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- Mar 23, 2014
Sorry, I am not well-informed about the Russian junior scene other than the top ladies - does Eteri currently have a top junior prospect for next season if all of the senior age-eligible girls move up?
2018-19 Russian Ladies' figure skating
- Thread starter Spirals for Miles
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- Oct 20, 2017
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She has several - Kamila Valieva, Daria Usacheva, and Maya Kromykh. Kamila is the one who is getting the most buzz though.
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- Apr 26, 2018
Kamila Valieva and Daria Usacheva are the ones I know about. Kamila performed at the Rostelecom Gala. She‘s the one with the insane flexibility.
Kamila:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=a8ehFx7fb8o
Daria:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3UUILIX11PM
I think they‘re both really talented and can dominate juniors easily. There‘s also Ksenia Sinitsyna and Alena Kanysheva who have to stay juniors for another season. And I suspect Anastasia Tarakanova will stay in juniors as well. They aren‘t Eteri girls, though.
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- Feb 27, 2014
Can Anna be part-time senior and part-time junior next year? isn't that what they did with Gubanova this year although Nastya hasnt skated juniors much if at all?
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- Dec 29, 2013
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Yes...she’ll be eligible to do Senior GP and then come back and do JWC. You can’t do JGP and Senior GP though as I understand it.
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- Mar 23, 2014
Thank you both for educating me! We've had two years of Kostornaia, Shcherbakova, Trusova dominance so I wasn't sure who was next in the pipeline.
Kanysheva is my fave non-Eteri girl. I'm looking forward to seeing what she can do next season since I think she will have much more pressure after her first successful junior season.
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- Feb 27, 2014
Amazing interview. Alina tells it like it is in typical Russian fashion.
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- Mar 26, 2014
I think, that Daniil just builds on "Averbukh's heritage". I remember when we saw ladies in Sochi my wife who had 0 previous experience in figure skating said that Yulia was different from others, "queens" included because during her program something was happenning every second unlike those others. We call it transitions here. And it was Averbukh who started that. Daniil followed and I think that he is a talented pupil. Anyway, their style is quite similar so that I see no particular difference for Alina. But why not for a change?
Seriously, I don’t understand why people are so desperate to have a “dominant No.1” in ladies all the time. Have people forgotten when there was actually competition at big events not so long ago? Think mao vs. yuna and kwan vs. slutskaya before that. As a fan, those victories felt way more satisfying and earned than when one skater is expected to win everything all the time. Even in mens, where there has been a clear no.1 for many years now, he does not win every major competition, and upsets are more interesting.
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- Oct 30, 2012
I think based on statistics, recent taller Japanese ladies tend to lose jumping capability after the age of puberty. Japanese techniques work best for shorter ladies no matter their body type, probably because their height don't change as much. Mao is very tall among Japanese ladies and she jumped very differently from Mai, Kaori, Wakaba, Rika...
But Alina could be doing so much more. Phantom & Carmen are both so overused. I don’t think the mindset of her current team can take her to another level. Also, Eteri’s skaters normally don’t have long careers. If she’d like to have a longer career after she’s done competing, Eteri isn’t the one.
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no skaters have long career.
I recently collected data on all junior girls who medaled at junior grand prix over a period of 10 years.. Only 1 in 5 got any relevant medals at senior level.
Out of those, about half didn't win any major medals when they were 18 or older.
"Eteri skaters not having long careers" is pure BS and a myth. All coaches who train juniors end up with a horrible career length statistic, and tons of talented and promising juniors who didn't transition well into seniors. Actually American and Japanese junior ladies do somewhat worse than Russians in terms of transitioning to senior, and Eteri's girls are doing much better than russian average.
I am not sure where this myth came from, if it was a "fan" thing, or if it was because Eteri's juniors are brilliant and get a lot of spotlight that juniors usually don't get, as only hardcore fans follow them.
- Joined
- Apr 17, 2018
Carolina Kostner cares to disagree
Anyway, I also compiled stats of JGP medalists, and got a similar statistic, but I think coaching environments have a lot to do with it. For instance, with Eteri, once you reach let’s say like 19 and start struggling, I feel like looking at those thriving youngsters with their quads and 3As will have some toll on your self confidence. As Liza once said “being 21 in Russian figure skating is like being 40.”
And the reason we don’t think Eteri or junior coaches can coach someone past 18 is because they’ve never gotten the chance. Zhenya and Yulia left Eteri, and Panova and Davydov haven’t even had a senior skater yet. Who knows, maybe they’ve actually got good strategy!
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- Dec 21, 2014
I think it’s actually great for Alina to have a rivalry- it’s incredibly motivating and really pushes skaters to be their best. There have been so many great rivalries in skating- and winning against skaters who are equally as good as you is much more rewarding than running away with it.
Carolina Kostner cares to disagree
I really discount her 'long career' - her career length has really been aided from poor prospects in her country.
I don't think that's exclusive to Russian figure skating, figure skating at least since the mid-90s (can't really state before as I wasn't born) has always favored towards younger female skaters.
Speaking only towards Eteri - I think a lot of people look at her older skaters leaving her as they get older (in figure skating terms) as indicative of her strategy/methods not being designed for older skaters and/or an extended period of time in her system. Her 2 most known/successful skaters left her, both of whom we could probably make a fair assessment in saying that they were burnt out, and if I'm remembering correctly several of her other skaters have left with nagging injuries that seem to linger and contribute to careers ending.
But Averbukh at least designed the routines that it wasn't overkill on the transitions. Maybe if Daniil does some slower music for Alina like Shcherbakova and Alena K have there might be a different impression, but the more up-tempo songs that he has for Alina this year its overkill on the transitions, while for points it works (as long as she doesn't make mistakes and get behind) its not aesthetically pleasing. While his choreography is the main offender, I would love the ISU to implement some timing rules for something counting, she has some moves that she holds for a second, if that, I've said since she debuted POTO her Ina Bauer is choreographically sloppy she holds it so little, especially once she arches her back that it looks like she's having to come out of it because she's losing her balance.
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- Jan 10, 2014
You can discount her 'long career' all you want but the truth is she led the European Ladies for the better part of the two quads, from 2006-2014. During this period, she won the Euros 5 times and 5 World medals, including the title in 2012. The number of World medals she won are more than all the World medals the other European ladies have won combined during those two quads. Since her comeback, she has finished no lower than 6th and has not finished below 3 Russians at Euros, Worlds, or OG. Keep in mind that skating for a smaller federation also has its own sets of challenges, the relative lack of facilities and coaching choices for example. Early in her career, a landslide destroyed the rink she was training at and she ended up moving to train with Huth in Germany. She really deserves a lot more respect than some people give her, especially considering she's still competing in singles in her 30's.
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- Feb 14, 2018
If it's a friendly rivalry then I agree.
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- Mar 23, 2014
Agree. She hasn't had a lot of competition in her own country, but neither did Joshi Helgesson, Elena Gedevanishvili, Sonia Lafuente, or Angelīna Kučvaļska, and how many international medals do they have?
Russian ladies have a unique set of challenges given the depth of competition, but plenty of them have long careers, presumably because they love to skate. Leonova hasn't retired yet, right?
Carolina Kostner cares to disagree
Anyway, I also compiled stats of JGP medalists, and got a similar statistic, but I think coaching environments have a lot to do with it. For instance, with Eteri, once you reach let’s say like 19 and start struggling, I feel like looking at those thriving youngsters with their quads and 3As will have some toll on your self confidence. As Liza once said “being 21 in Russian figure skating is like being 40.”
And the reason we don’t think Eteri or junior coaches can coach someone past 18 is because they’ve never gotten the chance. Zhenya and Yulia left Eteri, and Panova and Davydov haven’t even had a senior skater yet. Who knows, maybe they’ve actually got good strategy!
Most skaters who didnt stop winning at 15 stop winning medals around 16-17-18-19 regardless of coach.
