Now that everyone has belly-ached about the results. I want to take a minute to congratulate Kevin. He deserved this win. Lets get over the fact that the favorites did not skate well and move on.
BEST OF LUCK TO ALL THE SKATERS AT WORLDS......
^^
I think a good number of posters have been congratulating and praising Kevin throughout this and other threads for what he accomplished at 4CC, so you're not unique in that respect.
Personally, I don't have an issue with the so-called "favorites" not skating well. It's too bad for them, and they'll probably do better next time, or not. As I said earlier, Kevin deserved his win for being the most consistent along with landing a lot of quads. But that doesn't negate the fact that the scores were humongous on tech and PCS for Kevin, particularly in his lp, as well as scores generally being inconsistent in sp vs lp for many of the competitors. If simply landing quads is the standard that can grab those kind of tech and PCS scores when there's other areas of a competitor's skating that still need work, then this sport will continue to stagnate.
I'm equally critical when the so-called "top" skaters get humongous scores when they skate a clean program with quads. They deserve a lot of credit, but the scores are simply being thrown out piecemeal, and end up being all over the place. Patrick Chan has in the past achieved similarly overly high scores when his programs have been loaded with errors. And, e.g., earlier in the season when Hanyu was breaking records with his clean and well skated sp, I thought it was ridiculous for his scores to be that high. He skated well, but he's still a maturing skater and IMO, he did not deserve such high tech and PCS scores simply because he has gorgeous quads when he's on and budding artistry.
The runaway scores for mistake-laden programs from top skaters, as well as for skaters who can land quads but need to work on maturing and becoming more well-rounded are perfect examples of the fact that the sport has no measurable standard by which to judge what skaters do on the ice. The rules change every season and the scores fluctuate from competition to competition, and even from short program to long program at the same event. The craziness of the scores sends confusing messages to the skaters and to the fans. But I guess the clearest message for the men is, "Land those quads fellows, the more the merrier the judges will be, and therefore you will be, whether or not your overall skating is all that great."
Wonder whether or not there will be a significant "course correction" at Worlds. Certainly with a larger field of "top skaters," the judges will have their work cut out for them. It would be so wonderful to see all the skaters skating their absolute best and landing quads right and left. In that scenario and at the rate the judges have been scoring, they're gonna run out of numbers and have to start slashing guys on PCS even more than usual. That would only serve to hurt less established skaters even should they skate well (especially if everyone else skates well too). I guess it's more likely that at every event some competitors will falter, particularly when the quad stakes are so high.
If nothing else, Kevin Reynolds has certainly set himself apart from the middle tier guys by landing three quads in his lp. He needs to keep working on other aspects of his skating, but the question is, "Where's the incentive for working on becoming a more complete skater when you can CoP those kinda quad/quad/quad scores?" The judges apparently, seemingly are telling Kevin that he has arrived. For Max, maybe the judges are saying, "You need to get a good later draw to skate, and maybe you'll be consistently rewarded on your tech scores and your PCS scores might average out, especially if you add a third quad to your lp.
Most of all, don't fall, even though falling with completed revolutions isn't supposed to be that big a deal under the rules, you don't have any margin for error." Apparently, Dai and Hanyu do have more margin for error, and Hanyu was on the podium mainly because he's a known quad quantity who is the current boy prince of figure skating. Although Kevin may have been the newly crowned quad king at 4CC, he'll likely have to share that moniker at Worlds with Fernandez (and there's sure to be plenty of guys landing or attempting one or two quads in their lp.
I agree that the British Eurosport commentators are great at color commentary and knowledgeable aesthetic analysis. They also know better than some other commentators when to quiet down a bit and just watch the skating. Still, they should strive for accuracy even on statistical and fluff matters, otherwise they are not really doing their job.
In their defense there are only so many lines in the English language to express 'Great!'
