Ladies' Short Program

I ll wait to see how she holds at the Lp but she always had had issues with sp mostly, nevertheless she reminds me of the 15 year old Plush's attitude, the mentality and spark.
I think she and Adelina have a share of pressure because they have been hyped the last couple of years as Russia's next best thing and I think the anticipation of how they would do in seniors is large.

jaylee said:

She lost points on her layback, which needs improvement.

Click to expand...

It's mostly because Liza's back is not healed after injury and still hurts. You can see that in Kiss&Cry she was touching her back a lot because of that.

P.S. SC Kiss&Cry is the worst I ever seen :disapp:.

No doubt Liza made an impressive senior debut. She is a really good jumper, her speed and height on her jumps are reminiscent of Yuna. Her variations with arm over the head on her jumps is also a feat. Her challenge will be to keep it all together as the pressure mounts and her body matures over the next couple of years. I hope somehow that Mirai can get her mojo back - it has been missing since the 2010 Olympics IMO. Maybe the heightened expectations created by her wonderful Olympic FS have gotten to her. Rachel looks really good at Skate Canada, she will medal if she can just keep her confidence and deliver a solid FS.

Liza's excellent technique will help her adjust if and when she grows. If you remember Mao had issues with the flip and lutz technique when she was younger.

seniorita said:

I ll wait to see how she holds at the Lp but she always had had issues with sp mostly, nevertheless she reminds me of the 15 year old Plush's attitude, the mentality and spark.

Click to expand...

Agree, I think she not only share the pression with Adelina, but IMO she has also the pressure of being sort of the new Mishin champion, like Gatchinsky she's to been predicted a champion since she was very young. And yes, she reminds a lot of not only Plush's but all best Mishin pupils' attitude, and that's a good thing, since usually Mishin students are able to keep on this strong mental attitude.

jan said:

Liza's excellent technique will help her adjust if and when she grows.

Click to expand...

Agree, totally. IMO, she has the technique and the right attitude, she only needs to improve artistically, but that will come with time and experience of course!

Anyway, great jumps, but I particularly liked the second part of the program, with the step sequence, it's really good choreo IMO (one can see Lambiel's hand!).

All bets will be off with regards to Liza if in the next year like Mirai did at the same age she grows about 3, 4 inches. Remember how Mirai struggled the next year. And Mirai dominated the season before on the Junior GP then won Nationals and everyone was swooning over her as the next big thing. Mirai was even doing triple triples as a Junior but her growth spurt took those away.

Jammers said:

All bets will be off with regards to Liza if in the next year like Mirai did at the same age she grows about 3, 4 inches. Remember how Mirai struggled the next year. And Mirai dominated the season before on the Junior GP then won Nationals and everyone was swooning over her as the next big thing. Mirai was even doing triple triples as a Junior but her growth spurt took those away.

Click to expand...

That's frankly not true. I remember being a big Nagasu fan when she came out on Nationals, and then the next year watching her in Juniors get a ton of downgrades. (she frankly got a downgrade at Junior Nationals too in the long). Her jumps were getting downgraded in the long left and right in the JGP. Flatt beat her in the long at JGPF, and Flatt and Zhang beat her at Junior worlds out right due to Nagasu's jump issues. And Nagasu didn't even debut on the JGP series the same time as Zhang did because Nagasu had a bad skate due to jumps, which left her out of Nationals the year before.

The point Mirai has many qualities over Nagasu. But Mirai's jumping issues existed when she was a Junior too. Its wrong to say her problems are just because of puberty.

Its hard to know with Elizaveta. But Elizaveta is a much better jumper than Nagasu was as a Junior. And reports are Elizaveta's family is tiny so she's not expected to become very big.

Time will tell re the Russian divas. I don't know whether it's too late now for Mirai -- she has talent to die for, but something is still holding her back. She had a great program going and then the fall. Did she lose focus? I guess that's why so much cred given to the Russians (they have that dance/ ballet tradition going and the coaching tradition, and generally the great hunger and focus). Of course, the Russians have only in the past 10 to 15 years become strong in men's singles. For women's singles, really outside of Irina S and Oksana B (both of whom had issues, i.e., Irina w/ artistry and Oksana with consistency on jumps and lack of strong combo jumps), Russia never had seriously strong competition in the ladies field traditionally as they did in pairs and dance (I haven't mentioned Butryskaya on purpose -- she succeeded that one year in spite of serious problems with jump technique). Now, however, there is a bumper crop of young gifted Russian ladies coming. It makes me wonder whether Russia purposely began molding young girls for singles, rather than more traditionally for pairs.

Art&Sport said:

Time will tell re the Russian divas. I don't know whether it's too late now for Mirai -- she has talent to die for, but something is still holding her back. She had a great program going and then the fall. Did she lose focus? I guess that's why so much cred given to the Russians (they have that dance/ ballet tradition going and the coaching tradition, and generally the great hunger and focus). Of course, the Russians have only in the past 10 to 15 years become strong in men's singles. For women's singles, really outside of Irina S and Oksana B (both of whom had issues, i.e., Irina w/ artistry and Oksana with consistency on jumps and lack of strong combo jumps), Russia never had seriously strong competition in the ladies field traditionally as they did in pairs and dance (I haven't mentioned Butryskaya on purpose -- she succeeded that one year in spite of serious problems with jump technique). Now, however, there is a bumper crop of young gifted Russian ladies coming. It makes me wonder whether Russia purposely began molding young girls for singles, rather than more traditionally for pairs.

Click to expand...

For Nagasu I think the main issue is her own work ethic, if Frank Carroll's words about Nagasu having a great season in the Olympics and having a hard time being motivated. That to me was a very telling statement about Nagasu, because I could not imagine someone like Kim, Tara, Kwan etc being satisfied with just 4th place finishes.

I think it didn't help that Mirai really doesn't have a whole lot pushing her in the US. She was anointed the great American hope after Vancover (and there you go). I wonder if she feels like at her best she could easily beat the other US girls so perhaps isn't as hugely motivated to continue to improve/work on those issues. She does look much better this year though thank goodness.

In contrast I think with the young Russian ladies, they all have so much depth in Russia that it will be a dog fight literally to even make it to the Senior internationals. I think they have enough depth where one or two will make it into the Senior scene. They will have to work hard.

As for the is the Russians purposely now molding girls for singles than they are for pairs/dance. I actually wonder if its more the fact that figure skating is such a huge sport in Russia. And now that the economy is better there more parents are putting their girls especially in skating. (I know someone at a gymnastic board said that a lot of parents want their daughters to take either ballet, figure skating, or Rythmic gymnastics.) A more capitalistic system I think gives more people an opportunity to try. Add in the government though it seems from what I've read being willing to fund the more talented ones. Gives the Russians i suspect a growing talent pool. Ladies singles I think develop faster than the other disciplines, which may be why we are seeing them first. Provided too I suspect a lot more freedom to choose to the parents/skaters.

I'd imagine that eventually some of those Russian babies will be moving to pairs... But I really have a sinking feeling that we may be seeing the beginnings of a real powerhouse. That sport is so popular, Ice Age stars are household names it seems. Far more popular than the US. They have a much bigger population than lets say Japan (and combined if the government is willing to give some support to the talented ones). All I think can equal the beginnings of a very strong system with what may be a big talent pool. They may very well be able to convince a lot of their coaches to come back. Because if the coaches can make the same amount of money coaching talented kids than they will coaching the less talented kids. The coaches will choose the talented kids, and results. In a lot of cases...

Art&Sport said:

Time will tell re the Russian divas. I don't know whether it's too late now for Mirai -- she has talent to die for, but something is still holding her back. She had a great program going and then the fall. Did she lose focus? I guess that's why so much cred given to the Russians (they have that dance/ ballet tradition going and the coaching tradition, and generally the great hunger and focus). Of course, the Russians have only in the past 10 to 15 years become strong in men's singles. For women's singles, really outside of Irina S and Oksana B (both of whom had issues, i.e., Irina w/ artistry and Oksana with consistency on jumps and lack of strong combo jumps), Russia never had seriously strong competition in the ladies field traditionally as they did in pairs and dance (I haven't mentioned Butryskaya on purpose -- she succeeded that one year in spite of serious problems with jump technique). Now, however, there is a bumper crop of young gifted Russian ladies coming. It makes me wonder whether Russia purposely began molding young girls for singles, rather than more traditionally for pairs.

Click to expand...

Just wanted to point out that Oksana Baiul is Ukrainian and skated for Ukraine-not Russia.