Has CoP Destroyed Asada?

[evangeline]

Back to the topic,

IMO, her problem seems to be her weight and the loss of hang time because of that.

Even in her good days, time to time she had 2 footed landings in her 3A.

But she was light enough not to lose the control back then. Not anymore. Because of her added weight, the rotation won't stop that easily with 2 foot landing. And we all know what happens when the rotation doesn't stop with 2 foot landing.

I'm one of those who don't understand why she has to gamble on 3A. She has her other skills that shines over others. And I don't think 3A is one of them. She has to adjust herself to her physical change.

Hellcat, who is the skater in that GIF image of yours (what a 3A!)? It looks like Ilia Kulik to me...

 

[Blades of Passion]

I think it's Yagudin. He had those arm positions on his 3Axel where he didn't even pull all the way in.

 

[gourry]

Hellcat, who is the skater in that GIF image of yours (what a 3A!)? It looks like Ilia Kulik to me...

I also think it is Ilia Kulik. It doesn't look like Yagudin's body proprotion to me....

 

[Mathman]

Hellcat, who is the skater in that GIF image of yours (what a 3A!)? It looks like Ilia Kulik to me...

I think it's Yagudin. He had those arm positions on his 3Axel where he didn't even pull all the way in.

Unfortunately, I have to be the big meanie and remind everyone: no animated gifs in signatures, please. It's a question of bandwidth and speed of loading for dial-up viewers.

Also, images in signatures are supposed to be only 450 pixels long by 90 pixels high.

 

[evangeline]

I also think it is Ilia Kulik. It doesn't look like Yagudin's body proprotion to me....

Yes, it looks like Kulik's Aladdin costume....

But then again, both Yagudin and Kulik had sublime triple axels, especially Kulik's spread eagle entrance into his triple axel.



BUT to get back on topic, I don't think CoP has destroyed Asada; after all, she's won quite a dew major titles all under CoP. Her problems seem to be mental as those practice clips of her look perfectly fine. And I agree with the people who say that the obsession with the 3A may also be a culprit for her apparent decline.

 

[Blades of Passion]

Yes, it looks like Kulik's Aladdin costume....

But then again, both Yagudin and Kulik had sublime triple axels, especially Kulik's spread eagle entrance into his triple axel.

Oh, you're probably right. That does look like his Aladdin costume.

We don't see Triple Axels like those ones much anymore.

 

[hellcat]

Yes, he is Kulik

 

[newvie]

Why is Mao struggling?

It's because she has not been jumping in the correct way. The fact that she has ignored the basics of jumps to pursue to have more difficult jumps at an early age is haunting her now.

IMO, if she had a stubborn coach who insisted jumping in the right way, she shouldn't have suffered this much at the age of 18/19. Maybe she should be even better than Yuna by now, because she will make all the jumping passes of Yuna, jump 3A and make better extension than Yuna, satisfying ice ballerina worshipers.

Natural talents don't disappear. It appears differently depending on how it has been trained/garnished.

 

[Bennett]

Why is Mao struggling?

It's because she has not been jumping in the correct way. The fact that she has ignored the basics of jumps to pursue to have more difficult jumps at an early age is haunting her now.

IMO, if she had a stubborn coach who insisted jumping in the right way, she shouldn't have suffered this much at the age of 18/19. Maybe she should be even better than Yuna by now, because she will make all the jumping passes of Yuna, jump 3A and make better extension than Yuna, satisfying ice ballerina worshipers.

Natural talents don't disappear. It appears differently depending on how it has been trained/garnished.

Yukari, Kanako Murakami, Mao, Mai, and Shoma Uno. The students of Machiko yamada are so talented. As she grows them out of scratch, she should be a great coach. But they also seem to have some technical problems one way or another. Midori Ito, her former student, also had a wrap.

 

[DarkestMoon]

Why is Mao struggling?

It's because she has not been jumping in the correct way. The fact that she has ignored the basics of jumps to pursue to have more difficult jumps at an early age is haunting her now.

IMO, if she had a stubborn coach who insisted jumping in the right way, she shouldn't have suffered this much at the age of 18/19. Maybe she should be even better than Yuna by now, because she will make all the jumping passes of Yuna, jump 3A and make better extension than Yuna, satisfying ice ballerina worshipers.

Natural talents don't disappear. It appears differently depending on how it has been trained/garnished.

It may not be Tarasova's decision to keep going with the 3A, it may be Mao herself. Tarasova apparently said she is willingly to change the jump layout in the programs, but Mao insists to keep it because she doesn't want to see it as a failure.

Mao is struggling also may be due to fatigue from practicing the axels.

 

[steyn]

Out of 4 attempts, when she was doing the jump directly after a Spiral and in the second half of her program.

Yes, Yu-Na has landed the jump many more times than Mao...because she is constantly attempting it. She actually has less consistency with the jump than her Flip and Toeloop, though. It's not a bad jump for her, but she is clearly more of a toe-pick jumper.

I never said this. I said they are pretty much equal in their capabilities on it.

Interesting logic. It seems to me that you are making futile attempts to maintain your hypothetical theory that Yu-Na should not do edge jumps better than Mao because she is not much talented in edge jumps.

If you want to argue that Yu-Na's salchow is not good because she messed it up twice, apply the same statistics to Mao's salchow and also to Yu-Na's other jumps such as Lutz which she failed quite a few times. The very statistics you mentioned proves that your hypothetical theory is wrong.

I can accept your opinion as an alternative viewpoint although I don't agree. However never try to support it with double standards.

 

[FifthSeason]

Out of 4 attempts, when she was doing the jump directly after a Spiral and in the second half of her program.

Yes, Yu-Na has landed the jump many more times than Mao...because she is constantly attempting it. She actually has less consistency with the jump than her Flip and Toeloop, though. It's not a bad jump for her, but she is clearly more of a toe-pick jumper.
.

Yes, Yu-Na has less consistency with salchow than her Flip. But who has more consistent triple than Yu-Na's flip. She missed once since senior debut.

11 out of 14. is this inconsistent? Two downgrades out of 14 attempts, when she also was doing the jump directly after a sprial and in the second half of her program, and one invalid element at 2007 World.

 

[life684]

The results from Cup of Japan suggests long list of athletes having problems. Miki and Nakano's scores are mediocre by their standards and i for one do not believe it is Cop that is to blame.

Most skaters are finding it hard to skate in front of home crowd or expectation of olympic season. It is not cop to blame, at least the feedbacks they get can be used to rectify these errors like Ur, wrong edge calls (if they can rectify that is). as for Mao, her form is very Volatile, she could have bad patch and come and do very well when you sort of write her off. And even with in a program her form changes, one point she tries a 3A and has a terrible form, u think that is a knock out punch and then she delivers rest of the program as even that wasn't a big deal. So, mao is a head case and what is needs is a good sports psychiatrist.

Then again Destroyed is a too strong a word to use, it is not as if she quit skating because of bad form. What next if she performs 2 clean programs will we call her Mao, The Phoenix Bird.

 

[janetfan]

The results from Cup of Japan suggests long list of athletes having problems. Miki and Nakano's scores are mediocre by their standards and i for one do not believe it is Cop that is to blame.

Then again Destroyed is a too strong a word to use, it is not as if she quit skating because of bad form. What next if she performs 2 clean programs will we call her Mao, The Phoenix Bird.

Good observations life.

I hope we will see Mao "rising from the ashes" by the time Vancouver comes around.

 

[Kwanford Wife]

Watching Mao going back to last season it has become clear that something is effecting her skating.


The most obvious conclusion seems to be that the recent CoP rule changes have hurt Mao badly, enough at this point to have shaken her confidence.

Shouldn't we be wondering and worried that one the most talented skaters in the history of the sport has lost so much and so quickly?

Anybody care to explain how the decline of one of skating's greatest and most marketable stars is good for figure skating?

And will Mao bounce back in time for Vancouver?

I'm not so sure about this analysis... Look, I despise CoP and see all types of flaws into the system and its overall affect on the quality of skating. However, Mao has skated under this system for a few years now and as an athlete, she needs to be adaptable to the rules. Like all the competitors.

She's having a bad start to her season. It happens. Maybe she's stressed, injured, or her confidence is shaken. But you can't blame the judging system. We've seen this before under 6.0 - a young skater comes out and sets the world on fire for a couple of seasons only to watch her skating decline as others begin to raise their games. Some are able to adapt and move forward and others, not.

Its sad when it happens and I hope for her sake that Mao is just falling into the Dick Button catergory of "it happens to the all the greats" Its just unfornatuate it happened durning an Olympic year.

 

[SterlingTFX]

I agree that Mao has problems with her jumps. I'm more confused about her music selections! Her choices for this and last season have been too heavy, too serious for her, I think. She seemed much more at ease in 2007 skating to Czardas for her FS and in 2008 with Fantasie Impromtu. If things don't improve for her, I'd love to see her go back to her SP from 2007-2008 (the Fantasia for Violin). That was a thing of beauty. Going back to an old program could help her confidence out. Look what it did for Shizuka in Torino.

 

[katakwan]

IMO A skater seriously affected by the rule changed is just a small-time athlete,

if not a small-time athlete , just wanna say the journeyman player.

Impact players are on the field uninfluenced by it.

Maybe they change the rule... or it chases them.... Trailblazers

 

[antmanb]

I don't understand how learning a quad can mess up the technique on a triple. (Not a criticism on Mao, I've heard other skaters use that reasoning.) For example none of the men have trouble with triple toe, even if their quad toe sucks. None of the ladies with unstable or underrotated triples have trouble with their doubles. What make a quad so different?

Timing. Timing. Timing.

Everything about the jumps is dependant on split second timing for how you do everything. The timing and actions required for a quad will be different to those required for a triple, and muscle memory is tough to overcome, if you've been practising quads over and over again if you try to appraoch the triple you'll find you still go through the set up and jump as if you were going for a quad. Look at Pluschenko when he training the quad salchow seriously, he nearly always had issues with the triple, often doubling out on it.

Also with the men - most of them do the triple tow as a second half of a combination rather that as a solo jump or first jump in a combination so that helps to treat the quad toe and the triple as two separate jumps.

Ant

 

[mylastduchess]

Lets review all the bad choices Tarasova and Mao has made:

1.) 3 3Axel - okay who's brilliant idea is this? If Mao messes up 1 of the Axel she might as well say goodbye to an Olympic medal. Look at her short if she either pops her Axel, falls, or underrotates gets a big chunk of her score, she also won't get marks for a 2axel because she can only do 1. And since she doesn't do a 3/3 anymore the 3Axel is her only way to get her a huge score.

2.) Musical Choices - okay Masquerade wasn't really met with great enthusiasm as her long program last year... so they made it to her short this year? What is the logic in that? Plus in Olympic year they picked Bells of Moscow to perform to? What the heck! I can't imagine anybody performing to that music in an Olympic year except if they are super duper fans of twilight and they want Dracula's theme song to skate to. Not to mention the program has little content other than the big tricks and the straight line footwork. and it doesn't suit Mao... and did I mention I hate the program?

3.) Costume - Okay Mao your dresses the seasons has been lovely where did you get your LP dress this year?

 

[Olympia]

Quote from Newvie:
Natural talents don't disappear. It appears differently depending on how it has been trained/garnished.

Well said. I don't think Mao's gift is gone. I think it's in eclipse, for many of the reasons mentioned here.

Bennett's point about Yamada's students all having problems came home to me as I watched Yukari Nakano this weekend in NHK. That infernal leg wrap! How could a coach let a student out into the world with such an anomalous style. And yet the entire roster of Japanese ladies who have achieved triple axels, including Nakano, came from this woman's program. What a dilemma.

I came to the realization this weekend that although the Japanese ladies' team is one of the deepest in the world today, they're not as solid as they first appear. Mao is having problems. Nakano has gotten thus far and no further. Ando alternately shines and droops--nerves, possibly, and who could blame her. Suzuki is a delight but new and not yet proven. Suguri is good but not a top contender except in very rare circumstances.

So this year, the only truly formidable national team is...the Korean team.