Ic3Rabbit mentioned Japanese lady and I was replying to him. The Japanese citizenship is very hard to obtain if you are not born into it, and if by any chance you get it, you have to give up any other citizenships you may have. Even the children who were born to one parent Japanese and the other parent a foreigner, and therefore have two citizenship from birth, can keep them only until certain age (18 or 21, don’t remember which) and then they have to give up one of them.I may make myself look really dumb by saying this, but didn’t Savchenko/Massot get to compete in the olympics? Neither of them are from Germany!
Ic3Rabbit mentioned Japanese lady and I was replying to him. The Japanese citizenship is very hard to obtain if you are not born into it, and if by any chance you get it, you have to give up any other citizenships you may have. Even the children who were born to one parent Japanese and the other parent a foreigner, and therefore have two citizenship from birth, can keep them only until certain age (18 or 21, don’t remember which) and then they have to give up one of them.
Savchenko and Massot completed for a country who gives citizenship and does not mind someone having several citizenship. Yuko Kavaguti, when she got Russian citizenship, had to give up her Japanese one.
When this thread start about whether it is worth changing discipline if in your field it is really crowded, it is really a problem only in a handful of countries. Russia, Japan, and maybe USA and Canada, but both USA and Canada the fields are not as packed that one would struggle to get through. So most relevant it is for Russian ladies, Japanese ladies and Japanese men. That’s why the discussion about Japanese ladies. In Russia, finding a partner for pairs is doable if one is a consistent with jumps. For ice dance, if one leaves it to late teenage years, it can be too late because the same age kids are already winning GPF and junior world championship. For Japanese lady or man, it can be hard to find a partner within their country, and their training rinks are much more crowded than in the Europe or USA/Canada. It can be 20-30 people on the ice. Doing pairs in that would be dangerous. So that means practising abroad, and someone needs to fund it...
Just remembered, another example. Do you remember Russian Tkachenko skating with US Tobias for Israel? They were not bad, but Tkachenko did not get citizenship so they eventually retired. When one is switching country, it is quite a risk because no one, neither the skater nor the federation, can influence whether the skater will get the citizenship or not. Even Massot got his one on several attempts. Apparently there is a language requirement and he kept failing that!I may make myself look really dumb by saying this, but didn’t Savchenko/Massot get to compete in the olympics? Neither of them are from Germany!
I think doing ice dance wouldn’t be as problematic for Japanese ladies as doing pairs. Japanese male skaters are not particularly tall and seem to be on the skinny side, which wouldn’t matter in ice dance as much, so finding a partner would not necessarily be so hard. In pairs, one needs also someone tall and really strong. It would be hard for someone as skinny as Hanyu to be lifting a girl, because the girl, even a light pair girl, may weight the same what he does. So it would need finding a well build muscular men, like Chinese Han. If I was a Japanese skating federation and wanted to do well in olympic team event, I would line the men skaters, pick up 5-10 with the best pair-suitable figure, line the ladies and pick up the ones who are the tiniest for their age group. Match them and send them to Russia for training. They may not like it, but if it was all expenses paid and they had one in five (or one in ten) chance to get to the Olympics, they may try their best. Based on probability, 2-3 from five (or five from ten) would work out and I would have a few pairs ready including having some spare, in case of injuries. But for individuals to find a decent pair partner in Japan, when there is no tradition in this, it can be very hard.Thanks for your useful perspective! Apart from Shingo/Utana, I also see online that some fans want Moa Iwano and some other junior girls to switch to Ice Dance - and yes they're aware of the requisites within the Japan Fed. With the skating skills they're taught from a young age, they can transition perhaps with a lower level of effort than elsewhere. It's definitely the male part of those teams that's usually a question mark.
Ic3Rabbit mentioned Japanese lady and I was replying to him. The Japanese citizenship is very hard to obtain if you are not born into it, and if by any chance you get it, you have to give up any other citizenships you may have. Even the children who were born to one parent Japanese and the other parent a foreigner, and therefore have two citizenship from birth, can keep them only until certain age (18 or 21, don’t remember which) and then they have to give up one of them.
Savchenko and Massot competed for a country who gives citizenship and does not mind someone having several citizenship. Yuko Kavaguti, when she got Russian citizenship, had to give up her Japanese one.
When this thread start about whether it is worth changing discipline if in your field it is really crowded, it is really a problem only in a handful of countries. Russia, Japan, and maybe USA and Canada, but both USA and Canada the fields are not as packed that one would struggle to get through. So most relevant it is for Russian ladies, Japanese ladies and Japanese men. That’s why the discussion about Japanese ladies. In Russia, finding a partner for pairs is doable if one is a consistent with jumps. For ice dance, if one leaves it to late teenage years, it can be too late because the same age kids are already winning GPF and junior world championship. For Japanese lady or man, it can be hard to find a partner within their country, and their training rinks are much more crowded than in the Europe or USA/Canada. It can be 20-30 people on the ice. Doing pairs in that would be dangerous. So that means practising abroad, and someone needs to fund it...
I think doing ice dance wouldn’t be as problematic for Japanese ladies as doing pairs. Japanese male skaters are not particularly tall and seem to be on the skinny side, which wouldn’t matter in ice dance as much, so finding a partner would not necessarily be so hard. In pairs, one needs also someone tall and really strong. It would be hard for someone as skinny as Hanyu to be lifting a girl, because the girl, even a light pair girl, may weight the same what he does. So it would need finding a well build muscular men, like Chinese Han. If I was a Japanese skating federation and wanted to do well in olympic team event, I would line the men skaters, pick up 5-10 with the best pair-suitable figure, line the ladies and pick up the ones who are the tiniest for their age group. Match them and send them to Russia for training. They may not like it, but if it was all expenses paid and they had one in five (or one in ten) chance to get to the Olympics, they may try their best. Based on probability, 2-3 from five (or five from ten) would work out and I would have a few pairs ready including having some spare, in case of injuries. But for individuals to find a decent pair partner in Japan, when there is no tradition in this, it can be very hard.
Ok, I will reply with the same style as you do.First of all, I'm a she. Second of all, it's just as hard to find a partner for ice dance in North America. Many of us had to find a partner from another country to compete at the elite level, it's especially difficult to find male ice dancers.
Lastly, do not underestimate the strength and height that many of the male ice dancers have. Our lifts etc are no joke and take much strength on part of both partners, many of the men are quite fit and muscular as are the ladies.
Russia seems like the only country in the world, where the pairs field is so deep and so strong, that a skater could transition successfully from singles, and find that, despite being world class in the discipline, she was still not able to make the national team.
I'm surprised tha the Japanese federation does not seem to have a long term strategy to develop the pairs discipline. The potential is huge for them. Why are they not trying to attract tall(ish) and strong young Japonese male skaters ? In my opinion they should work on finding these guys... because they are out there. Japan will improve so much their result in the team competitions with better pairs...
Ultimately, I think it boils down to the fact that there aren't any successful dance or pair teams from Japan to inspire the young athletes to do those disciplines. Their women (Shizuka, Mao, Midori) and men (Yuzuru, Daisuke T) have made it to the top spot in major events and are role models for skaters there.