No-jump skating | Golden Skate

No-jump skating

Joined
Jun 21, 2003
If there were a sport called skating-without-jumps, who would be on your all-star team?

Here's mine: Shae-Lynn Bourne as a solo skater; Lucinda Ruh; Alissa Czisny; Yukina Ota.
 

jennylovskt

Medalist
Joined
Oct 20, 2006
Men: Alexei Yagudin, Kurt Browning, Jeffrey Buttle, Johnny Weir.

Ladies: Ekaterina Gordeeva, Sasha Cohen.
 
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museksk8r

Record Breaker
Joined
Oct 31, 2006
Country
United-States
Michelle Kwan, Angela Nikodinov, Dorothy Hamill, Yuka Sato, Nicole Bobek, Sarah Meier, Paul Wylie, Brian Boitano, Kurt Browning, Stephane Lambiel, Jeremy Abbott, Jeffrey Buttle, Patrick Chan, Shawn Sawyer, Diasuke Takahashi, Matt Savoie, and Ryan Jahnke
 
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Joined
Jan 30, 2004
Cool concept!
I'd have to agree with many suggested already!
Kurt, Shae Lynn, Sasha Cohen, Lucindah Ruh, Nicole Bobek, Katia Gordeeva, Yuka Sato, Johnny Weir, Ilia Kulik.
 

hockeyfan228

Record Breaker
Joined
Jul 26, 2003
John Curry.

The great ballet writer and critic Robert Greskovic wrote yesterday in the Wall Street Journal,

Meanwhile, elsewhere in Manhattan, Ice Theatre of New York offered another 1970s wonder: Ms. Tharp's "After All" (to Tomaso Albinoni). This ice "dance" dates from 1976, when it was created for the great figure-skating champion John Curry. "After All" was revived here by the skating troupe for the first time since Curry, who died in 1994, stopped doing it. When Curry first performed the three-movement, solo work, it was a beacon of hope for the art of skating. The ever-scrupulous Ms. Tharp had arranged a work of real choreographic finesse that honors the integrity for skating's fine-edge schooling. It was something quite beyond what Curry used to call the "bunny suit" acts of "Ice Capades."

Curry's impassioned work with ice theater helped turn the tide, but seeing "After All" in this current, welcome reappearance on a program where nothing else even barely compared to its depth and coherence proved that much remains to be done. The raised standards that were set on ice during the same decade that gave ballet the 1970s works that ABT recently brought back to glory have yet to be consistently met or respected.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119491610355990696.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

Then, Maya Usova, Janet Lynn, Shizuka Arakawa, Susanna Poykio, Ekaterina Gordeeva, and Johnny Weir. And I have high hopes for Patrick Chan.
 

krenseby

Final Flight
Joined
Jan 8, 2006
Joined
Jul 11, 2003
Skating solo without jumps requires first rate musicality, versatility, and ability to manipulate edging. I think without those abilities one would want to see the jumping tricks.

I would put in order of preference: John Curry. David Liu, Stephane Lambiel, Kurt Browning, Ilia Kulic, Michelle Kwan, and Shae Lynn. There may be more that I haven't seen.

Joe
 

Big Deal

Final Flight
Joined
Jan 23, 2004
The musicality, the death-sure edge quality, the high-tech spins ant the touch of art. Here is my list
Men: John Curry, Stephane Lambiel, Ilia Kulik, Toller Cranston, Christopher Dean, Oleg Protapopov.

Ladies: Michelle Kwan, Sasha Cohen, Jayne Torvill, Ludmilla Protapopova(Bielouszova).
 

sillylionlove

Medalist
Joined
Oct 27, 2006
I would have to go with many of the names already said and add
Dorothy Hamill
Babalonia and Gardner
the Protopopov's
(give me a break for the spelling please)
Torvill and Dean
 

slutskayafan21

Match Penalty
Joined
Mar 28, 2005
Stephane Lambiel, Todd Eldredge, Alexei Yagudin, Johnny Weir, Jeffrey Buttle

Michelle Kwan, Sasha Cohen, Caryn Kadavy, Dorothy Hamill, Anna Kondrashova
 

kittyjake5

On the Ice
Joined
Dec 7, 2005
Michelle, Sasha, Yuka Sato - each of these ladies has great style and movement on the ice without jumps.

Lambiel, Wier and Kulik - I could watch them skate all day.
 
Joined
Jun 21, 2003
I think it would be quite tricky to compose a satisfactory program with no jumps.

For instance, I left both Michelle Kwan (my favorite lady) and Johnny Weir (my favorite guy) off my list because their use of selected jump elements greatly enhances the choreography of their programs.

In the 2006 COI tour Michelle did the best she could with a jump-free program (doctor's orders). It was lovely, etc., etc., and the audience was full of compassion for her.

Still, there were obvious moments when the music and the choreography called for highlight elements, and they weren't there.

Same for Johnny. To me, part of what makes his elegant skating so enjoyable to watch is the smoothness and grace of his jumps. Unfortunately for Johnny's medal ambitions, this is more apparent in exhibitions than in his competitive programs, IMHO. But even a masterpiece like Fallen Angels would be lessened if he scaled back on the athleticism.

Caroline Zhang, on the other hand -- well, it's too early really to form an opinion, but right now I would say that her non-jump elements are to die for, but her jumps can sometimes be a distraction from the quality of the rest of the program, instead of an enhancement.
 
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slutskayafan21

Match Penalty
Joined
Mar 28, 2005
I think it would be quite tricky to compose a satisfactory program with no jumps.

For instance, I left both Michelle Kwan (my favorite lady) and Johnny Weir (my favorite guy) off my list because their use of selected jump elements greatly enhances the choreography of their programs.

In the 2006 COI tour Michelle did the best she could with a jump-free program (doctor's orders). It was lovely, etc., etc., and the audience was full of compassion for her.

Still, there were obvious moments when the music and the choreography called for highlight elements, and they weren't there.

Same for Johnny. To me, part of what makes his elegant skating so enjoyable to watch is the smoothness and grace of his jumps. Unfortunately for Johnny's medal ambitions, this is more apparent in exhibitions than in his competitive programs, IMHO. But even a masterpiece like Fallen Angles would be lessened if he scaled back on the athleticism.

Caroline Zhang, on the other hand -- well, it's too early really form an opinion, but right now I would say that her non-jump elements are to die for, but her jumps can sometimes be a distraction from the quality of the rest of the program, instead of an enhancement.

I agree with all you said but even if you took out all the jumps Zhang still needs to work on her speed, basic skating, and ice coverage. I agree her non-jump elements are phenomenal though.
 

gkelly

Record Breaker
Joined
Jul 26, 2003
I think it would be quite tricky to compose a satisfactory program with no jumps.

Well, skaters could just choose music that doesn't have musical highlights that seem to call for jumps to punctuate them.

But if I were devising rules for a competitive event that didn't rely on jumps for technical difficulty, I would allow jumps of up to 1.5 revolutions. In most cases a tuck axel or 1.5 toe loop into a lunge, or a split-flip or simple split jump, etc. etc., would complement the music just as well as a triple jump.
 

JonnyCoop

Record Breaker
Joined
Dec 28, 2003
Great topic! I've seen a lot of programs over the years that have been terrific on the ground, but bad in the air, meaning basically as long as they didn't try to jump it was a great program.... (However, this does not mean that all the people on my list are terrible jumpers; this would be my list of people who I feel do not even HAVE to jump to make an impact.)

My list, off the top of my head:

Men -- DEFINITELY David Liu. Emanuel Sandhu. Matt Savoie. Shawn Sawyer. Johnny Weir. Kurt Browning. Alexei Yagudin. Michael Schmerkin. (An unusual choice, but he makes the list due to his Worlds program of -- I think it was 99 -- where he missed about every jump he tried, but between the jumps it was really cool -- a middle Eastern motif where he was pretending to play drums and things like that.)

Ladies -- Angela Nikidonov. Silvia Fontana. Chen Lu. Katarina Witt. Katya Gordeeva. Lucinda Ruh.

I'm sure I'll think of more later on.
 

kittyjake5

On the Ice
Joined
Dec 7, 2005
I think it would be quite tricky to compose a satisfactory program with no jumps.

For instance, I left both Michelle Kwan (my favorite lady) and Johnny Weir (my favorite guy) off my list because their use of selected jump elements greatly enhances the choreography of their programs.

In the 2006 COI tour Michelle did the best she could with a jump-free program (doctor's orders). It was lovely, etc., etc., and the audience was full of compassion for her.

Still, there were obvious moments when the music and the choreography called for highlight elements, and they weren't there.

Same for Johnny. To me, part of what makes his elegant skating so enjoyable to watch is the smoothness and grace of his jumps. Unfortunately for Johnny's medal ambitions, this is more apparent in exhibitions than in his competitive programs, IMHO. But even a masterpiece like Fallen Angles would be lessened if he scaled back on the athleticism.

Caroline Zhang, on the other hand -- well, it's too early really to form an opinion, but right now I would say that her non-jump elements are to die for, but her jumps can sometimes be a distraction from the quality of the rest of the program, instead of an enhancement.

I am a little confused. I don't believe that a skater that does not have other tricks other than jumps is less pleasing to watch that a skater such as Zhang who has an arsenal of spin tricks. When Michelle skated her COI jump free program she was in bad shape, I am surprised that she even could get on the ice and perform, even her trade mark spiral was off a bit. Who knows what kind of jump free program Michelle would be capable of doing injury free.

I have to disagree with you about Johnny too. JMO
 
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