Does "level hunting" kill the beauty of figure skating?

[TT_Fin]

This years special thing is jump during spin or when going out from a spin. I hate it.

In pairs lifts are so ugly it is not any more favourite discipline. I would change one lift in FS to side by side spin. I love pairs' spins.

I am not even fan of little girls jumping too much. Basic skills should become first. An I will never understand why presentation is combined to difficulty of the performance.

 

[Ic3Rabbit]

Yes.

 

[AlexBreeze]

I strongly dislike "difficult exit" feature.

For instance, Kolyada was known for his beatuiful textbook spins. But when he had to add that jump-out, it looked strange and unneseccary.

Also, as I understand, the rules don't specific what is a difficult exit so that it leaded to misunderstandings.

 

[Mathman]

I agree that some of the individual features that the ISU has pushed in variouos years can mkae for lopsided and unattractive programs.

But on the plus side, it's can also be cool when an athlete can navigate an obstacle course of bullet points while also putting it all together in an esthetically satisfying whole.

 

[FaustinaF]

I totally agree with you.
Too much jumps leave no space for other skills, and yes I do believe pair skating have forget elegance and decorum for their always-more-acrobatic liftings. There must be a balance: the same name of this sport requires it. This is an art expression besides a technique demonstration, so one should be able to express feelings even with spins, transitions steps, jump landings, I mean THIS should be the real difficulty in figure skating, to show everything as the most natural and artistic thing, showing quality without any apparent effort, and not to add jump after jump.
Now, so many examples come to my mind, but I think for example that Ilia Malinin is doing a great job in mantaining this balance. He wants to achieve perfection on ice, and he knows well how much artistry is fundamental to obtain this goal. He didn't forget that. That's the key of becoming a true artist skater I believe. Medvedeva was a great skater too, because she put art expressions at the same level of jumps and other technique. That definitely makes the difference in figure skating.

 

[CrazyKittenLady]

Lol

 

[Anna K.]

Lol

...dead horse emoji?

 

[Anna K.]

an esthetically satisfying whole.

It is itself a bullet point - in PCS, the "unity".

However, I believe that there is some disproportion in TES and PCS bullet hunt because it is much easier to describe what is a perfect axel than what is a perfect element unity. If the definition is not clear enough and you can't put a finger on it, i.e. "this skater objectively made a perfect element unity and that skater didn't" then it becomes harder for skaters to make progress because goals are unclear. It seems safer to stick to workhorse programs than are known for pleasing the judges.

 

[CrazyKittenLady]

...dead horse emoji?

 

[Anna K.]

Thanks! I don't now yet if I'll need it. But let us have it here just in case

 

[Rebecca Moose]

Yes, particularly the footwork sequences. It's horrifying.

 

[Mathematician]

I really hope season #155 of reiterating the exact same opinions about the exact same issue will be just as exciting and valuable as all of its predecessors

 

[TallyT]

We do seem to go through this 'it's all ruined, I tells ya, roooooooooooiiiiiinned' thing every couple of years, just like music does, and literature, and so on. It's true that, no matter what the ISU pontificates, skating that is pure and intricate and beautiful isn't rewarded as much as jumps and tricks and the mugging (especially mugging right in front of the judges) that has wrecked quite a few for me though other people seem to like it, so anyone who wants to win big will go for these, especially when ridiculous marks for PCS and GOE are given when not even deserved (politics and the desperation to make the 'right' skater a star). And the cut in the length for the FS, whole maintaining the amount of athletic geewhizzery they needed to get in, doesn't help and they show no signs of wanting to fix it.

However.

Firstly, level hunting is not the only thing that's doing it, and my guess is how it looks on social media, where flashiness is exactly the point, has a lot to do with it. Adam starting the backflip, the now-stale-as-mouldy-bread cartwheels... flash and whizzbang works there. And social media is not going to go away. (A side point, Mark Hanratty mentioned on one of the junior streams this week young skaters who, as well as winning, want to be 'invited to shows in Japan'. Gotta be noticed for that.)

Secondly, who - not what, who - are we comparing recent skating to? Unless someone breaks out in the next few months, there currently isn't any senior level skater (and yes, I include the Russians, I do see some of their present best online thank you) who is or is likely to be as beautiful and brilliant and interesting to watch and rewatch as some of the greatest in history but then... when the greatest in history were active, 99% of the skaters weren't as beautiful to watch as them. Most of the not so beautiful skating have been largely forgotten, only a few full competition videos lurking in corners of youtube so we forget that the general level of even elite slating of the past isn't the ones we all watch and hype a lot.

 

[rabidline]

Me, after the elder Selevko unleashed the plague of the heel spin difficult feature upon us: yes.

 

[Diana Delafield]

... when the greatest in history were active, 99% of the skaters weren't as beautiful to watch as them. Most of the not so beautiful skating have been largely forgotten, only a few full competition videos lurking in corners of youtube so we forget that the general level of even elite slating of the past isn't the ones we all watch and hype a lot.

You want a corroborating example of that point? The last year my partner and I competed at the national level, before we agreed it had been fun but we were both ready to move on into more education and raising families and having careers outside skating, we finished 6th at the Canadian championships. Of the five pairs=ten skaters who finished ahead of us (and the marks didn't drop off suddenly between fifth and us), seven of those ten skaters went on to earn world medals, three of them world champions and one, with a new partner, an Olympic medal. So not too shabby an era in Canadian pairs at the time. But if I were to sign this with my real-life, before-marriage, competition name, and didn't just refer to my partner as My Partner the way he asked me to, you still wouldn't recognize us. We were competent for the time, but not memorable. I checked in YouTube and found Debi Wilkes had a series of Retro Skating videos covering past competitions with one for that year, but although she says pairs was the best event that year, she still only shows the winners. So we're not anywhere on the internet.

There was some great skating at that time, but as @TallyT says, 99% was nice to watch but not memorable. It's important to accept that the same scenario exists today even with advances in technical accomplishments. Decades from now, most of the competitors even with devoted fans today will be forgotten, if figure skating even still exists. Enjoy it as it's performed, while it lasts.

 

[jorge2912]

I totally agree with you.
Too much jumps leave no space for other skills, and yes I do believe pair skating have forget elegance and decorum for their always-more-acrobatic liftings. There must be a balance: the same name of this sport requires it. This is an art expression besides a technique demonstration, so one should be able to express feelings even with spins, transitions steps, jump landings, I mean THIS should be the real difficulty in figure skating, to show everything as the most natural and artistic thing, showing quality without any apparent effort, and not to add jump after jump.

I think some pairs programs feels more like background music and haven't relation with the choreography even applicating the principle of well balanced program , the elegance is losing because the musical choice , is ok that they choose something like tops 40 but no all the music it fits for a SP or LP .maybe choreography needs more corporal expression or sync the music style with it.

most of the competitors even with devoted fans today will be forgotten, if figure skating even still exists. Enjoy it as it's performed, while it lasts.

I think it depends of the age of the fans , the younger fans just looks for the trend or the awesome and tomorrow they will forget it. personally if i watch pairs the awesome technically talking isn't so important because if they doesn't have expression or choreography doesn't fit with music or the idea is lost because a mistaken style ,for me is just an empty program

 

[TallyT]

I think some pairs programs feels more like background music and haven't relation with the choreography even applicating the principle of well balanced program , the elegance is losing because the musical choice , is ok that they choose something like tops 40 but no all the music it fits for a SP or LP .maybe choreography needs more corporal expression or sync the music style with it.

That has more to do with choice of music than level hunting? And we have to allow that tastes are what they are. Kids these days may simply not connect with the music older skating fans do.

I think it depends of the age of the fans , the younger fans just looks for the trend or the awesome and tomorrow they will forget it. personally if i watch pairs the awesome technically talking isn't so important because if they doesn't have expression or choreography doesn't fit with music or the idea is lost because a mistaken style ,for me is just an empty program

But there were plenty of empty programs before! I can't speak so much for pairs, I have never really connected with the discipline, but for others I have copies of the full SP, FS or both in competitions going back to 2012 at least (largely because of Yuzu, yes) and some earlier (because of my love for odd, now obscure skaters) and there are more than a few empty, artistically/musically disconnected or plain whatthehellweretheythinking programs, at GP or even Worlds and yes, Olympic level. Also as I said, I don't think there are any GOAT level skaters at the minute or any with the promise of being one (I could be wrong of course, remember what Neils Bohr said about prediction), but there have been times before when no one has reached that magic level and there will be again.

(Oh, and there are young fans who love beauty in skating. I meet them all the time online.)

 

[TT_Fin]

Yes, musicality would be worth another thread and if it was still judged separately I would make another thread of it. I am pleased it is not judged separately any more. Low level skaters (read skaters who hardly got not jump triples but skated clean) got something like 3 GOEs from musicality even when they skating to music was perfect. Very very few of skaters is really that bad.

What I mean by opening this thread - after thinking about it for a long time but being afraid it goes to much arguements - if it does, I will ask to close this thread. So far this has been fine - it is just what AlexBreeze said about Kolyada before. As he is one of my all time favorites in men, I could not agree more. Spins are prettier without jumps between or without ending to jump, but of course this is personal opinion. I would also like pairs rather stay injure free instead of too hard entries, especially when they try too much compared to present skills. It does not give much to people like me in the audience. IMO FS is going too much towards to please judges more than to please the audience. If audience who don't like the trend, do not understand or even care much about levels but want to watch the beauty of the sport, audience do not buy tickets and that is not good for the sport.

At the moment my favs are skaters who put their soul to choreo seq. Some put just some moves there because it has to be there, but some are really thought to be showy. Of course it is also about the choregrapher what he/she plans.

 

[Mathematician]

(Oh, and there are young fans who love beauty in skating. I meet them all the time online.)

If anything to me it seems like beauty/artistry is the main focus for young skating fans more than the older crowd. Kids identify with their favourite skater like they do with artists. They relate to the personality and style, and the skater becomes an emotional/characteristic role model for them. This disposition is the overwhelming rule from what I see with the young crowd. Young as in, say, mid twenties and under.

I think it depends of the age of the fans , the younger fans just looks for the trend or the awesome and tomorrow they will forget it.

Like frankly this is just blatantly incorrect. Show me any evidence of this claim. The young crowd loves unique and firey skaters more than everyone. Come on, if anyone are myopic bandwagoners its the oldies. Its an "old-timer throwback" disco/rock dance or some melodramatic neoclassical otherwise the geriatrics are fast asleep.

IMO FS is going too much towards to please judges more than to please the audience.

Dont see it. In every interview I watch, at least for the ladies, the girls rave about how excited they are to show themselves to the fans as much as possible. Just today I watched a Bazyluk interview and when asked about scores she said she doesnt even look at scores (she is being hyperbolic but the point is clear), "I just want to skate for the fans as well as I do in training, the judges are on their own to score whatever they want". I remember Muravieva last season barely missed on being national champion, I expected her to be devastated as she usually is but she ended up just being ecstatic that she finally skated a clean FS for the fans. Petrosian stone faces interviews in actual scored competitions with 250 score, meanwhile the only time I ever saw her shed a tear was at test skates last year, "I just want to effectively transmit the heart and emotion my trainers put into this program". I almost never see a skater complain about scores, only letting down fans.

 

[TallyT]

I almost never see a skater complain about scores, only letting down fans.

Errr, any with any brains does not complain too much these days about their scores in public because that's the way to get really dogpiled on. They are also mostly being schooled in pr speak so I'd take what they say about it with a heaping grain of salt.

Anyway back to whether the level hunting is harming the sport (I suspect we will tread the same paths quads times, changes and whether everything else from and probably before IJS came in harmed the sport...) it can be made beautiful if the skater is technically and and artistically skilled enough. There ain't many of those through the years though. The question is, should the sport be developed for those one or two bearing in mind that there aren't any at the minute anyway (imo as I said) and it may be a wait till we get another one or two, or change it to make the rest of 'em more attractive to the paying public?