural tendency to wake & sleep with natural light and darkness. The other option might be to have final practice in the evening before each event? But this is so different to how skaters are used to competing, and I do think it is unfair that skaters preparing for the most important event of their lives have to make so many changes to their usual routine just so NBC have the option of showing parts of it live - you know they won't be bothering to show all of it even with this proposal, and yet all the skaters have to suffer!
In that Boston 2016 schedule, the Ladies SP (the event with possibly the highest number of competitors?)... was the first competition of the day at 12:10pm on Thursday, with practices starting at 7:00am.
In Helsinki, the Ladies SP is currently scheduled to start about 2 hours earlier than Boston, at 10:15am... so will practices start at 5:00am?!
I realise there is a practice rink at Hartwall, and I guess that might allow parallel practice sessions - but would the skaters be happy to practice there... and then skate on "different ice" for the competition later?! Did they have to do that in Boston?!
Yes, this ^
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Well, looking at the schedules of Worlds 2014 and 2015, it doesn't seem like scheduling competitions in the morning is such a radically new idea. And a lot of the practices took place at the practice rinks. I'm not saying that such a schedule doesn't totally suck for the skaters in the first groups, but it's not like someone invented before-sunrise-practices just for the next Olympics
I'm just not going to pretend that the skaters are actually a priority for the organizers
not saying I like it
I'm just not going to pretend that the skaters are actually a priority for the organizers
not saying I like it
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- Jul 9, 2014
Yes, I was part of the opening ceremonies in 1984 and they were definitely in Broad Daylight. We had white flags for dress rehearsal and the director of the broadcast from "ABC" told our director that our flags were not filming well and when he saw the cut, they called some studio and our flags were taken, lined with gold lame' and we got them back about an hour before we performed. We were last and It was actually early evening when we hit the field and it was dark (In the stadium) or close to it when the torch was lit. In fact you can see in the video that the stadium lights are on. Here's some behind the scene's dirt. There were only 10 guys in the entire cast of 380. However, the costumer had made skirts for the girls and pants for the boys. ABC took one look at them and said he didn't like the way it looked and said "Put them all in Pants" Several of the girls quit and our next rehearsal was spent fixing all holes in formations. It took 8 hours......
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tLLjWidoSTk
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This is true, but I also remember skaters saying it affected their performances at both events - in Japan the traffic and distance between the rink and hotel meant that skaters were up super early and then had to try to nap at the rink between practice & event because there wasn't the time to go back & forth. I don't know where the skaters are staying during the Olympics, the rink is in the coastal cluster, over 2 hours away from the village, but even if they are in Gangneung itself, you still have to factor in travel time.
And even in your examples, you don't see practice before 6.30am. But I can't see how that can be done with the proposed schedule in 2018, particularly as security will be stricter than at Worlds, so you need to allow more time for turn around between the end of practice and the start of the event.
Yes, like I said, I agree that it sucks for those in the early groups and that it will most likely not enhance performances. I'm not trying to argue that this is an awesome idea. But unfortunately I can totally see how the TV people go to the organizers and say "look, they start competitions at Worlds early all the time, so we want this too to accommodate our broadcasting schedule"
I'm just not surprised that they're more inclined to cater to the guys who bring in the money, that's all.
Yes, I was part of the opening ceremonies in 1984 and they were definitely in Broad Daylight. We had white flags for dress rehearsal and the director told of the broadcast "ABC" told our director that our flags were not filming well and when he saw the cut, they called some studio and our flags were taken, lined with gold lame' and we got them back about an hour before we performed. We were last and It was actually early evening when we hit the field and it dark (In the stadium) or close to it when the torch was lit. In fact you can see in the video that the stadium lights are on. Here's some behind the scene's dirt. There were only 10 guys in the entire cast of 380. However, the costumer had made skirts for the girls and pants for the boys. ABC took one look at them and said he didn't like the way it looked and said "Put them all in Pants" Several of the girls quit and our next rehearsal was spent fixing all holes in formations. It took 8 hours......
Maybe they should have put everybody in skirts!
- Joined
- Mar 3, 2014
The timing of the FS has Jackson B. Squat to do with American exceptionalism and pushiness.
It's got 100% to do with American greenbacks.
Don't like the time? Get your favorite company in some other country to pay the equivalent of *hundreds and hundreds* of *millions* of dollars for broadcasting rights and I guarantee it will be on that country's time schedule.
I don't like the schedule, or that I probably won't see small country skaters I love like Julian Yee. But it's all about the benjamins. Ain't capitalism grand?
It's got 100% to do with American greenbacks.
Don't like the time? Get your favorite company in some other country to pay the equivalent of *hundreds and hundreds* of *millions* of dollars for broadcasting rights and I guarantee it will be on that country's time schedule.
I don't like the schedule, or that I probably won't see small country skaters I love like Julian Yee. But it's all about the benjamins. Ain't capitalism grand?
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- Jul 9, 2014
That's what they said at first and it created a HUGE Backlash!! Including from me. I had given up a good paying job in order to be a part of the group and there were other boys who had traveled all the way to LA from as far away as Japan to be part of the cast. It would have been unfair to them (As this was not a paying gig) to have traveled all that way at their own expense, just to be told there were no longer part of the cast. There were several debates on the subject. I remember suggesting that the boys should just wear Kilts the girls could stay in skirts. Several Marching Bands wear kilts and I thought it would have been cool. Here's Granada Hills High School, Where Bibi Liang went to school. This School is right across the street from CSUN, where I went to college and where I met tiny, talented, and sweet Bibi. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OgM5U5hlwB8
If you look right in the center of the flags, you can see the "Captain" who just happens to be a boy (Hint, his vest has no white border). However, with the hats that we wore in the Olympic Ceremony, you would never have know he was there. I bet some people never knew, even though they were only a few steps away on the side of the street. You'd never have noticed him on a football field with a hat on, surrounded by 300 people in the same costume.
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- Joined
- Jul 9, 2014
This is Completely True!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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- Oct 9, 2011
A side issue I'm really upset about is that NBC has American TV broadcast rights through 2032, so ABC/ESPN could not have a stab at broadcasting the Olympic Games again until then if they were smart enough to buy the rights .... and seeing if they could provide more coverage on TV as they did in the "good old days". Growing up and watching the Olympics on ABC and Wide World of Sports and when CBS had broadcast rights briefly... I feel the actual broadcast of figure skating wasn't as edited as much as NBC's coverage nowadays. Everything has changed, and there are DVRs and livestreaming.... I have memories of seeing completely unknown skaters in the early rounds of the men's or ladies' competitions on ABC. Networks around the globe can't please everyone. And unfortunately NBC will have the American TV broadcast rights for the next 16 years, so we'll never see another network's take on it until 2032 or if the IOC decides to fire NBC...which I don't think is likely.
Will be interesting how they cover it in Australia as February is the traditional start to the ratings period and since South Korea is only an hour behind the East Coast, I'm wondering if we'll get delayed coverage or the network will put them on their secondary free to air channels? Sochi, Vancouver, Torino and Nagano were all live, Salt Lake had some live and delayed.
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- Jan 1, 2013
The Olympics, Winter or Summer, ARE ratings. No show that Seven has could beat it for ratings. The ratings season will not matter.
What WILL matter is that Seven are a bunch of greedy you-know-whats and are refusing to share with Foxtel. Instead, they will have live coverage during the "day" (in Korea time), but will heavily bias towards the "popular" sports (so a lot of snowboarding), and the rest will go behind their paywall (like they did for Rio). And I am not at all convinced that the skating will stay out from behind the paywall.
I refused to buy their app for Rio and I was furious every time they showed the "LIVE AND FREE" logo or said those words, because they were blatant lies.
In my opinion each country who organizes e.g. the Winter Olympics must have a say at what time the various events are being held and definitely not because of what might be convenient for USA... That is way too demanding, considering also their east and west coast.
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What irked me with the Rio coverage was the constant switching events between 7, 7TWO and 7Mate or moving something onto the app when you were getting into it and only to discover, be stung by saying if you're not a Telstra customer, $20 please!!! The timezone wasn't a big deal for me of course, you deal with it, but knowing 7, they'll annoy ppl in 2018 and 2020 somehow 
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