Alena Kostornaia

[DizzyFrenchie]

Dasha delivered a perfectly clean skate in the short program. In the free she did one mistake, but less severe than Young You did in the short. Also, without hesitation I say that overal quality of Dasha's skating is on a different level. Still You received six points higher score for the free skate than Dasha so I do not understand where do you aim to. Nevertheless, this is Aliona's FF, so matters of Dasha vs. You hardly belong here.

Sorry for OT. I entered the debate about scoring motivation and it relates more to Russian Ladies thread. It does affect Alyona's chances of making GPF.

Well I just watched the second half of the ladies practice, and it was pretty rough for Aliona.
She mostly skated in circles, and after she fell on the 3A in the run-through, she was near tears for the rest of the practice. Poor baby!

I hope she can turn around her mood for the FS!! But I'm beginning to think that she might really need a sports psychologist... She didn't interact with the coaches even once, from what I saw.

In 2019-2020 season she had many rough practices before delivering perfect skates in competition. I hope she will do the same tonight.

 

[McBibus]

I think aliona is much closer to Liza than you think. If she skates cleanly AK should always have higher PCS than Liza. And now with the new programs more confidence they will be neck and neck with 1 or 2 other girls for that final spot for the Olympic team come nationals.

I do agree: if she puts her jumps and flow at best, defines a step sequence and polishes the entry in the last spin she could do 82+ with 36.xx in PCS.
But yestarday I saw the typical "program is not ready yet" esitations and that does have an impact on PCS.
More than Aliona being bashed (it could change with her growing) I look at Liza's super rating on Performance and Interpretation.
Her PCS jumped high after last year rostelecom.

Anyway the punishment come from TES.
That's where the gap was and good elements usually push PCS up too.
On a good note, her skating skills where judged second only to Kami's.

Do we really think the Russian federation wants to enrage EG by not taking all 3 of her girls? There are 6 to choose from and 5 have ultra jumps.

Yes i do. Not to enrage her but not caring abobut her and surely not wanting her to be the Queen sweeping a full podium.
The 3 designated girl are all Eteri's but it seems they are pushing to ensure that if some of them fails the replacement comes from elsewhere.

Now while I think that Aliona does not have any slack from the jury right now because of last year, I also hope that she could be fairly judged when she skates at her best.
We have to see if this is a " we expect more from you girl: raise to the challenge!" or if they are looking on any angle to push her head down.
Time will tell.

If Liza clearly deserves an Olympic spot so be it. The same for AK or Anna or Sasha or Maya or Dasha.

The road to the olympics is long.
Nationals are in the second half of January I think.
It's a marathon not a sprint, but ensuring a place in the GP final could be very important.

 

[Scott512]

I do agree: if she puts her jumps and flow at best, defines a step sequence and polishes the entry in the last spin she could do 82+ with 36.xx in PCS.
But yestarday I saw the typical "program is not ready yet" esitations and that does have an impact on PCS.
More than Aliona being bashed (it could change with her growing) I look at Liza's super rating on Performance and Interpretation.
Her PCS jumped high after last year rostelecom.

Anyway the punishment come from TES.
That's where the gap was and good elements usually push PCS up too.
On a good note, her skating skills where judged second only to Kami's.



Yes i do. Not to enrage her but not caring abobut her and surely not wanting her to be the Queen sweeping a full podium.
The 3 designated girl are all Eteri's but it seems they are pushing to ensure that if some of them fails the replacement comes from elsewhere.

Now while I think that Aliona does not have any slack from the jury right now because of last year, I also hope that she could be fairly judged when she skates at her best.
We have to see if this is a " we expect more from you girl: raise to the challenge!" or if they are looking on any angle to push her head down.
Time will tell.


The road to the olympics is long.
Nationals are in the second half of January I think.
It's a marathon not a sprint, but ensuring a place in the GP final could be very important.

Russian nationals are not until January and then we have a lot of time on our hands to speculate about this and that maybe that's not a good thing. A lot of girls have a chance to make the Olympic team including aleona including Liza and about is the and about 5 others. I wish the system was better and they would take the top Tan in the world and then add like 25 more skaters after that by country.

At some point and it may be years away the TT ladies dynasty may be over but why screw around with it when it still goiing strong?
If the Russian federation wants to make sure one of the 3 girls was not a TT girl they're more stupid and maniscal than I thought.

Nastia and Masha left this off season next season they will have like 5 ladies wanting to leave the Russian federation. Lol. Why bite the hand that feed you (EG) and who makes your federation special. As rough and difficult as she is the Russian figure skating federation wouldn't be crap without her. They would be the Canadian figure skating federation.

Let's see what aleona can do tonight and moving forward but the handwriting is on the wall they are at the ISU and Russian federation paving the way for the Empress.

 

[patee]

 

[Batsuchan]

I'll be screaming for our girl!! Go Aliona GOOO!!!

 

[irriya]

I have no faith in this world now

 

[Vemvane]

Well done to Aliona on her bronze! I am so, so impressed by the sheer height of her 3A - it is a massive jump. She is more comfortable with Lovely, I think, than with the Vivaldi Four Seasons programme, and hopefully by her next outing she will have regained her confidence, and built up her fitness and stamina to skate the free with verve and energy.

FP video on instagram:




And the same from the ISU YouTube channel:

 

[Vemvane]

Interview with Aliona, including the reasons behind the change of her programmes:




Google translate:

Russian figure skater Alena Kostornaya commented on her performance at the Canadian Grand Prix, where she took third place.

- I am also very glad that I was able to overcome myself in some way, show the program, correct yesterday's mistakes. Yes, other bugs have been added. But I am very happy with the result.

- Alena, what can you say about the changes in your programs and your assessment for the components?
- Probably, it is not for me to decide what grades I should or should not receive. What I dashed off, I got it. This is not my decision. I can't say anything specific.
Today was the first presentation of my new programs. And today I got what I dashed off.
After the tournament in Finland, I went to the second training session. The coaches said: We are changing the free program. She did not argue. Why not? If I feel it well.
And the change of the short program happened unexpectedly. There was a question about a show room. In Canada I decided to skate the program in English, in France - in French. I started preparing the New York issue. And when I drove, everyone realized that it turns out much better than my current short one. So we decided to change it, - Sport24 correspondent Konstantin Lesik reports the words of Kostornaya.

 

[Batsuchan]

Not Aliona's best skate, but so, so much better than practice!!
Congrats on your bronze medal, darling!!

I'll write more later!

 

[nussnacker]

It breaks my heart to see her dropped by the judges like this. She wasn’t perfect, no, but the judging of her seems extremely harsh to me. She still deserved more than what she received, imo.
I rewatched her jumps, her 3A in the SP was clean. Her 3A in the FS was closer to q, but she’s not being given any benefit of the doubt, while some others get more obvious errors ignored. Don’t even get me started on PCS.

I hope she still has energy and motivation to keep improving. She’s on the right track. What’s upsetting me is that as soon as she stepped out of her 3A I felt like she gave up on that program.

She knows she has 0 room for error and she’s going to get hammered for every single possible thing, which subsequently makes her skate even more nervously and cautiously.

What done is done. She needs to score higher than Daria, if Daria medals at NHK. Scoring higher than Liza at Rostelecom, given how the scoring has been going, will be impossible. 3*3A and clean skating need to be back ASAP now.

 

[nussnacker]

I am suspecting that NY NY might have been planned as an EX for this year. That’s why they switched to it, just adjusting it to competitive SP. Then this decision makes sense, and it’s probably not hard for her to switch the program.
For Lovely, it was already of a length close to FS, when it was being skated in shows, so not that much new to learn there as well.

If this is they way I am assuming, then it should be just fine. I am certainly hoping they worked hard with her in preparation for GP, that her killer competitive instincts will kick in full force and she shows everyone she’s not the one to be counted out.

So it was indeed planned as an EX for this season, not last season’s program as 1TV made it sound like.

 

[Lzbee]

Congratulations on the bronze Aliona!

It was very far from her best but I actually thought her scores were justifiable when compared with non-Russians. It's compared to the other Russians who are still getting some candies that it feels frustrating.

It sounds like she's accepted how things are and is listening to the coaches now which I think is a good thing. There may be arguments for her score to be higher but there's not much of a leg to stand on when there's still a lot of work to be done. I have faith that she'll get there, I just hope that she can learn to feel comfortable with her jumps even when one is less than ideal.

All of that said, all she needed was a bronze here and she got it. So on to the next one! She has a much better chance of getting silver at IDF which is a ticket to GPF and another chance to show her improvement.

 

[Vemvane]

More photos.

 

[Scott512]

I have no faith in this world now

Why what happened?

When I went to sleep last night I didn't see any results so I thought the ladies were skating on Sunday. The fans must have been very spoiled having the men's free program and ladies free program yesterday.

I've only seen one other post today in aleona's fan thread and I saw that she got bronze. I hope she wasn't robbed of silver. But I think this is something to build on and her triple axle is getting better and by the end of the Grand Prix season she will be ready to fight for an Olympic spot. But even more importantly she's going to be the most beautiful skater in the world again that much is evident.

I hope AK sees the bronze as something to build on I hope she's getting confident again and has full confidence in her coach is boach to lead her back to the top.

Happy Halloween by the way.

 

[nussnacker]

All of that said, all she needed was a bronze here and she got it. So on to the next one! She has a much better chance of getting silver at IDF which is a ticket to GPF and another chance to show her improvemen

She needed a silver for a secure chance. In France she doesn’t really have anyone to lose to, even if she doesn’t do better than now. So it’s bronze and (likely) silver.

Chances are, it’s either Young or Daria which will take silver and bronze at NHK. If Daria takes silver, Aliona will be compared to Liza for 6th spot, and will have to best her by the sum of scores. Liza won’t be marked down in Russia, even with a bronze. If Kaori skates clean and medals ahead of both You and Daria, while You takes bronze, this will ensure Aliona’s path into GPF.
If Daria takes bronze and You silver, it’s Daria vs Aliona vs You vs Liza by best sum of scores for the last 2 spots. Currently both Daria and You have better scores than Aliona.

If Anna somehow loses to Aliona in France, then Aliona will certainly be at GPF. However, even Anna with a neck problem was still scoring more than Aliona here.

Chances are looking slim at the moment, everything depends on how Aliona does in France and how NHK stacks up. It is now or never for her. Next 3 weeks will decide her fate. If she doesn’t make GPF, she’s got 0 chance, regardless of how she does at Nationals.

 

[Scott512]

It breaks my heart to see her dropped by the judges like this. She wasn’t perfect, no, but the judging of her seems extremely harsh to me. She still deserved more than what she received, imo.
I rewatched her jumps, her 3A in the SP was clean. Her 3A in the FS was closer to q, but she’s not being given any benefit of the doubt, while some others get more obvious errors ignored. Don’t even get me started on PCS.

I hope she still has energy and motivation to keep improving. She’s on the right track. What’s upsetting me is that as soon as she stepped out of her 3A I felt like she gave up on that program.

She knows she has 0 room for error and she’s going to get hammered for every single possible thing, which subsequently makes her skate even more nervously and cautiously.

What done is done. She needs to score higher than Daria, if Daria medals at NHK. Scoring higher than Liza at Rostelecom, given how the scoring has been going, will be impossible. 3*3A and clean skating need to be back ASAP now.

Well said and while all you said is true and it's disappointing that aleona is getting shafted or at the very least treated harshly compared to Liza and maybe even KV there is a lot for her ber to look forward to this season. Liza almost never skates well at Russian nationals. They would really have to puff her scores up for her to be in the top 3 seniors there. That may happen but aliona could legitimately be ready to move past her at Russian nationals.

I also think alyona's parents or agent need to go to the Russian federation and privately complain about the nonsense going on with scoring. She should also say she may retire after this season or she may represent another country. If you don't stand up to the Russian federation you will get rolled over like a car tire on a bug on the street.

Does anybody have the final scores for her and and silver and gold skaters?

 

[Scott512]

Congratulations on the bronze Aliona!

It was very far from her best but I actually thought her scores were justifiable when compared with non-Russians. It's compared to the other Russians who are still getting some candies that it feels frustrating.

It sounds like she's accepted how things are and is listening to the coaches now which I think is a good thing. There may be arguments for her score to be higher but there's not much of a leg to stand on when there's still a lot of work to be done. I have faith that she'll get there, I just hope that she can learn to feel comfortable with her jumps even when one is less than ideal.

All of that said, all she needed was a bronze here and she got it. So on to the next one! She has a much better chance of getting silver at IDF which is a ticket to GPF and another chance to show her improvement.

Candies? LOL! Thats a perfect comment from you on Halloween!

There is a realistic chance Russia will get all 6 spots for GPF. Yet only get 3 for olympics and worlds, LOL its a joke but the joke is on us. Figure skating is a niche sport that needs new leadership. We dont need to any country to have like 6 spots for olympics or worlds. But an extra spot or 2 should happen if you dominate a discipline like has never happened before.

Changing the programs worked for Aliona. Now she needs to make the GPF and do something special there where the judges cant hold her down while propping others up. Can she do 2 3As in her free skate by GPF? I expect her to get better as the season go on. But if she doesnt get a PCS score h deserve it will be hard to overcome Liza. Forget about Kami for now. Anna and Sasha have issues. Its all up in the air and up for grabs except for the #1 Russian laady.

 

[decafjava]

Well done I am glad Aliona is improving!

 

[Scott512]

Are we making too much of the Olympic team for the Russian ladies when in reality no one is going to catch Killa Kamila this season?
Well I guess Liza could catch her. Naah. Maybe only Sasha if she hits like four quads and KV falls ones.

So are we stressing out too much whether the most beautiful skater in the world makes the Russian Olympic team or not?

 

[McBibus]

She badly needs a stable 3A.
That would begin a positive chain reaction: TES > Confidence > Boldness > Shining on the ice.

A thing that worries me since last year: she never get SS4 anymore. What is missing?

What do you think of the new FS?