Problems with dominations of certain countries

This may just be a thing of mine, but I do worry about it. At the Olympic's in 2014 the Dutch won far too may medals at speed skating, mostly at long track but also some at short track. Personally, I didn't much care as my sport to watch is Figure Skating, and not some dumb speedy thing. In fact, I was pleased the Dutch won less Olympic medals in South Korea than four years earlier in Sochi because it just feels wrong when one country has sweeps, gets a majority of the golds and so on. A bit of domination is fine. If it happens once, but when it happens all the time worries come to the fore. I understood perfectly when ISU officials made remarks and commented on the Dutch dominance in some disciplines. And consequently changed some of the formats.

In Figure skating the Dutch aren't present very much, but the competitions are dominated by Russians, Americans, Canadian and Chinese (pairs especially). I love it, especially the pairs (where Germans won the Olympics, which was a wonderful outcome in this case) and definitely love all the good skaters. Especially in pairs. However, not one ISU offical makes remarks, comments and wants to change things despite the ladies division (and to a certain extent the pairs too) being totally dominated by one country for quite some time. Don't get me wrong: I think the Russian skaters, whatever the discipline, are very, very good and deserve medals. But sweeps (very prominent in juniors especially) aren't considered a problem according to the officials. I haven't heard complaints about the Junior Pairs Grand Prix Final being dominated by Russian Pairs. And of course the skaters in question aren't sport wise doing anything wrong, because they're definitely the best. No arguments there.

I'm not one of the people convinced that the judging is biased or whatever. But why is it a problem to be dominating in speed skating (and I agree that it's not good to have one country leading the way all the time), but it isn't presumably in Figure Skating? I tend to be totally in agreement with posters here who would like to see the best skaters, and not so much the best skaters per country, worldwide and I know that at least in 2 disciplines the Russians are the best (definitely), but why is that okay in Figure Skating but not in any other discipline? Why is it a problem if The Netherlands sweeps a podium in Speed Skating but it isn't when a Russian or American team does the same thing? Not to devalue any skater of skating couple, but I don't get it. There's even been quite a few speed skating presidents of the ISU (and the current one is both speed skating heritage and Dutch) with all its handicaps.

Sorry guys, I don't mean to whine (though it may look like it) but I just don't understand that dominance of one country is a problem in speed skating but not in another discipline. I could of course put forward the same arguments for South Korea but then I would refer to Short track speed skating......

It’s a problem when a country dominates *and the sport isn’t considered global enough* on a commercial level, i.e. doesn’t attract enough viewers = make money. Few people watch sports their own country isn’t any good at (with figure skating, we are exceptions to the rule, and point to fact, how many people watched Formula 1 racing here before Max? I still don’t, but again, I’m an exception to the rule).

Sure is a good thing some Dutchies played coach for skaters from Asian countries and generate interest there for long track.

Figure skating is much more global than speed skating. It attracts viewers from across the globe, whereas big speed skating events... well, big tournaments in the Netherlands have full crowds, but elsewhere...?

From my own point of view, I like to see many countries share the podium. I would have liked to have seen three different countries on the men's podium last year and three different countries on the women's podium. I loooove:luv17: seeing smaller countries with skaters entered in events. It makes me happy

It probably diminishes popularity in the US that there is not a senior ladies skater contending for the title, but only from an accessibility standpoint. Local skaters = easier coverage and more coverage.

That said, because of that, no one "on the street" in the US (that is, not on a figure skating forum) could identify the World ladies podium from last year absent the Olympics connection. No one cares that Russia has more ladies on the podium, because no one knows I will pay you a thousand dollars if you would find anyone, *anyone*, in the city of Bethlehem who can identify Alexandra Trusova. Or even recognizes the name.

Nathan Chen might, might, have some visibility (mens skating is always less popular) as the champion skater who goes to Yale, but it's still not enormous. And no one is running around going, yippee yay two USA men on the world's podium, we rock. Figure skating doesn't do that here

But like I said, I love seeing the wealth spread around, I love seeing unexpected results, I love seeing an Ivan Shmuratko or an Alessia Tornaghi on the podium. Diversity can only make the sport stronger in the long run:thumbsup:

ladyjane said:

However, not one ISU offical makes remarks, comments and wants to change things despite the ladies division (and to a certain extent the pairs too) being totally dominated by one country for quite some time.

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Just as an aside, the ISU is making efforts to get more people into pairs, because the discipline has withered a bit in recent years as ice dance has risen in popularity.

But to the main point, I don't think ladies or pairs has been dominated by one country (Russia, in this case) to an exclusionary degree. If we begin post-2014, Russia has won 7 of the last 15 medals in ladies; now, 4 of those 7 were gold, so the topline is pretty formidable, but that has still left room for three medals apiece for Canada and Japan and one each for the USA and Kazakhstan. Japan's still got heavyweights in the ring, Korea is a rising power, and the US just got its own long-term hopeful.

In pairs, it's even more the case; Russia hasn't won the World pairs title since 2013; in the years since, two wins apiece for Germany, Canada and China. In the general estimation, the top three teams in the world at this moment are, respectively, Chinese, Russian and French. Only 4 of the last 15 World medals went to Russian pairs.

Now, if you're talking about juniors, yes, Russian absolutely dominates junior pairs (and junior ladies, but even this season on the JGP you're seeing the corrective as other countries start to wheel out their response contenders). It often takes until the senior level for many other countries to catch up. Obviously for competition's sake we'd all like to see more elite junior pairs from other countries, but a lot of that is down to differences in how training and organization.

ladyjane said:

But why is it a problem to be dominating in speed skating ... but it isn't presumably in Figure Skating?

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For me the difference is in the essence of these two sports. Figure skating is about both physical achievement and art. That already sets it apart from speed skating. Could you imagine gala performances or shows for speed skaters? There is also a big difference in the physical part. There is much more risk in figure skating than in speed skating. How often do top speed skaters fall or do wrong movements? As a result, when one country dominates speed skating you know in advance that it will win. And moreover, you can be more or less sure who will win. Hence, having something like GP prediction game that we have here would be meaningless. What you are left to see is quite repetitive (I could even say "boring") movements from 30 seconds to 12 minutes with the known in advance outcome. Now go the last 2 -3 seasons and look up GP preidction game results. With all the so-called Russian dominance ladies' results were absolutely unpredictable...


Short track is different. They do fall in short track so that sometimes there are very curious outcomes...

For a record, I have nothing against speed skating. After 5 years in figure skating I was 3 years in speed skating.

ladyjane said:

Sorry guys, I don't mean to whine (though it may look like it) but I just don't understand that dominance of one country is a problem in speed skating but not in another discipline. I could of course put forward the same arguments for South Korea but then I would refer to Short track speed skating......

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Or Russia in rhythmic gymnastics.
I guess, it's simply not all countries are the same.

Why dominance is a problem at all though?
If it’s a tradition in a country, they developed and invested money in training facilities and development of that sport in their country, they should deservedly be ripping the benefits from that.
Netherlands had a long lasting tradition of long distance speed skating from skating on frozen canals, the have a lot of big sized rinks, they invested heavily in that sport, and now they are winning because of that.
If some countries are concerned they aren’t as dominant in certain sport, it’s up to them to develop that.

I just don’t see the problem, at all. If countries dominate, well because they did more than some other counties to be able to do well in that sport. Netherlands dominate in speed skating, a ton of other countries in other disciplines (Kenians running, etc), why single out Netherlands?

i agree that JGPF with pretty much only russian skaters is not as interesting as it could be as some skaters from other countries are competitive enough at times .... but not in pairs... Russian junior pairs are much better than others... however, this gets nomalized : often with Russian pairs, the boy is in his last year of eligibility and the girl pretty young... they are put together for a while but will not remain together as they will not age out together.... some girls get new junior partners, the guys move on to senior and find also a new partner... and some also retire from all the mixing up of people...

I do personally think that this is a great way to learn the sport and excel at a younger level... but perhaps not the best way to create chemistry in the long term.

HOWEVER, moving from this specific discipline and to answer your question in a global manner : ISU has some rules to prevent domination. In seniors, only 3 skaters can compete at major events.... so from the 10-12 great pairs that were juniors, only 3 will be competing later on...
I believe that ISU and all sports, including speed skating should follow swimming in which ONLY TWO athletes can compete in the biggest events like worlds and olympic games...

but then, people would complain saying that the third Russian or Japanese skater is so much better than both skaters from other countries....

I agree with you, I don't like podium sweeps... especially in judged sports....I would be fine with 2 skaters per event... but from my years on this forum where people have often dissed the third canadian lady, I know that many prefer to see the best athletes winning, no matter the country.

I think that some fans are like that, but I also think that for many fans, they relate a lot to sports where their athletes are competitive... for instance, I have watched artistic gymnastics forever... Canada is not a strength but once in a while, an athlete would win an individual medal... and lately, our girls are getting better... but rhythmic gymnastic??? snoozefest for me... I am not intrigued by the sport at all, and there is no athlete from Canada who is good enough to make me more curious to watch it... so forget hoops and clubs... i am bored... i think that figure skating has the advantage of having contenders from MANY countries in the Senior event....

Problem is, most federations lack the means and funds of long term planning, if their governors have solid long term plans in the first place.


The Tutberidze Effect can be applied anywhere at any time.
But what federation has the necessary dedication for a 10 years plan?
What federation doesn't depend on volatile government (read tax paying voters) support for sports?
What federation can attract long term sponsors and media interest to promote their sport?

Russian athletes in general are very fortunate their government is interested in promoting its international prestige through sports. Their culture dates back to USSR days.

It's an issue that really bothers me because if someone is ahead, you shouldn't try to hammer down that person but rather it's up to the others to push it harder and learn from who's ahead of you.

Rules to prevent dominations changing scoring system in order to favour certain skaters is borderline cheating to me.

So for me personally i'm not against country domination.

Is it a problem commercially? Well in the case OP brought up about russian ladies you saw this season at JGP Chelyabinsk i don't remember the last time i saw a crowd that packed for a JGP event; or the test skates, people are interested to watch these skaters, they go to the competitions, in general we all want to see the top athletes competing regardless of which country they come from.

On that topic (commercial success) there are a number of issues ISU should address around its website and the difficulty on finding all the informations you need to know, and even down to their youtube channels: ISU channels aren't as popular in terms of views and subscribers (and that goes to things like the youtube algorithm, how often you upload contents, at which hours of the day, how interesting is that content,...).

For instance there isn't an official way to rewatch performances from senior skaters at Grand Prix events, you have to wait someone to upload those videos, dealing with copyright issues which damages those channels (through demonetization, limiting access to the platform, and ban if you get 3-4 of those).

In any sport, I'm all for the best athletes winning. If they're all from the same country, too bad. We're going to hold them back because of where they're from?

That being said, I do find too many podium sweeps boring, but the skaters standing on those podiums sure don't, and that should be what matters: what's fair to the athletes who probably put their literal blood, sweat, and tears into getting there. It's not like they're not going to show the others. Anyone bored with podium sweeps can go back and watch their favorites instead of staying tuned for the medal ceremonies.

Now, small fed bias or bias against certain skaters, on the other hand. Don't get me started...

well, domination can be bad for government funded athletes like in the model Canada (and many other countries) use...

Canadian athletes who have no chance to medal get less funding... let alone those who have no chance of a top ten...

It is even worse with sports that are not traditionally popular and successful for Canada...

Concrete example : ladies in downhill skiing are not performing lately... their money was allotted to other disciplines which meant no funding for some athletes.... one of them (Yurkiw) had to fund their own way to just compete on the circuit....

So, let's say that ISU went the opposite way and allowed as many Russians and Japanese ladies on the senior circuit... Canadian ladies, when there is no Osmond for instance, would see themselves outside of top ten... the funding would get cut.... and the SPORT would suffer.

We can say the same with allowing as many US and Canadian dance teams to compete.... Ice dance would lose support in other countries.

As a whole, the sport grows when competitors from the entire planet develop. Long term is the vision.. that's why some sports were nixed for instance, like ski ballet which was a completely North American dominated sport... gone...

Balance is good.

4everchan said:

well, domination can be bad for government funded athletes like in the model Canada (and many other countries) use...

Canadian athletes who have no chance to medal get less funding... let alone those who have no chance of a top ten...

It is even worse with sports that are not traditionally popular and successful for Canada...

Concrete example : ladies in downhill skiing are not performing lately... their money was allotted to other disciplines which meant no funding for some athletes.... one of them (Yurkiw) had to fund their own way to just compete on the circuit....

So, let's say that ISU went the opposite way and allowed as many Russians and Japanese ladies on the senior circuit... Canadian ladies, when there is no Osmond for instance, would see themselves outside of top ten... the funding would get cut.... and the SPORT would suffer.

We can say the same with allowing as many US and Canadian dance teams to compete.... Ice dance would lose support in other countries.

As a whole, the sport grows when competitors from the entire planet develop. Long term is the vision.. that's why some sports were nixed for instance, like ski ballet which was a completely North American dominated sport... gone...

Balance is good.

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This logic exists not that I agree with it. My view is that for the state financing there should be some goal. National pride or national health are quite legitimate goals. But national pride is about podiums. Everyday people would not care less if a skater was 9th or 11th so that getting into top-10 cannot be a goal per se. What we have this season is Medvedeva, Tuktamysheva, Kostornaya, and Scherbakova fighting for 1 spot. Each of them are way stronger than any of acting Canadian ladies. 3 of them will have to watch the worlds on TV while those Canadian ladies will compete for a place in Top-10. I am sure that even Canadian figure skating fans would rather see if Medvedeva skates clean with new combos, or Tuktamysheva lands cleanly all her triple axels, or Scherbakova jumps the quads, or just enjoy Kostornaya's skating. I personally always watch the best non-Russian skaters and often enjoy them starting with Mao and going through today with Rika and Bradie. But I skip early groups because the difference is so striking and life is too short.

It's a vicious circle, and it happens to some sports in every country, and pretty much every sport in some countries. A nation has less stars/winners, so interest wanes, so people support it less, so less funding is made available, so less stars/winners get their chance, so interest wanes... which is sad when it's one you follow, but it's the nature of it.

In my opinion, it's not the podiums per se, it's the possible podiums, if everyone knows that the only possible medallists will be all from one or two countries, the rest of the world will turn off. And off. And off. (Especially when, as with Tutberidze's teens, from an outside perspective they are all much of a muchness looks/personality/style wise). Whereas if there's a mix of possibles... there's the chance of a mix of audience, of getting folk engaged through cheering their own enough to follow the rest. Which is why the limits for Worlds/Olympics makes sense from a business POV.

Being skating, personality comes into it even more than in most sports but you've got to get the audience to see the person.

[email protected] said:

Each of them are way stronger than any of acting Canadian ladies. 3 of them will have to watch the worlds on TV while those Canadian ladies will compete for a place in Top-10. I am sure that even Canadian figure skating fans would rather see if Medvedeva skates clean with new combos, or Tuktamysheva lands cleanly all her triple axels, or Scherbakova jumps the quads, or just enjoy Kostornaya's skating.

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Err... we wish. That's not how it works, try checking a sport where your country is comparitively weak (swimming, perhaps? basketball? I don't actually know) and how many of your people would rather watch the foreign champions there.

But then again, as el henry said, look at the lack of interest in the US despite Nathan Chen or even in Nathan Chen. He and Zhou have actually done little to raise the sport's profile or popularity. So podiums aren't everything... it's not a simple matter.

[email protected] said:

This logic exists not that I agree with it. My view is that for the state financing there should be some goal. National pride or national health are quite legitimate goals. But national pride is about podiums. Everyday people would not care less if a skater was 9th or 11th so that getting into top-10 cannot be a goal per se. What we have this season is Medvedeva, Tuktamysheva, Kostornaya, and Scherbakova fighting for 1 spot. Each of them are way stronger than any of acting Canadian ladies. 3 of them will have to watch the worlds on TV while those Canadian ladies will compete for a place in Top-10. I am sure that even Canadian figure skating fans would rather see if Medvedeva skates clean with new combos, or Tuktamysheva lands cleanly all her triple axels, or Scherbakova jumps the quads, or just enjoy Kostornaya's skating. I personally always watch the best non-Russian skaters and often enjoy them starting with Mao and going through today with Rika and Bradie. But I skip early groups because the difference is so striking and life is too short.

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I think that depends on how much a figure skating fan someone is, while I want to see the American skaters do well - I don't particularly root for them all that much to win in competitions with skaters that I prefer more. But casual viewers and who the sport needs to watch more, they probably root for their home country's skaters.

TallyT said:

But then again, as el henry said, look at the lack of interest in the US despite Nathan Chen or even in Nathan Chen. He and Zhou have actually done little to raise the sport's profile or popularity. So podiums aren't everything... it's not a simple matter.

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el henry said:

From my own point of view, I like to see many countries share the podium. I would have liked to have seen three different countries on the men's podium last year and three different countries on the women's podium. I loooove:luv17: seeing smaller countries with skaters entered in events. It makes me happy

It probably diminishes popularity in the US that there is not a senior ladies skater contending for the title, but only from an accessibility standpoint. Local skaters = easier coverage and more coverage.

That said, because of that, no one "on the street" in the US (that is, not on a figure skating forum) could identify the World ladies podium from last year absent the Olympics connection. No one cares that Russia has more ladies on the podium, because no one knows I will pay you a thousand dollars if you would find anyone, *anyone*, in the city of Bethlehem who can identify Alexandra Trusova. Or even recognizes the name.

Nathan Chen might, might, have some visibility (mens skating is always less popular) as the champion skater who goes to Yale, but it's still not enormous. And no one is running around going, yippee yay two USA men on the world's podium, we rock. Figure skating doesn't do that here

But like I said, I love seeing the wealth spread around, I love seeing unexpected results, I love seeing an Ivan Shmuratko or an Alessia Tornaghi on the podium. Diversity can only make the sport stronger in the long run:thumbsup:

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It's a bit unfortunate that Alysa Liu isn't senior eligible for 2 more years; otherwise the US media and thus some popularity might be able to capitalize on the technical revolution that is happening in ladies figure skating. Unfortunately she'll be senior in 2 years when its not such a ground-breaking achievement for ladies skaters.

TallyT said:

Err... we wish. That's not how it works, try checking a sport where your country is comparitively weak (swimming, perhaps? basketball? I don't actually know) and how many of your people would rather watch the foreign champions there.

But then again, as el henry said, look at the lack of interest in the US despite Nathan Chen or even in Nathan Chen. He and Zhou have actually done little to raise the sport's profile or popularity. So podiums aren't everything... it's not a simple matter.

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Nathan has actually raise the sports profile.

I actually been a fan of women figure skating but then Nathan actually added excitement to mens.

Also mens figure skating became the highlighted center NBC broadcasting compared to women's. As NBC put the mens on the prime spot compared to womens before.

And this happen when Nathan came along.

[email protected] said:

This logic exists not that I agree with it. My view is that for the state financing there should be some goal. National pride or national health are quite legitimate goals. But national pride is about podiums. Everyday people would not care less if a skater was 9th or 11th so that getting into top-10 cannot be a goal per se. What we have this season is Medvedeva, Tuktamysheva, Kostornaya, and Scherbakova fighting for 1 spot. Each of them are way stronger than any of acting Canadian ladies. 3 of them will have to watch the worlds on TV while those Canadian ladies will compete for a place in Top-10. I am sure that even Canadian figure skating fans would rather see if Medvedeva skates clean with new combos, or Tuktamysheva lands cleanly all her triple axels, or Scherbakova jumps the quads, or just enjoy Kostornaya's skating. I personally always watch the best non-Russian skaters and often enjoy them starting with Mao and going through today with Rika and Bradie. But I skip early groups because the difference is so striking and life is too short.

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ermmmm the sport goes into cycles... a few years back, Russian ladies didn't do well.. it took sochi to motivate the state to fund the sport like it did .... so if back then, a gazillion american (and other more successful countries) had had an unlimited pool at worlds, i am not sure even the russian government would have dared to fund the russian ladies... it s thanks to the ones who were fighting for top ten that a hope was seen for better days....

Russia and Canada are at polar opposites when it comes to sports funding... our national pride doesn't necessarily come from sport.... but without the ISU quota, the sport would die, trust me... and if it is too bad for the Russian ladies staying at home, well the Canadians ladies did earn their 2 spots to go to home-worlds -not 3.... and I can guarantee you that the home-crowd will be excited to see these two ladies over a young russian skater they have never heard of... most people outside of hardcore skating fans do not even know about the tutberidze girls and still talk about the little girl with a red coat....

I agree that quotas are necessary to keep the sport alive and to get more new fans. I'd be excited to see 24 very best skaters at Worlds even if most of them came from 2-3 countries, but I doubt a casual person would enjoy a competition with very few different flags near skaters' names. Not to mention the reason why FS is broadcast in some countries is only because a native skater is skating there.

Also, as one user mentioned before, more skaters from a few strong countries would mean that FS would regress in smaller ones. Rinks are quite expensive and if someone responsible doesn't see any motivation to fund figure skaters (if no skater gets to Worlds/4CC/Euros for example), the funding will be cut and the rinks will simply be given to hockey, curling, casual skating and so on.

well ... In some level I agree we have to have define numbers for others countries... but i think they should have away for other countries have more skaters like for example who wins euros, 4 cc, the finalist of the grand prix, ... have a sure place in worlds