2020-21 Russian Ladies' Figure Skating

[flanker]

It's all fine that junior skaters aren't penalised for being younger. I agree with it. But I would understand the 3A's side if they weren't so happy. Like all that came before them, their PCS was held back too while they were juniors. People talk about how being a junior or senior shoulders even matter, but they forget that it has always been like this and all other skaters have gone through the same.

I'm happy if RusFed is deciding now to not think about age and seniority, but frankly I can't tell if that is what they're doing. Usacheva didn't get the same benefits. Forgive me for being sceptical.

Anyways, this is why PCS does not matter at all. With the inflation and score cap squeeze, by the Olympics all the skaters will have around the same PCS. Not something to rest on.

It's not even two years before when some people were advocating that PCS should play much bigger role in scoring, because, you know, figure skating is not "just about jumping". Now I can read that someone has "quads and 3A, that should play a major role, shouldn't it?" Or that PCS doesn't matter. It's hard to establish what the public demads truly are then, if the claims are so changeable

 

[anonymoose_au]

It's not even two years before when some people were advocating that PCS should play much bigger role in scoring, because, you know, figure skating is not "just about jumping". Now I can read that someone has "quads and 3A, that should play a major role, shouldn't it?" Or that PCS doesn't matter. It's hard to establish what the public demads truly are then, if the claims are so changeable

Well I'd probably assume it's two very different sets of people.

I mean obviously the "Yay! Hard elements" crowd wasn't going to complain when technical stuff was weighted more highly, just as the "Artistry" crowd weren't going to keep quiet at that time.

Perhaps...the ISU is right maybe there does need to be an artistic and technical program...I guess it would be interesting to see what a skater primarily known for their jumps would do in an artistry program with no jumps (it's not quite the same because he still did triples, but I thought Alexander Samarin paid more attention to his step sequences and such at the second stage during his FS). And vice versa. Only problem is, I can't think of a way to score it which wouldn't result in either the best jumper winning all the time, or the best artistic skater winning all the time...

 

[silveruskate]

It's not even two years before when some people were advocating that PCS should play much bigger role in scoring, because, you know, figure skating is not "just about jumping". Now I can read that someone has "quads and 3A, that should play a major role, shouldn't it?" Or that PCS doesn't matter. It's hard to establish what the public demads truly are then, if the claims are so changeable

You misunderstand me. It won't matter because of the way the scoring system is set up. Skaters with already high PCS have nowhere to grow. All that can happen is skaters with lower PCS catch up. No point in even trying to find an advantage from PCS. But for now this is just Russia so who knows.

 

[Alex65]

What would have been the reaction if Tutberidze had said that Trusova getting basically the same pcs than Usacheva in the short and higher pcs in the free is total bs?

I hope those who say "it's normal to call unfair scoring" would have said the same. Because that was unfair.

Usacheva deserved the same treatment than Kostornaya at 2018 jgpf where the girl was given a total advantage of almost 7 points in pcs, 5 points in the free. Skating back to back (on the same music) it was clear imo that Usacheva was the more polished skater (and was clean). She deserved a 5 points lead in pcs in the free.
That was an unfair scoring toward an Eteri's skater.

I don't see the need for Plushy to call anything when his skater won, especially getting generous judging.

Camila gets a well-deserved +5 for her spins. But in terms of skating skills, transitions and difficult steps, she does not have a noticeable superiority over the main part of the field. And she is much inferior in this to Alena, no matter what they say. The aesthetics of her movements are pleasant, this is also indisputable, but it is not the same as the presentation and interpretation of the program.
I will repeat once again about Usacheva's estimates for FP. She was restricted to the РCS solely for political motives in this competition. Valieva should not have lost, but since this happened, the judges made every effort so that she did not end up in third place. You will see that at his next start, Usacheva will receive a full PCS. IMO

 

[flanker]

Well I'd probably assume it's two very different sets of people.

I mean obviously the "Yay! Hard elements" crowd wasn't going to complain when technical stuff was weighted more highly, just as the "Artistry" crowd weren't going to keep quiet at that time.

Perhaps...the ISU is right maybe there does need to be an artistic and technical program...I guess it would be interesting to see what a skater primarily known for their jumps would do in an artistry program with no jumps (it's not quite the same because he still did triples, but I thought Alexander Samarin paid more attention to his step sequences and such at the second stage during his FS). And vice versa. Only problem is, I can't think of a way to score it which wouldn't result in either the best jumper winning all the time, or the best artistic skater winning all the time...

I would be putting words out of my finger if I would say whether it's the same set of people or different. But both cases are (or were) equally loud.

I personally don't want the separation between technical and artistic skates, one of the things that made me a FS fan was precisely the unification of both sides, the artistic and the athletic one. I also wonder how the scoring would look like in the artistic competition. We can have objections about whether the judges or technical panel call or give the proper GOE for the edges, URs etc., but it's still far more objective than the components.
Also, for skating without jumps, we have ice dance. Maybe there could be another category, something like "single ice dance", but I wouldn't change the current model.

You misunderstand me. It won't matter because of the way the scoring system is set up. Skaters with already high PCS have nowhere to grow. All that can happen is skaters with lower PCS catch up. No point in even trying to find an advantage from PCS. But for now this is just Russia so who knows.

PCS is relative to other skaters. If we have a skater, who let's say grew from 7s to 9s, and he competes with another skater, who skated on the same level, you shouldn't keep the other skater low relatively to the first one just because he's just starting on the 9s and he has "nowhere to grow".

 

[plushyfan]

2. Talking about the scores of other skaters publicly. I'm personally annoyed of him mentioning Kamila, when I know from her interviews how much she hates that. I don't want her to be a pawn in these ridiculous coaching powergames

You are so nice, you are a great fan of Kamila and you care about her feelings, what she likes, wha she hates. But you don't care about Sasha's feelings after an incredible amount of work that she has done in recent months! Does she feel she has improved, but do the points show that she has failed to achieve anything in this matter? Do you think that is fair? Probably she is grateful to Plushenko, who spoke out this injustice. It seems only he has guts o talk about it.

 

[silveruskate]

PCS is relative to other skaters. If one skater, who let's say grew from 7s to 9s, but if he competes with another skater, who skated on the same level, you shouldn't keep him low relatively to the first one just because he's just starting on the 9s and he has "nowhere to grow".

We talk about skaters growing and improving, better not to pretend that a lot of PCS is nothing but a reputations game. So that is where my main point about senior/junior skaters comes from. It's just a different kind of reputation bonus. You had Alina/Zhenya at 9+ in the Olympics while Aliona had far superior skating skills a month later at Jr Worlds 2018. What should she get, 11 or 12? If they were already giving 9+ to only the best of the best I would agree with you.

I just understand the confusion when the whole landscape has changed. This one reputation component of junior/senior suddenly disappeared.

 

[Resa]

For any skaters, or people who understand physics of figure skating - does using PR make the jump easier? It does seem unfair to reward someone doing 3 revolutions and 2.25 revolutions the same amount of points, but if both are equally difficult then I guess it doesn't matter save for aesthetics.

I guess minimal prerotation is more difficult since you need to "hurry" to leave the ice soon but still generate enough force and momentum to complete the rotations in the air

 

[Resa]

Transitions only make up a single bullet point and aren’t even necessary to reach +5 GOE. Her lutz absolutely has good height and distance, is effortless throughout, has a good take off and landing, and a good body position throughout. That’s enough for +4 right there, and if it’s with the music she can still theoretically earn +5.

I feel like everyone focuses too much on transitions when talking about how much GOE a jump should get. The bullet point for transitions is a bonus! It’s not supposed to factor in unless the skater has hit the first three bullet points. Clearly it doesn’t work that way in practice but still.

THIS!!!

 

[anonymoose_au]

PCS is relative to other skaters. If one skater, who let's say grew from 7s to 9s, but if he competes with another skater, who skated on the same level, you shouldn't keep him low relatively to the first one just because he's just starting on the 9s and he has "nowhere to grow".

So I went to the ISU.org website to see about this, and found this file: https://isu.org/figure-skating/rules/fsk-regulations-rules/file it talks about scoring PCS on page 82, and the criteria for them. I don't see anything about it been relative to other skaters, it looks like it's supposed to be scored against a mythical skater, who can do all the stated criteria perfectly.

So I guess people are right in saying Plushy is incorrect to say a 14 year old can't receive 10s purely because they're 14, but it's not wrong to say that 10s should be given out very sparingly. When you give a skater a 10 you're basically saying they've reached perfection. This perhaps wouldn't be an issue if judges always marked to the criteria, but it's hard to imagine that a judge who gave a skater a 10 in a category would ever give them less than 10 next time unless they really messed up their program, even if at that particular event they didn't skate a 10 but a 9.5. This could impact the scoring and be the difference between a skater coming first or second or ending up off the podium, not such a big deal at a national competition, but at the Olympics or Worlds it would really mean something.

 

[Skatesocs]

it looks like it's supposed to be scored against a mythical skater, who can do all the stated criteria perfectly.

In theory, yes. This is how it should be. It has never been so in practice.

 

[anonymoose_au]

In theory, yes. This is how it should be. It has never been so in practice.

I wonder why this is so...I guess the fact that judges often judge skaters from their own country has an impact and I guess we can't expect the ISU to try and get judges from countries not competing in the event (for example Euros been made up of judges from non-Euro judges, and 4CC judged by non-4CC judges) since judges need quite a bit of training I imagine.

Even then it probably wouldn't work, like I love Donovan Carillo even though I'm not Mexican and find his performance ability off the scale! Even if I tried really hard, I might still be inclined to give him a higher score than he maybe should. (To say nothing of how I would have scored Plushy )

Ah figure skating...on the one hand I wish you could be scored like running, or swimming, or downhill skiing, but the performance aspect is why it's so compelling. It's a conundrum!

 

[Novalis]

You are so nice, you are a great fan of Kamila and you care about her feelings, what she likes, wha she hates. But you don't care about Sasha's feelings after an incredible amount of work that she has done in recent months! Does she feel she has improved, but do the points show that she has failed to achieve anything in this matter? Do you think that is fair? Probably she is grateful to Plushenko, who spoke out this injustice. It seems only he has guts o talk about it.

You and Alex are both partly correct.

You are correct that I've sounded too harsh on Sasha. You would be surprised to learn that I have probably watched more Sasha's programs than anyone elses over the last three year period. I am a fan of her quads. And cantilever. And personality (she has a charming off ice personality). Sasha is the very best ladies figure in some things, but I think she's also the worst at some other things (out of the top ones). She gets deservedly rewarded for the great things, but she should be further behind with the bad things. Alex was correct when he claimed that Sasha got 34 PCS in SP all of last season, even international judges. I checked and true (well almost), she did. And I was shocked.

I guess I didn't pay enough attention for two reasons. I didn't like her last season's SP, so I often didn't rewatch it (and there's no quads obviously). And her final position was always so clear last season. When she won, she deserved it. When she was third, she deserved it. It never felt like I needed to scrutinize the points. But anyway, they still should not be on so level terms in PCS.

And I'm not just talking about the difference between her and Kamila, but between her and all the other major skaters. Dasha too I think should beat her. Maybe not as clearly, but still. I think there should be a gap in PCS.

 

[Novalis]

You misunderstand me. It won't matter because of the way the scoring system is set up. Skaters with already high PCS have nowhere to grow. All that can happen is skaters with lower PCS catch up. No point in even trying to find an advantage from PCS. But for now this is just Russia so who knows.

I suppose you're correct, and I've been too naive. It will be all about the Tech points. And those are basically all about the jumps.

 

[FelineFairy]

In my opinion, the development from 6.0 to the current scoring system was successful only in the technical respect. The component score is as subjective as before. And I don't think it's the individual choice a judge is making, or that it is their low judging skills. To me it looks more like an instruction to use PCS as a ranging tool instead of an objective scoring tool of each component. And heated discussions are heated just because we all have our favourites. It hurts to see one who appeals to your soul placed below one whose style is not your cup of tea. Sometimes judges do it on purpose, and it's not corruption or ignorance. Does anyone here remember the 70's and 80's in ice dance? It's not about ladies, but I think it can be compared to the changes we see in ladies. There were skaters at that time who (maybe 10 years ahead of their time) started skating to one musical piece instead of several and showing a story on the ice.... But they were not rewarded by ISU, although another pair much later was. What was different? I believe policy, trends, which were generally accepted. As for now, the judges IMHO follow a general policy where the components are not judged separately, also because some of them have no difference from the "artistic impression" score. Introducing an "artistic" programme would make sense for me only if (1) it were a separate medal and (2) there would be a real change in the approach to the scoring. Even then, discussions about performance and interpretation would still be as heated as today.
BTW I'm an international judge in a hobby where the evaluation system is also highly subjective. And the international federation issues bulletins which comment on how this or that aspect of the rules should be applied. And there are heated discussions... And curses thrown at judges... At least we have no coaches LOL!

 

[flanker]

We talk about skaters growing and improving, better not to pretend that a lot of PCS is nothing but a reputations game. So that is where my main point about senior/junior skaters comes from. It's just a different kind of reputation bonus. You had Alina/Zhenya at 9+ in the Olympics while Aliona had far superior skating skills a month later at Jr Worlds 2018. What should she get, 11 or 12? If they were already giving 9+ to only the best of the best I would agree with you.

I just understand the confusion when the whole landscape has changed. This one reputation component of junior/senior suddenly disappeared.

I am and I always was for scoring according to actual performance, never said anything different. I would argue, though, with Aliona having "far superior skating skills a month later at Jr Worlds 2018". Compared to Evgenia and Alina? That's a matter of opinion. Though, there is hardly any way how to equalize scores from one competition to another, as I was explained many times. I would be glad if the standard was set to every competition equally, but I'm afraid that that's impossible to compare an actual skate with a ton of skates that took place within let's say last five years to preserve them comparable.

So I went to the ISU.org website to see about this, and found this file: https://isu.org/figure-skating/rules/fsk-regulations-rules/file it talks about scoring PCS on page 82, and the criteria for them. I don't see anything about it been relative to other skaters, it looks like it's supposed to be scored against a mythical skater, who can do all the stated criteria perfectly.

So I guess people are right in saying Plushy is incorrect to say a 14 year old can't receive 10s purely because they're 14, but it's not wrong to say that 10s should be given out very sparingly. When you give a skater a 10 you're basically saying they've reached perfection. This perhaps wouldn't be an issue if judges always marked to the criteria, but it's hard to imagine that a judge who gave a skater a 10 in a category would ever give them less than 10 next time unless they really messed up their program, even if at that particular event they didn't skate a 10 but a 9.5. This could impact the scoring and be the difference between a skater coming first or second or ending up off the podium, not such a big deal at a national competition, but at the Olympics or Worlds it would really mean something.

Not on the paper but in actual competition you have to somehow measure skaters against each other. If you gave particular score to one skater and then you see another skate that in your opinion is better, than of course you probably take that as a factor when scoring.

I would agree that 10s should be given rarely, but I also say that kamila is a rare skater. Though he based his argument on the age primarily, whiule I think everyone would agree that particular skaters are maturing differently. Like I'm sorry to european women but at the events like Nebelhorn and now in Hungary I see older ladies than Kamila or even Sasha in the senior category that can be hardly measured not just from the technical perspective but also from the angle of "maturity" of their skating (apart from the best like maybe Loena, Eva or Alexia).

And there is still the factor that it's unethical to make such comment in such situation publicly if you are a coach of a rival skater. As I've said, if he has objections, he should have adressed them to the FFKKR, not transfer the competition to the media.

 

[flanker]

I suppose you're correct, and I've been too naive. It will be all about the Tech points. And those are basically all about the jumps.

Maybe apart from the technical panel there should be "components panel" that would settle some basic limits where the score should be around

 

[anonymoose_au]

Maybe apart from the technical panel there should be "components panel" that would settle some basic limits where the score should be around

I've heard this idea before, it's a good one because honestly the judges have so much to do! Scoring technical stuff, looking at little details for the GOEs and at the same time looking at the program as a whole...

I saw a study that said human beings can't actually multi-task even if they believe they can...

Money probably will prevent that, dang.

 

[Skatesocs]

Not on the paper but in actual competition you have to somehow measure skates against each other. If you gave particular score to one skater and then you see another skate that in your opinion is better, than of course you probably take that as a factor when scoring.

Yes.

To me, "objective scoring" doesn't really matter, as the function of the judges is to come up with a ranking. This ranking should be as accurate as possible (and the elements should be called as accurately as possible), but I really don't care about "objective" scoring of elements and PCS. It's fun to discuss. But beyond the scope of a judge.

 

[Jontor]

Do we have any news on Stage Three next week yet?

Shcherbakova, Tuktamysheva, Samodurova and Gulyakova are all supposed to be there.

What about the injured Medvedeva and Sinitsyna?

We still haven't seen Gubanova, Nugumanova, Tsibinova, Sakhanovich and Tarakanova.

Is there any chance we might see any of Khromykh, Valieva and Usacheva again?

Also, Konstantinova and Shulskaya might show up again?