2018-19 European Ladies' figure skating | Page 4 | Golden Skate

2018-19 European Ladies' figure skating

TGee

Record Breaker
Joined
Sep 17, 2016
Who is Loena's coach? I do remember this skater, hopefully some more prestigious coaches/choreographers can work with her.
Leona's great...and has come very far (as has her brother) with virtually no support from her country for many years.

Her story, and Carolina's, seem to show that there is a long way to go for figure skating to break into public consciousness.

I thought the earlier suggestion of a European-only series -- perhaps advanced novice and junior - sounds really smart.

Russia and Canada have domestic series, and there is also a North American Series at the novice level.

So, at this point skaters from other European countries have fewer early season strength-on-stength events to help them develop.

But how to fund the skaters and coaches to get there?

(Edited to fix spelling of Loena's name. My predictive spelling is stuck on Français and I'm fighting it all the way. Thanks for the catch.)
 

hanca

Record Breaker
Joined
Sep 23, 2008
European figure skating needs to be collectively reformed just like US figure skating just reformed itself. I honestly think there needs to be a European development meta-federation... one that put's on a European novice and junior championship and/or it's own internal grand prix(like Russia's Cup of Russia events) and then gives funds to those who do well. And maybe have it serve as a qualifier for junior worlds and/or the junior grand prix as IMO there are too many skaters at the events IMO. I honestly think many of these skaters would have more fun in a "euro skate league" rather than going to grand prix events/junior worlds and then getting wrecked by Russians. Figure skating would be better for spectators with more Europeans who are competitive, fewer non-competitive Europeans at the big events, and some specialized events for the mid level skaters.
you know, I am sure you mean well, but this sentence sounds so arrogant! So you know how to fix European skating. And in your view, all the European countries need to unite and create a bigger skating federation. Because that worked so well for the USA, right? So where are the US ladies that are fighting for podium at worlds? Where are the US pairs that are contenders for worlds medals? USA has one decent man and several decent ice dance couples. I am not sure that is a proof of how well things work in the USA where there is one huge skating federation. Maybe when USA have contenders in all categories, it may be time to give their model as an example for other countries to follow, but until then...
 

NaVi

Medalist
Joined
Oct 30, 2014
you know, I am sure you mean well, but this sentence sounds so arrogant! So you know how to fix European skating. And in your view, all the European countries need to unite and create a bigger skating federation. Because that worked so well for the USA, right? So where are the US ladies that are fighting for podium at worlds? Where are the US pairs that are contenders for worlds medals? USA has one decent man and several decent ice dance couples. I am not sure that is a proof of how well things work in the USA where there is one huge skating federation. Maybe when USA have contenders in all categories, it may be time to give their model as an example for other countries to follow, but until then...

I am not calling for a pan-european federation... if I wanted that I would have just said that.... I'm just asking for greater coordination in development including putting on meaningful events.
 

TGee

Record Breaker
Joined
Sep 17, 2016
I am not calling for a pan-european federation... if I wanted that I would have just said that.... I'm just asking for greater coordination in development including putting on meaningful events.
I may be wrong on the history, but my sense of it is that before the JGP and Challenger B series took off, the events in these series provided much of the early season competition opportunities for skaters in smaller federations.

But now, skaters from the larger federations come to these European events having already debuted their programs as summer series and/or test skates / high performance camps. More, the skaters who get the assignments have to have earned a berth to compete out-of-country which is no small feat in a large federation.

I can see how it could be discouraging to local European skaters, especially when one of these events is really the first opportunity for feedback from ISU level judges.

So, some coordination and European-only events or series at the lower competitive levels may be among possible options...
 

hanca

Record Breaker
Joined
Sep 23, 2008
I am not calling for a pan-european federation... if I wanted that I would have just said that.... I'm just asking for greater coordination in development including putting on meaningful events.

So why create yet another organisation that will be squeezing money out of skating federations, if the organisation and sport development is the role of ISU?
 

TGee

Record Breaker
Joined
Sep 17, 2016
So why create yet another organisation that will be squeezing money out of skating federations, if the organisation and sport development is the role of ISU?
One doesn't need to create a whole organization and formal structure.

USFA and Skate Canada cooperate and co-designate certain summer competitions. There is as I noted above a North American summer series at the Novice level that requires no special supernational organization.

That said, sometimes pooling resources can be helpful for smaller countries. It's an economies-of-scale issue.

It's not the role of the ISU to fill the role of the national federations, but smaller federations are disadvantaged in terms of summer series, updating curricula and creating training resources, getting the sports science to coaches and novice/junior skaters etc.
 

NaVi

Medalist
Joined
Oct 30, 2014
I can see how it could be discouraging to local European skaters, especially when one of these events is really the first opportunity for feedback from ISU level judges.

So, some coordination and European-only events or series at the lower competitive levels may be among possible options...

I'm less worried about senior skaters than I am with novice and juniors... and most(greater than 50%) novice and junior events in Europe don't have any skaters from countries other than Europe. The problem is that the events are practically meaningless. The best skaters in Europe don't ever skate against each other.
 

TGee

Record Breaker
Joined
Sep 17, 2016
I'm less worried about senior skaters than I am with novice and juniors... and most(greater than 50%) novice and junior events in Europe don't have any skaters from countries other than Europe. The problem is that the events are practically meaningless. The best skaters in Europe don't ever skate against each other.
Yes, it's critical to bring the stronger skaters together.

That's the exact reason why Canada set up the national summer series a few years back and is cooperating with the US on the revitalizing Novice series.

Travel across North America is expensive so skaters weren't seeing one another. Up until recently, many of the strong skaters did not see each other until the prenationals qualifier.

The Canadian summer series has only 5 geographically spread out events and participants have to compete in at least 2 competitions.

With international assignments on the line depending on their ranking in the series, as well as funding and other supports, skaters will make sure to get there.

The cross border series bring together skaters who wouldn't otherwise see each other until JGPs.

Yes, these are very large competitions with many flights in ladies, but they seem to be game changers. Minto Summer Skate, which opened the season and the Canadian series, had about 1000 registered skaters from pre-juvenile to senior with about 1500 judged performances.

The other solution is Ted Barton's: livestream the summer series events. (Ted is director of British Columbia section...mountains, fjords, difficult winter travel...his commitment to using technology is based in experience.).

With livestream, the skaters and coaches can see the competition early. But it doesn't sound like this has been instituted in Europe outside of major ISU events.
 

Weathergal

Medalist
Joined
May 25, 2014
Who is Leona's coach? I do remember this skater, hopefully some more prestigious coaches/choreographers can work with her.

Loena (ugh I just realized I accidentally misspelled her name earlier) is coached by Carine Herrygers, the same coach as her brother Jorick. As for choreographers, I know she works at least sometimes with Adam Solya. I thought she had two solid programs last season.
 

[email protected]

Medalist
Record Breaker
Joined
Mar 26, 2014
The key thing is the number of kids entering the sport. It is driven by prestige, cost and infrastructure. If parents believe that FS is a costly low prestige sport with difficulties to pursue because of the lack of rinks, no coordination or new competitions will help.
 

TGee

Record Breaker
Joined
Sep 17, 2016
The key thing is the number of kids entering the sport. It is driven by prestige, cost and infrastructure. If parents believe that FS is a costly low prestige sport with difficulties to pursue because of the lack of rinks, no coordination or new competitions will help.
Agreed that low numbers at entry and sparse facilities will greatly reduce the potential pool.

However, these are well known challenges even in 'big' skating federations.

Coordination and competitions can maximize the achievements of the available pool and raise the profile, and the prestige.

But more to the point, high quality basic skating lessons offered by professional coaches at a young age -- promoted to help with all skating sports (Hockey, speed, and figure skating) greatly increase the pool of skaters, and take advantage of available infrastructure.

Both Canada and the US have made bottom up reforms to their basic skating in the past 5 years to promote better and more rapid progress while keeping kids having fun. I haven't heard of similar reforms in Europe.
 

NaVi

Medalist
Joined
Oct 30, 2014
Anastasiia Arkhipova has her best opportunity thus far to get junior grand prix medal... here's hoping she does well.
 

Tolstoj

Record Breaker
Joined
Nov 21, 2015
I didn't know Lucrezia Beccari changed coach this season, she is with Franca now.

She is attempting the 3ltz this season (and hopefully 3-3)
 

GS Forum Staff

Record Breaker
Joined
Jan 11, 2008
Competition chat

Just a reminder:pray:

Please keep all competition chat in the Competition forums. This includes scores, starting orders, elements, links to videos, etc. Once the entire event is over, feel free to discuss in other Fan Fest, national threads, etc.

Should we find that folks are still discussing competition info in these threads, said threads will be closed until after the competition.

Thanks for you understanding and for supporting Golden Skate!
 
Last edited by a moderator:

TGee

Record Breaker
Joined
Sep 17, 2016
Just a reminder:pray:

Please keep all competition chat in the Competition forums. This includes scores, starting orders, elements, links to videos, etc. Once the entire event is over, feel free to discuss in other Fan Fest, national threads, etc.

Should we find that folks are still discussing competition info in these threads, said threads will be closed until after the competition.

Thanks for you understanding and for supporting Golden Skate!
So, sincerely.

It's not okay to thank someone here for pointing out a promising small federation skater that I wouldn't have known about otherwise?

And noting that she placed well?
 

DSQ

Record Breaker
Joined
Apr 14, 2018
Country
United-Kingdom
The key thing is the number of kids entering the sport. It is driven by prestige, cost and infrastructure. If parents believe that FS is a costly low prestige sport with difficulties to pursue because of the lack of rinks, no coordination or new competitions will help.

In the UK there are tons of kids skating at nationals, upwards of thirty or forty, but the numbers drop off a lot when we get to Junior and Senior levels.

So it’s not necessarily just about kids entering the sport but having support from the Association to keep at it.
 

j00mla

Made in USSR
Final Flight
Joined
Jan 2, 2017
Since Israeli skating refers to Europe, I would like to draw your attention to Alina Soupian. She trained and trains in St Petersburg, her native language is Russian (I heard she told "privet" to her parents when sitting in K&C). In addition to a good school of skating, I noticed her emotions, she gives the impression of a very stubborn athlete, prone to perfectionism, and reminds me Trusova in this aspect.

Social Media
IG - https://www.instagram.com/alinasupian2004/
 
Top