Should Gracie or Caroline or Agnes or Mirai replace Alissa for Worlds?

[Mathman]

Then you get to the next question: where do you draw the line? ie how much of a clear running edge is "enough". You are headed down a slippery slope now...

Yes, exactly. That's why the CoP is ill suited to try to score a "slippery slope" sport like figure skating.

Ordinal judging, now...we can tell with great confidence and with unanimity among judges that Browning's failed flip was not as terrible as Petrenko's failed Lutz. But to say that Petrenko deserves exactly 1.2 points (not 1.1 and not 1.3), while Browning deserves 2.3 -- these numbers do not attach to anything quantifiable in the actual skating.

 

[Précision]

So, with that in mind, why should a failed attempt at a jump get any points? You either complete the jump or you don't...

Now, of course you can create situations where it's possible to make up at least some of the points lost. Tack on an extra jump elsewhere (as is already done), etc.

Hi all! my first post...

I'm a huge figure skating fan, but more specialized in synchronized skating. This quote above got me thinking about the calling of elements in synchro.

Program consist of elements such as line, block, wheel, circle and intersection. To get higher levels you have include features to your elements (travel and chance of direction/configuration for circle and wheel, pivoting and change of configuration for block and so on..) There is also ice coverage reguirements for each element. And that one is tricky.

If you do all difficult features in your Line element to get a level 4 BUT you don't cover a reguired length on the ice you don't have a Line. It's a no call. 0 points for that. And it happens quite alot, even world champion Rockettes have had a few no call's this season just because of the ice coverage which has nothing to do with difficulty.

I think the system in single skating is little better, you did something when you jumped, so you'll get some points. More points is you succeeded to do a difficult and well landed jump with right technique.

 

[gkelly]

Here is how I think it should go. Half a point gradations from easiest to hardest jump, factor of three for each additional rotation. The .5 gradation was used in the original CoP. I don't think the tinkering and micromanaging of base values in the meantime have improved anything.

Well, the even 0.5-point increments make for cleaner math, but they're less reflective of the actual relative difficulty of the jumps.

It's pretty well established in the skating community that toe loop and salchow are practically the same difficulty and that loop and flip are closer to each other than to either toe loop/salchow or lutz, and axel is closer to toe loop/salchow of the next higher order than to lutz of the same order . . . allowing for individual preferences and pet peeves.

With triples and quads, the toe loop becomes easier or at least more consistent than the salchow, although many skaters learn the triple salchow first.

 

[Mathman]

Except my way is much simpler. No GOE stuff to further complicate things...

ETA: How much would he have gotten had he FULLY ROTATED the jump, then fell?

If he had fully rotated the jump before falling he would have got 6.0 base value.

After deduction for GOE and fall penalty he would end up with 2.0 points for the element.

Edited to add: By the way, the reason for the designation 3Lz<< instead of 2Lz (both with the same base value) can either help or hurt the skater, it seems to me. It was done this way so that a skater who under-rotated his quad toe would not be killed by Zayak rules later in his program (although it didn't help Oda when he did a 3T+3T instead of a 4T+3T).

But I think it could go the other way, too. If you get 3Lz<< then you can't repeat another solo 3Lz, but if instead you got credit for 2Lz, then you could.

 

[dorispulaski]

Précision,
Welcome to Golden Skate! We hope you post long and often.

We have not had many threads about synchro, but because of icenetwork, subscribers get to see quite a lot of it. Anything you write about it will be very much appreciated, particularly any insights you have about synchro scoring. I think it's a beautiful discipline, but I don't understand it very well & am eager to learn.

 

[Skater Boy]

I think we lost our way on this thread. I am waiting with wonderment if Alyssa will cry an injury or what.

 

[gkelly]

Yes, exactly. That's why the CoP is ill suited to try to score a "slippery slope" sport like figure skating.

Ordinal judging, now...we can tell with great confidence and with unanimity among judges that Browning's failed flip was not as terrible as Petrenko's failed Lutz. But to say that Petrenko deserves exactly 1.2 points (not 1.1 and not 1.3), while Browning deserves 2.3 -- these numbers do not attach to anything quantifiable in the actual skating.

Except the ordinal judging was for whole programs, not for individual elements.
Petrenko placed higher in that short program, probably because the other mistake he made (turnout on the landing of the triple axel) was less severe than the other mistake that Browning made (singling the required double axel).
(In a long program the relative severity might be different)

So even if we're using ordinals, it helps to have a way to keep track of all the better things and worse things that each skater did, compared to up to 30 other skaters in the same event (sometimes the host country gets an extra entry in the SP). That's where numbers come in handy, whether as placeholders or absolute scores.

It also helps to have a way to keep track not just of who was better than whom on each element, but by how much.

What we could do is hand out a code of points to the judges, tell them to do their own math however they want, and add up their scores to create ordinals. If we could publish detailed protocols of each judge's scores for each element and each presentation criterion/program component, that would go a long way toward explaining how the judges arrived at that ordinals and making the ordinal system more transparent. Naturally these could only be published after the fact.

 

[mskater93]

That is why, to me, an ordinal approach is a better match for what we are trying to judge than a point-based system is. Trying to translate continuous gradations into discrete point values is tricky indeed.

Ah, you are in the grossano camp, then! He has been a proponent of (returning to) an ordinal-based approach even as IJS was introduced, tweaked, tweaked, tweaked....

As a skater, I can tell you that IJS is great for getting feedback: this was awesome (+ GOEs), this was good (full bv, 0 GOE), this was OK (a couple +GOE and a couple minus -GOE), this was close (<) this stank (-3 GOE, -1 fall) or that's not what I expected!! (L1? Are you kidding me?!! That should have been called at least a L3. What was THAT tech panel looking at?!!) versus ordinals like 1, 2, 5, 7, 4 (what place did I get? 3rd? but, my TOM was 3/4 and I got a 7th... Why did judge 4 give me 7th? Does he not like brunettes? Maybe I should dye my hair blonde!). Basically, you had to request a critique from the judges and get their feedback more off the record to know what you needed to fix to have judge #4 not place you 7th in the same group again.

It's great for judges when they are on a panel for a super-large group (15+ skaters) because they grade what they see versus trying to remember what Suzie Smith did as the second skater out versus Tina Thomas who's three warm ups later at skater #16 (when both had pluses and minuses and were really rather equivalent, because Tina's jumps were great, spins were OK, steps were adequate and skating was average and Suzie had great skating and steps, her spins were OK and her jumps merely adequate but one has to be graded higher than the other) and trying to leave room to squeeze Brenda Brown between Sara Single and Wendy White into 9th place, oh crap, I don't have room, I'll just put Brenda into 13th because I boxed myself in...

 

[Mathman]

Précision,
Welcome to Golden Skate! We hope you post long and often.

We have not had many threads about synchro, but because of icenetwork, subscribers get to see quite a lot of it. Anything you write about it will be very much appreciated, particularly any insights you have about synchro scoring. I think it's a beautiful discipline, but I don't understand it very well & am eager to learn.

What Doris said!!!

Thank you for joining us, Precision. Post often, post long!

As a skater, I can tell you that IJS is great for getting feedback: this was awesome (+ GOEs), this was good (full bv, 0 GOE), this was OK (a couple +GOE and a couple minus -GOE), this was close (<) this stank (-3 GOE, -1 fall) or that's not what I expected!! (L1? Are you kidding me?!! That should have been called at least a L3. What was THAT tech panel looking at?!!) versus ordinals like 1, 2, 5, 7, 4 (what place did I get? 3rd? but, my TOM was 3/4 and I got a 7th... Why did judge 4 give me 7th? Does he not like brunettes? Maybe I should dye my hair blonde!). Basically, you had to request a critique from the judges and get their feedback more off the record to know what you needed to fix to have judge #4 not place you 7th in the same group again....

Yeah, you are right about all that. Dr. Rossano and I are just muttering in our beer. Don't mind us.

 

[mskater93]

Except my way is much simpler. No GOE stuff to further complicate things...

How do you distinguish between a 3A with a difficult entry, great height and distance, a wonderful outflowing edge held very securely, and a difficult exit out
versus
crossovers around the rink, stalking the entry on a back outside edge, jumping basically straight up and down, a questionable amount of rotation, but technically clean

without "GOE stuff"? I am not being facetious with this question, I really AM wondering how you would distinguish between them. Both of these fullfill the requirements for a 3A...one just fullfills it "better"

 

[Précision]

What Doris said!!!

Thank you for joining us, Precision. Post often, post long!

Thank you both! I'm glad there is interest towards synchro, I'm sure there will little "synchro-propaganda" in my writings sometimes. I just think it deserves to be considered as a same kind of figure skating disipline as the other four. Just little younger and still developing.

Anyways, back to te topic title: I think there is no reason to send Gold or Zhang to Worlds, Czisny has earned her spot and to me is a real medal contender which the other two would not be.

 

[R.D.]

If he had fully rotated the jump before falling he would have got 6.0 base value.

After deduction for GOE and fall penalty he would end up with 2.0 points for the element.

Ok, here we go. He's still getting points (i.e. being rewarded) for a completely failed element. A fall is a fall, shouldn't matter whether he rotated in the air once or 5 times...

This is the change I want to see, using the 3Z jump as an example:

3Z- successful - 7

3Z - fall/hand(s) down - 0

3Z - 2-foot/stepout - 3.5

3Z - doubled - 2

3Z - singled - 0.5

Probably not a whole lot different from the current Cop as far as point values go, but it's a heck of a lot simpler IMHO. Could probably play around with the numbers a bit as well.

_____

Now, someone asked about varying degrees of a successful jump (the current role the Grade of Execution plays). My response to that may not be popular, but here it is: I'm going to invoke the basketball analogy again. You have two players that each take one shot. Assume both shots are taken within the 3-pt line and from the same distance, say 18 ft. One of the players has an open look at the basket. He takes the shot and hits. The other player is being double-teamed and the shot clock is running out. He is forced to throw up a very difficult fadeaway jumper, but by some miracle, the ball bounces on the rim and then falls into the hoop. Which shot is worth more?

That's right, even though the shots had varying degrees of difficulty, they both count as 2 points.

A jump is a jump is a jump. A 3Z is worth 7 pts no matter what.

Now, if you wanted to award/encourage more difficult entries into jumps, there might be ways to implement that, possibly by treating the entry into the jump as a separate element altogether...but the entire point is this: the less subjectivity in the system, the better.

 

[R.D.]

I think we lost our way on this thread. I am waiting with wonderment if Alyssa will cry an injury or what.

I think we would have heard about such an injury by now...but I guess you never know.

I assume she's going to go, and frankly I hope she goes. She's the best we've got.

 

[Mathman]

Ok, here we go. He's still getting points (i.e. being rewarded) for a completely failed element. A fall is a fall, shouldn't matter whether he rotated in the air once or 5 times...

This is the change I want to see, using the 3Z jump as an example:

3Z- successful - 7...

I think the problem is this. In basketball, it is obvious what it means for the ball to go through the hoop.

In skating it is not so obvious whether a skater has done a triple Lutz or not. If a skater's take-off edge is wobbly, then you could say, nope, that's not a Lutz, that's a flip. Check out Kurt Browning's jump in the video that gkelly posted. Is it a flip? Is it a Lutz? None of the above?

Under current rules, if you rotate 990 degrees (expecting 1080), then you have still done a triple Lutz, but if you rotate only 989 degrees, then you have done -- well, not a double Lutz (that would be 720 degrees), but a half-way sort of triple Lutz.

If the skater stumbles and bumbles on the landing but doesn't quite fall, does that satisfy the definition for a successful jump, which includes "landing on a running outside edge on the opposite foot from the take-off foot"?

(And what if your favorite skater falls but has a cool costume? )

 

[PolymerBob]

I think we would have heard about such an injury by now...but I guess you never know.

I assume she's going to go, and frankly I hope she goes. She's the best we've got.

There might be an injury involved. If Alissa doesn't go, that leaves the question of who goes in her place. Historically, Caroline seems to do better in front of international judges than national ones, and she is on a definite upward trend.

 

[Mathman]

^ If Alissa withdraws with an injury, Agnes Zadwadski goes. This was already decided and publicly announced two months ago.

 

[skateluvr]

Agnes does not get much love. What do people see in her skating (or not) that they dislike?

 

[lcd]

Agreed. Is this the Gracie Gold hype machine raising more reasons to have too high expectations next year? Back after nationals the word was she was telling anyone who would listen that she "coulda' gone to Four Continents"

Her time will come. Please.

 

[R.D.]

^ If Alissa withdraws with an injury, Agnes Zadwadski(sic) goes. This was already decided and publicly announced two months ago.

....which is all the reason I REALLY hope Czisny is able to make it! Not only make it, but give it her best effort, of course.

 

[Trewyn]

Agreed. Is this the Gracie Gold hype machine raising more reasons to have too high expectations next year? Back after nationals the word was she was telling anyone who would listen that she "coulda' gone to Four Continents"

Her time will come. Please.

Really? Gracie thought she should have gotten a 4CC ticket?? Seriously. She could have opted to skate in seniors and *earn* her ticket. She didn't. Jr Worlds was perfect as her first big international competition! You're right, her time will come. She'll be able to prove that as a senior next year.As nice as it sounds to see Gracie as the solution to any US Ladies problem, I really think it's pretty irrelevant because she skated as a Junior at Nats. The story would have been entirely different if she skated Seniors this year and placed.