Brilliance and perfection

[demarinis5]

Thank you to everyone for posting the videos. It was such a treat watching these wonderful selections!

 

[Olympia]

Gordeyeva and Grinkov, in 1986, when she was fourteen and he nineteen. They had just become world champions. Senior world champions.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IWAYne3BaM0&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wtFgZYOSXvI&feature=related

And here they are in the Calgary Olympics. I think this is the moment when they really clicked, and we noticed that their hearts both beat in the same rhythm. Complete unison--complete unity. Notice how rapturous Peggy and Dick are in their remarks. Peggy's only complaint is that Katia doesn't point the toe of her free leg at one moment.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0B0tSnQKzwo

And no one's mentioned Michelle at fifteen, doing Salome. Her first world championship, 1996.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GKmUW8wPB0s

 

[skateluvr]

Mao at TEB 2005 is one competition I wish I was there. The program, her presence and dress, everything was perfect!

Well, I really hope she brings back the triple flip/triple loop. and forgets about trying to perfect the 3 axel. She is so ethereal and touching in her Jupiter program. She has become a skater than can transfix us without jumps. I will always be in her corner. Delightful indeed.

 

[clairecloutier]

My preference is always for skaters with good feet. Everything else can be fixed later but if you don't have good feet, you're in trouble.

I definitely see what you mean about the importance of good feet, edges, and basic skating skills. But--I'm not sure I agree everything else can be fixed later. One thing I always look for is whether the skater has a "good back." By this I mean, is the skater's back nicely arched? Are the shoulders up and square? Does the upper body stay still and centered as the skater moves across the ice? These are skills that tend to be acquired early on in a skating career. When skaters show up at the elite level with a flat back/poor posture, it doesn't usually seem to improve much. Their choreography and general interpretation often improves, but not so much their actual posture. I consider Miki Ando an example of this, as well as Caydee Denney.

 

[SGrand]

Those videos of V/M and D/W at such young ages are so incredibly cute! Meryl is the most adorable little thing!

 

[deedee1]

I consider Miki Ando an example of this, as well as Caydee Denney.

Have you ever seen Miki live?

Like you, one thing that bothered me over the years is she gets bent upon crossovers. She admits herself that she tends to bent back when she is very nervous and in need of accelerating speed.

When I saw her live, however, her back did not bother me as mush as on TV. Miki also surprised me because she skated BIG and had such a presence on the ice. Especially in the Gala, she is a completely different skater compared to her norm with typical NM's blah competitive programs.
Leonova and Amodio also surprised me in the same way at the recent WTT in Tokyo.

I would say watching skaters live and watching them on TV (or thru tiny PC screen) are two different things. :yes:

Considering Carolina, Akiko or Dai, at this point of their career, just proved us this past season that they could achieve something big in their own way, why not Miki?
She still has some room for improvement and can of course learn a new thing or two at her age, why, she is now NM-free Miki.

 

[Violet Bliss]

Since we are posting videos of prodigies, here's Han Yan at 11:

http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XMjU4NjE0MTUy.html

And his current 4T3T at 16:

http://imgsrc.baidu.com/forum/pic/item/7dd98d1001e93901be7c65987bec54e736d1961e.jpg

 

[Olympia]

I definitely see what you mean about the importance of good feet, edges, and basic skating skills. But--I'm not sure I agree everything else can be fixed later. One thing I always look for is whether the skater has a "good back." By this I mean, is the skater's back nicely arched? Are the shoulders up and square? Does the upper body stay still and centered as the skater moves across the ice? These are skills that tend to be acquired early on in a skating career. When skaters show up at the elite level with a flat back/poor posture, it doesn't usually seem to improve much. Their choreography and general interpretation often improves, but not so much their actual posture. I consider Miki Ando an example of this, as well as Caydee Denney.

It's good to see someone else singling that trait out for praise. Yuka Sato and Dorothy Hamill were two skaters who impressed me with their backs. Also Michelle: I remember seeing her skate onto the ice for the warmup before the short program at the Nagano Olympics and thinking, "What beautiful posture!" Posture was something I always felt that Oksana Baiul lacked. She tended to hunch a bit, which put me off her for quite a long time despite all the praise she received.

I also love the feet. There, Michelle and Yuka Sato excel also. Gordeeva is another one with amazing feet. Another one on this list for me is Mao.

 

[clairecloutier]

It's good to see someone else singling that trait out for praise. Yuka Sato and Dorothy Hamill were two skaters who impressed me with their backs. Also Michelle: I remember seeing her skate onto the ice for the warmup before the short program at the Nagano Olympics and thinking, "What beautiful posture!" Posture was something I always felt that Oksana Baiul lacked. She tended to hunch a bit, which put me off her for quite a long time despite all the praise she received.

You're right about Oksana; she did tend to hunch a bit. I think what kept people from noticing/commenting on this was the extraordinary flexibility she had through her back (as a young skater--remember her donut spin, still the best I've seen?). She used that sinuousness and flexibility, as well as her long arms, so well in expressing music that it masked other flaws in her skating.

And yes, Michelle did have lovely posture. This was especially noticeable in Michelle's sit spin, which was pure and lovely in its position. So many times, skaters do sit spins with a horrible, half-bent back, which ruins the line of the spin. Michelle's was perfect.

The skater whose posture I admire most now is Alex Shibutani. When he skates, his back is always so straight, his shoulders always up and well positioned. Judy Blumberg commented on it during one performance, saying what wonderful backs he and Maia have. (It sounds funny to say someone has a "good back," but skating people understand. )

 

[Dragonlady]

I definitely see what you mean about the importance of good feet, edges, and basic skating skills. But--I'm not sure I agree everything else can be fixed later. One thing I always look for is whether the skater has a "good back." By this I mean, is the skater's back nicely arched? Are the shoulders up and square? Does the upper body stay still and centered as the skater moves across the ice? These are skills that tend to be acquired early on in a skating career.

Yes, very good point about the backs. I don't understand why everyone who aspires to be a skater does not take ballet lessons. Within the first couple of months after my daughter started taking ballet, I noticed a huge difference in the way she moved. She stood straighter, with shoulders squared, and just the way she walked and moved was more graceful. Tink took ballet because her best friend was taking ballet, but the improvement in her posture and movement was so remarkable that I would strongly recommend this to anyone, male or female, wanting to skate competitively.

 

[blue dog]

You're right about Oksana; she did tend to hunch a bit. I think what kept people from noticing/commenting on this was the extraordinary flexibility she had through her back (as a young skater--remember her donut spin, still the best I've seen?). She used that sinuousness and flexibility, as well as her long arms, so well in expressing music that it masked other flaws in her skating.

And yes, Michelle did have lovely posture. This was especially noticeable in Michelle's sit spin, which was pure and lovely in its position. So many times, skaters do sit spins with a horrible, half-bent back, which ruins the line of the spin. Michelle's was perfect.

The hunched posture was evident in Ukraine's females singles skaters (Liashenko, Baiul, Efremenko, Lavrenchuk). Their females who skate pairs or dance (Filonenko, Romanova, Volosozhar, Savchenko, Grushina) had great backs.

With regards to Michelle's sit spin--what she lacked for in having a low sit spin, she made up for in that lovely posture. Tara Lipinski had a nice, low position, but hunched over.

 

[mskater93]

Michelle was at 90 degrees in her spinning knee, though, so it was low enough.

 

[skateluvr]

Since we are posting videos of prodigies, here's Han Yan at 11:

http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XMjU4NjE0MTUy.html

And his current 4T3T at 16:

http://imgsrc.baidu.com/forum/pic/item/7dd98d1001e93901be7c65987bec54e736d1961e.jpg

SF, wonderful first link. Second link I see a logo type thing-pale and underneath chinese (I think) writing.

Is it geoblocked in America?

 

[Bartek]

If you look closely at Sasha's spirals, they were on very, very shallow edges. The positions were great, but the edges were not. Her charlotte was often just on a flat. She also constantly lost control of her edges, which I think is half the reason why she fell so much, she just could not hold landing edges for her life and many of her landings were shaky. Of course, the American commentators will not say anything is wrong with her, but I was reading someone's blog who attended and analyzed every US National and Worlds in the US from like 1990-2006ish and they always commented on how Sasha's spiral was gorgeous but on almost a flat edge.

That's not true! They were on very shallow edges but at the beginning of her career, when she trained under Nicks. In 2005-2006, not only did her spirals have breathetaking positions but they also had great edges, easy change of change and magnificent ice coverage. In fact, it was CoP that forced Sasha to improve those things in her spirals that she used to neglect under 6.0. Edges, speed, ice coverage. It was all to get the heighest level, and bullets for GEO. Look at her spiral sequence in 2006:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=M-v3_X35DZo&t=1m30s
In the first spiral - I spiral into fan spiral - she does almost a full circle with a deep edge. The edge is especially deep when she gets close to the board. That shows control. She was in a very difficult position, got very close to the board, yet was able to deepen her edge and avoid a collision with the board. Then the second spiral has decent speed and edges. Only the last spiral is slow and on quite a shallow edge. The whole sequence covers the entire ice rink and looks really spectacular, at least to me.

That's true she did her charlotte most of the time on a flat but remember she had a full split in her charlotte and it's difficult to do even on a flat. Look here in her malaguena program at the speed she has and the ice she covers with her charlotte: www.youtube.com/watch?v=FNQCFfITCYQ&t=2m6s

And now here, she did something extremely difficult, charlotte on the edge but forward, nor backward. It's 2010 SP from Nationals: www.youtube.com/watch?v=UNweTvOwfAM&t=1m40s

So, as you can see, Sasha also did charlotte on the edge. Michelle always did them on a flat.

 

[skateluvr]

Sometimes people seem unwilling to see how incredible, unique and exquisite Sasha Cohen was. I am a big MK fan, but I think most people would admit if she were more secure in herself and a nerveless samurai warrior like Kwan, the jumps would have been more consistent and she would have more world medals and maybe Olympic gold. If she had skated clean in 2002, it would have been impossible for the judges. Every skater has imitated Sasha since she has competed. She did do some spirals on edges but some would be impossible for anyone to use much edge and get the split she got. Incredible control, beauty, every position, except the falls an incredible line of beauty.

"Dark Eyes" is one of the great Sp's of all times. And her return to Nationals was just lovely in the SP. Sasha always doubted herself. And by the time she came MK was in a love fest with the fans at Nationals. When everyone screams for Michelle, it was tough on her. She could not match the MK personality, drive or confidence. As a competitor under COP, no one will match MK's record. No one can stay in for 10 years with the exception of the driven, bionic once in a lifetime Plushenko who is willing to pay the price of pain, surgery, more pain because he is so lionized in Russia. MK is his female equivalent along with Slutskaya. How rare are women like Irina and MK? Remember they esp MK were making big money to stay in and tour. It's gone. Those days are over, for sure. Sasha's doubt was always in her eyes -lovely eyes, while MK was relaxed, yet so focused. Todays's fans of Yuna say MK had no transitions, no difficult step sequences. If you judge her by today's rules, she would not always win.

I sometimes think people who are very critical of Sasha, Tara or Sarah are very disgruntled fans of MK who never got over the losses at the Olympics. We had 4 extraordinary winning women who hit in the nineties. Also wonderful were skaters like Kimmie, Caroline, Mirai who are CoP skaters. There was one diminutive Sasha who often made us sigh when she fell, but she also soared like no other lady I remember. We were so lucky to see her go for it. I can appreciate her on an edge on or not.

 

[skateluvr]

yet another young lady from Japan with so much talent.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r0HUDgpKeJY&feature=related

 

[whispering]

SF, wonderful first link. Second link I see a logo type thing-pale and underneath chinese (I think) writing.

Is it geoblocked in America?

baidu blocked. Here is the 4T3T clip：http://www.tudou.com/v/L-4WaxJMsjo/v.swf

 

[skateluvr]

thanks you whispering...

a beautiful performance from this 16 year old you might know...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Ni_gasbgec

I love this performance. Such purity and innocence about the young Yuna and this is one of her best programs. I wish she were skating like this now but all things end, some too soon.

 

[skateluvr]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rItG6GiB35c&feature=related

15 year old mao, just incredible with a triple axel

 

[Olympia]

I sometimes think people who are very critical of Sasha, Tara or Sarah are very disgruntled fans of MK who never got over the losses at the Olympics. We had 4 extraordinary winning women who hit in the nineties. Also wonderful were skaters like Kimmie, Caroline, Mirai who are CoP skaters. There was one diminutive Sasha who often made us sigh when she fell, but she also soared like no other lady I remember. We were so lucky to see her go for it. I can appreciate her on an edge on or not.

I was a huge Michelle fan (everyone, act surprised!), but I loved Sasha too. Sasha had qualities that no one else had. Her positions and her posture were remarkable. Of course many Americans wanted her to be another Michelle in terms of international success (without overshadowing Michelle, of course), and the fact that she didn't have Michelle's astonishing record was a bit of a disappointment to a lot of fans. But realistically, there aren't many skaters like Michelle in a generation.

Though her mistakes during competition could discourage fans, she racked up a pretty decent number of medals for a supposed head case. Probably her most impressive moment for me was the long program in the 2006 Olympics, when she fell but didn't fall apart. I'm sure she felt that she had somehow failed by not winning the gold, but I think her silver was a huge victory, a testament to perseverance and sheer grit. If a head case wins an Olympic silver, what does that make the bronze medalist? (Who was, if you recall, Slutskaya.)

Bartek, thanks for the analysis of Sasha's edging. I like your description. Hmmm, if CoP forced Sasha to pay attention to edging and improve her skills, maybe it's not such a bad system after all.