Pairs Free Skate

Over at FSUniverse, they report that the first group is warming up.

It looks like Yoyogi Stadium is PACKED.

Denney / Barrett
Spartacus...
Double Twist - good (or Triple?)
Triple Toeloops - big step-out from her
Throw Triple Lutz - good
Lift - good, 2 changes of position
1 Axel - 2 Toeloop - I think he singled, a bit wobbly
Death spiral - good
sbs spin - pretty good
Lift - good
Throw Triple Loop - I guess, I think throws are difficult to identify, too many legs, good
Straightline Stepsequence - great energy
final Lift - she has good extension
Pair spin - good speed at beginning, slowed down a little towards the end

She is happy. That was good. The sbs jumps looked quite iffy, but I am not sure if he singled the Axel or just has such an airy Double Axel. I think they have somehow an old-fashioned look and style - and I don't mean that that's necessarily a bad thing.

Score: 101.66

Medusa said:

Denney / Barrett

She is happy. That was good. The sbs jumps looked quite iffy, but I am not sure if he singled the Axel or just has such an airy Double Axel. I think they have somehow an old-fashioned look and style - and I don't mean that that's necessarily a bad thing.

Score: 101.66

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That score drops them behind D/D overall.

Tarzan and Jane
Triple Toeloop - Double Toeloop - I think she or both doubled the second jump, but clean I was correct here, and since it was clean and fluent they got +1 GOE
Triple Twist - well, a K/S triple twist, what more can I say -0,28 GOE, level 2
Throw Quad Salchow - both hands down -2,60
Lift - not bad here I am surprised, it got a big +2 GOE, does anyone know why?
Lift - good +0,6 GOE
Death spiral - slowing down a lot towards the end, +0,56
Double Axel - he loses control of the landing, steps out -1,60
Throw Triple Loop - perfect, even her landing position was quite good, great smile from her, +0,70
Lift - with difficult carry, not quite as solid as at Worlds, lots of +2s, giving them a +1 GOE overall
sbs Spins - in sync except for the last two seconds, +0,30
Straightline Steps - ok, Level 3, +0,30
Pair spin - nice, +0,50

Ugh, I think they were tired. He was also holding his shoulder in the warm-up. And what's with his double Axel, it always looks iffy. I know that his best jump is actually a Triple Salchow (which I guess she can't do consistently, otherwise they would probably risk it). New freeskate next year please. Russians seem to be in a good mood. Moskvina is there, looks please.

Score: huge, 120.07 SB, perhaps that was a 3-3

EDIT - I will just add what the protocols say, it's interesting. Everything except for the Twist and the Steps were level 4. Can someone explain this?

5ALi4 6.50 2.00 2 2 1 2 2 2 2 2 3 - - - 8.50
5SLi4 6.60 x 1.00 2 2 2 2 1 2 2 2 2 - - - 7.60

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So both lifts got nearly the same GOE, why is on the first one +2 added overall and on the second one +1?

Zhang/Zhang
I would rather see twice their short than their long, which has the typical mechanical look.
Double Axel - Triple Toe - completely out of sync, but both went for it, -1,2 GOE
Throw Triple Salchow - fantastic, +1,26
Throw Triple Twist - not as high as they can go, level 3 and +1,64
Lift - good, +0,80
Death Spiral - also really slow at the end, +0,84
sbs Spins - small parts out of sync, level 3, +0,4
Throw Triple Loop - slightly wobbly, +1,12
Triple Salchow - she flips out, downgraded, -0,76
Lift - really good, +0,8
Lift - very steady, her positions have improved, much petter than Pang or Kavaguti, +0,8
Straightline Steps - a bit behind the music, but okay, level 3 and +0,2
Pair spin - average, +0,40

The only really glaring mistake is that she flipped out of the Salchows and that he jumped the Triple Toe two seconds before she got up into the air for it. I don't like the program, it's like Chinese Pairskating 101, big tricks, some background music.

Score: 123.40 SB, they deserve that

The results are out - 1st Zhang/Zhang w/123.40 ; 2nd Kavaguti/Smirnov w/ 120.07 ; 3rd Dube/davison w/ 108.68 ; 4th Denney/Barrett w/ 101.66 ; 5th Takahashi/Tran w/ 82.91 ; 6th James/Bonheur w/ 82.59

Of the teams who scored over 100 points, it is interesting to note that the complete newbie team of Denny/Barrett are in that grouping in their first year as Senior.

Denny/Barrett have little past experience as a Pairs Team. All the others over 100 points have been around for some time and many many competitions.

I think they made a splash, and I expect they will make an even bigger splash in the Olys.

Medusa said:

EDIT - I will just add what the protocols say, it's interesting. Everything except for the Twist and the Steps were level 4. Can someone explain this?

So both lifts got nearly the same GOE, why is on the first one +2 added overall and on the second one +1?

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Well, I can explain why it was scored this way, but I can't really explain why it was scored this way.

The GOEs for a level 4 Axel Lasso lift go like this: -1.5, -1.0, -0.5, 0.0, +0.5, +1.0, + 1.5.

For a Step-in Lift it is: -2.0, -1.4, -0.7, 0.0, +1.0, +2.0, +3.0.

This usually happens when one element has a much higher base value than another, to keep the GOEs more or less in line, percentagewise. But in this case the base values are comparable (6.5 versus 6.0).

I think the whole shebang is the ISU's attempt at dealing with the issue of whether a lower level with a higher GOE should score higher or lower than a higher level with lower GOE.

Mathman said:

This usually happens when one element has a much higher base value than another, to keep the GOEs more or less in line, percentagewise. But in this case the base values are comparable (6.5 versus 6.0).

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Thanks. That was what confused me the most, that both lifts have similar base values, but got different GOE.

I can give some history. At first with COP, it was allowed to do 3 axel entry lasso lifts in the same LP. (And every team that had a good one, for one the Siudeks, and for another Inoue & Baldwin) did those 3 lifts with the same entry to get the extra points). Then they required all lifts to have different entries, so your choice is axel entry lasso level 4, step up entry lasso level 4, and another lift. This last year AFAIR they gave bonus to the lifts in the last half of the program, so they are mostly moved there, too.

good job by Denny and Barrett. Anything other than last place is impressive considering where they came from!