What has changed for the better in figure skating?

[frompolandwithlove]

Hi, I have a question for long-term fans of the sport. I know many of US here have been following the sport for decades. We often talk about what skating was like back then. We wonder what's missing from modern skating. We reminisce about our favorite skaters and favorite shows and programu from the past.
But here's the thing - as a relatively new fan, I can't objectively compare skating from different eras. I don't yet feel nostalgic for the "old days" (Ok, this is kind of a lie, I am nostalgic for old competition format), but those who have been watching skating since childhood certainly have comparisons. I know complaining is fun, but... well, I've lost my enthusiasm, I'm worried about how the next season will turn out and what the future will bring for my favorite sport, and I desperately need some optimism.

So, what has changed for the better in figure skating for the past 10-20-30 years? What positive changes do you see in recent years? What's better now than it was "back then"?

 

[yfan1]

If you want to talk about the past 30 years, I'd say that the CoP was a positive change to the judging, because

1. It meant that judge voting in order to get the 'right' result - which often resulted in weird switching of results - vanished, and all the judges needed to do now was go element by element. Also, another thing this fixed was that now theoretically someone in 10th place could go and win, which was nigh on impossible in 6.0

2. The early CoP encouraged better programs, because transitions were incentivized. This sounds odd, but there were many many empty programs. The footwork being forced to plain have more content was good too. Spin positions people complain about, but frankly I think it's a good thing that flexibility was encouraged.

Another good thing in the last 30 years is the technical innovation. Michelle Kwan's COE spiral, women going for 6-7 triple programs, men going for huge quads - all were good things.

I would also say some of the very best programs and performances happened in the 90s and 2000s-early 2010s. I definitely wasn't a fan of the pre-1990s skating all that much. One thing I *will* say, is that even if we take into account the less than ideal skating posture nowadays, the skaters seem to pay attention to dance training more and the best are very good performers, better than the average performer of the 90s or 00s.

Some of the best ever artists (Yuna Kim, Sui/Han, Mao Asada, Lambiel, Takahashi, Hanyu) are relatively recent skaters, not of the olden days. People can say 6.0 had freer performances, sure, but I think these skaters lay on the very best intersection of 6.0 and CoP, and ended up doing great tech content in addition to excellent artistry.

Even up until recently, we had skaters with huge flowing jumps, like Kolyada, Boyang, Han Yan, among others. Women like Karen Chen and Alena Kostornaia were beautiful skaters in a dying women's field.

It's not all bad. It's more that the judging lets things get away that it shouldn't (and yes, some rules and guidelines can be better too). And one can argue judging has always been bad...

 

[Arigato]

Music with vocals. (Copyright crap entered the picture but I still see it as a huge positive.)

 

[noskates]

Getting rid of the 6.0 judging.

 

[bartlebooth]

Music with vocals. (Copyright crap entered the picture but I still see it as a huge positive.)

Even though I complain A LOT about crossover songs (ugh), bad covers or grating vocals in general, I agree that broadening the choice was a good thing. Instrumental versions of pop/rock songs felt generally lame.

 

[Mathman]

I agree with @yfan1 that CoP was largely successful in its main goal of heading off criticisms and negative perceptions of ordinal judging.

 

[4everchan]

a lot of things are better but it often also means that there are counterparts to them

1) judging is better. The Code of Points rewards elements and their respective difficulty and execution. Downside : PCS manipulation
2) better programs, better balanced programs : unfortunately, most of the programs now look the same
3) making ice dance a sport rather than theatre on ice : counterpart ... it became very technical and now the ISU is backing down (unfortunately and dumbing it down with "themes" and no real patterns
4) Loss of figures and more over, loss of figures being the most important part of the mark... the sport was boring to watch and often things were decided before a skater even had a chance to do a spin of a jump... counterpart : skaters no longer train figures and no longer have beautiful blade control.
5) The system and that's my opinion only, developed skaters like Patrick Chan, Stéphane Lambiel, Jeff Buttle, Daisuke Takahashi and Takahiko Kozuka : these skaters were the ones who brought the most beautiful programs with great skating skills and competent jumping. Chan has been referred to as the "first" who did combine beautiful skating and a stable quad. Counterpart : skaters realized quickly that once you added exotic quads, you had a very big advantage so it brought us to the new generation of skaters, Hanyu, Chen, Uno, Malinin, Shaidorow, Grassl, Gumenik, etc who do have 3-4 different quads and more. Some are/were still very good skaters but their programs suffered from the long set-up for these quads, making them telegraphed, something we hadn't seen in about two decades.
6) Vocals were mentioned, it has pros and cons. To me, more cons than pros but then, there have been very good programs with lyrics.
7) Online streaming : there is so much skating we can watch for free now and we can see all of it, not just the top flight
8) JGP put forward : same as 7. Thank you Ted Barton.
9) Code of point and judging protocols easily available : to a passionate fan like me, my understanding of the sport and its scoring is so much deeper and this makes me enjoy everything better.. . counterpart : I sometimes get taken by the wuzrob fever
10) Online forums like this one : brings us all together . Counterpart ... people do not agree with my opinions LOL

 

[4everchan]

I agree with @yfan1 that CoP was largely successful in its main goal of heading off criticisms and negative perceptions of ordinal judging.

this is huge coming from you. I appreciate it very much. I know you often refer to the good 6.0

 

[meem]

When Olympic pairs champion Artur Dmetriev died recently, there were videos posted of his 1992 & '94 short & long programs (with Natalia Mishkutenov). Each of the programs were highly technical and yet they were so beautiful you'd think they were exhibition programs. Today's pairs programs are even more demanding but IMO the beauty of pairs is gone-the "two skating as one" has turned into strictly competitive technical only skating. For me, now the beautiful programs seem to be in ice dance (that back in the day were not all that interesting until Torvill & Dean and Klimova & Ponomorenko came on the scene). G/P's Wuthering Heights and S/D's Dune are highly technical but so beautiful that you forget how demanding they are technically. So this is how I view the big changes in skating.