2019-20 Russian Ladies' Figure Skating

[colormyworld240]

I agree there is nothing healthy about elite sport. So why would we let a child do it? Children do not have the ability to make rational, logical decisions. Adults do (at least better than children). Adults can make their own informed decisions about their body. Children can't.

Trusova might be training quads now if the age limit for seniors was 18, but I bet she would be training them much less frequently. She wouldn't be doing them in shows, for example. She would only be doing them in a safe, controlled environment, for a limited amount of time to not risk injuries from overtraining. Learn the quads, but don't overtrain them, and minimize the risk to your body. Protect children, let adults take more risks and compete in the elite sport.

I believe Sasha has said in an interview before that she jumps until her coaches tell her to stop, but sometimes she just keeps going and she wants to keep going. I also believe Daniil has confirmed this. And after her first JW in the K&C Daniil asked her what she needs to work on next and she said "4Lz, 4F, 4Lo" and Daniil replied with "we will learn to skate".. or something along those lines. I don't think Sasha jumps quads purely with the goal of winning competitions. Otherwise she would've gone for a simpler layout in the recent JGPF and won. She was asked what her motivation was and she says because she loves to jump and wants to be the first. She doesn't strike me as someone who cares if the age limit was 18; she's been working on them since she was way younger because she loves it. The only way to stop that would be to completely ban her not just from competition, but from skating.

 

[Elucidus]

Literally all elite sports are bad for health. If you believe otherwise, you are extremely naive.

Folks, there is nothing healthy about elite sports. Nothing. Nope. Nein. No health. There is no way to train for that "taking care of your body" and "remaining healthy" and blabla. Its just not happening.

Also if you think kids wont train as hard, you are also extremely naive.

Don't bother to argue with the folks like him. They are not naive. They are just cunning enough to use emotional arguments such as kids health to pursue their own nationalistic/personal interests. Whether these arguments are true or not - is the last thing that they are interested to know.
It's easy to prove, btw. You can't avoid nationalistic bias in a matter like this - since changing the age will negatively affect ONLY one country and one discipline - ladies skating in Russia. You can't change the rule which meant for ALL countries but in fact affecting only one - and saying it's about ALL kids health. All the while when similar situation was with american young skaters - no one bothered then with their health or careers - and believe it or not - nobody were hurt. It's just pure hypocrisy.
To illustrate such typical manipulation - let's take a look at this line:

A higher age minimum will mean that kids won't train as hard when they are kids in order to preserve their long-term physical health so they can achieve greatness as adult competitors at the elite level. They will learn to take care of their bodies instead of pushing them as hard as they can as fast as they can.

You CAN'T "achieve greatness as adult competitor" in Russia when there is unprecedented talents growth boom resulting in extremal local hypercompetition. It's impossible to maintain long career in such environment when there are thousands of talented skaters on all levels beginning from early age - and ONLY 3 SPOTS in national team - each year, every year. I will repeat time and again - the longer you want to be careers for some skaters - the more other numerous skaters careers will be destroyed early. You can't have happiness for everybody in sport - and there are too many talents in Russia worthy medals to maintain long careers/slow development for some chosen ones. While it's possible in other countries with low level fs - it's not the case for Russia.
They can't not know about that. However what they basically propose - instead of nurturing and helping to promote such wonderful talents growth (advocating for changing quotas system for example) - they want by raising the age - to destroy as many talents there as possible - to ensure that most of them can't become known worldwide ever by keeping them behind age/quotas wall so long that most of them can't help but choose to end their career due to lack of perspectives. Of course they will deny it - but what you can say if it IS single and unavoidable result of such decision?
Let's take a look at another line:

It is actually far more dangerous to get injured and heal while you are a child, because you aren't done growing yet, and the injury can negatively impact your growth. Sure, children heal faster, but that doesn't mean it is better to get injured as a child.

They can't not know that injuries are accumulating with age, can't they? Whether you take it slow or not. The longer is your career - the more unhealthy you become. Let's see Osmond retirement letter for example. Canadian competitive environment is much less severe than russian one with much more careful couching approach - still, how many injuries she had. Basically it means that natural time limit a lady skater can have is about 20-22 y.o. at best - in any country, on average. Which means that the higher you set senior age - the shorter will be adult career. Due to injuries accumulating and health issues of women bodies/weight management. Whether you want it or not.

Literally all elite sports are bad for health. If you believe otherwise, you are extremely naive.
It is equally bad for everyone, so between spending 20 years training on that level, and 10 years on that level.

True. I admit there IS a problem with figure skating as a sport, though. It's due to the fact that the jumps which are foundation of that sport now - should be learned at early age - or you can't learn them at all. Therefore this is the most "young" sport of all of them where kids are beginning to train as early as 4. Of course if you beginning so early - you gonna end it early as well. You can't do anything about that though - so I don't see any sense to complain. It's just such a sport - all we can do is take it as a given and move on.

 

[el henry]

Well, again, i wonder if you read the person's argument.
"The age limit should be raised to make sure teens don't overtrain dont break themselves with quads and so on and for them to be healthier overall".
While I never raised a teenager, I still remember being one. While, possible, the cell phone would have stopped me and my buddies, something as in "well, now you wont be able to compete with grown-ups for more 2 years" would make literally zero difference I would still do all the same to kick *sses of my peers.

just saying.

The cell phone was one of the first things I thought of, but not the best for sure

But I think if there is a limit for everyone, it could work. Would it work right away? No. But lots of people said you couldn't make hockey players wear helmets, (yes, I'm old enough to remember when they didn't) they wouldn't wear them, it's not safe, but with enough regulation -- like, you can't *compete* unless you do this that or the other thing -- it can work.

Now is it a good idea? That can be debated, and I suspect we'd be on different sides of the debate, but that's But it could work.

In Russia you already can't drive a car until age of 18 by law.

I would wait until USA or Canada (or parents) show an example and ban Alysa Liu or Stephen Gogolev from competition until age of 18. But all I see from USA is "In Quads We Trust".

I don't know about US skating parents, I am not a US skating parent. I am a US skating fan and I have been arguing for limits for quads on young skaters. For Alysia, for Stephen, for any of the Russian skaters, for any of the Japanese skaters, for anybody.

I'm a one person example of consistency.

whole post

I agree:thumbsup: any limitation needs to be done on a macro scale, the effects of the limitation need to be consistently applied at comps, and parents and coaches need to buy in.

Oy

 

[Scott512]

Have you ever even watched Anna Shcherbakova skate?....

And Alena K too.

 

[Scott512]

The cell phone was one of the first things I thought of, but not the best for sure

But I think if there is a limit for everyone, it could work. Would it work right away? No. But lots of people said you couldn't make hockey players wear helmets, (yes, I'm old enough to remember when they didn't) they wouldn't wear them, it's not safe, but with enough regulation -- like, you can't *compete* unless you do this that or the other thing -- it can work.

Now is it a good idea? That can be debated, and I suspect we'd be on different sides of the debate, but that's But it could work.



I don't know about US skating parents, I am not a US skating parent. I am a US skating fan and I have been arguing for limits for quads on young skaters. For Alysia, for Stephen, for any of the Russian skaters, for any of the Japanese skaters, for anybody.

I'm a one person example of consistency.



I agree:thumbsup: any limitation needs to be done on a macro scale, the effects of the limitation need to be consistently applied at comps, and parents and coaches need to buy in.

Oy

Its hard to be consistent on this board. Well done!

Scary what Alysa and al the Eteri girls are doing to their bodies with quads and triple axels. But they are willing to take the risks so I support them with my fingers crossed.

 

[el henry]

Its hard to be consistent on this board. Well done!

Scary what Alysa and al the Eteri girls are doing to their bodies with quads and triple axels. But they are willing to take the risks so I support them with my fingers crossed.

Thank you; I may be wrong, but at least I'm consistently wrong

I've never said what these girls are doing is not impressive, of course it is. I'm willing to admit I scare easily But I scare easily on behalf of everybody.

And the age sure isn't getting raised this year, so we still have an extraordinarily competitive Russian ladies' field.

 

[andromache]

I believe Sasha has said in an interview before that she jumps until her coaches tell her to stop, but sometimes she just keeps going and she wants to keep going. I also believe Daniil has confirmed this. And after her first JW in the K&C Daniil asked her what she needs to work on next and she said "4Lz, 4F, 4Lo" and Daniil replied with "we will learn to skate".. or something along those lines. I don't think Sasha jumps quads purely with the goal of winning competitions. Otherwise she would've gone for a simpler layout in the recent JGPF and won. She was asked what her motivation was and she says because she loves to jump and wants to be the first. She doesn't strike me as someone who cares if the age limit was 18; she's been working on them since she was way younger because she loves it. The only way to stop that would be to completely ban her not just from competition, but from skating.

Then it should be that a child who is so irresponsible either is luckily rewarded by defeating everyone when she turns 18, or she defeats everyone when she is 14 but unluckily is too injured to defeat others when she turns 18. Just because a child loves doing quads doesn't mean they are entitled to do them in competition.

In response to everyone else arguing with me....

honestly, at this point I wish they would just bring back figures as 20% of the competition, and use computers to ensure that they are judged accurately. They are the foundation of the sport. The ability to use technology to judge them will add accuracy and entertainment for TV audiences. Skaters will have to train figures and spend less time risking injury on jumps. The sport can evolve without quadsters peaking at 15 and retiring at 18, which is sadly what seems to be preferred by some people. A sport where you ought to retire by 18 is a sport for the Youth Olympics, not the regular Olympics. Not sure what the problem with that is.

 

[LiamForeman]

In response to everyone else arguing with me....

honestly, at this point I wish they would just bring back figures as 20% of the competition, and use computers to ensure that they are judged accurately. They are the foundation of the sport..

Hmmm, with all due respect, I imagine you are an "elder" in terms of skate fandom. But did you ever have to do those awful patches at five in the morning? They did NOT really help with free skating. Trixie Schuba had laborious crossovers, labored jumps, labored everything. Her mastery of figures obviously did not translate to her ability to actually SKATE. So please stop romanticizing the figures, okay? Skaters should just spend an hour a day working on edging IN THEIR FREESTYLE. It's just my opinion but I am sure others would agree with me.

 

[colormyworld240]

The cell phone was one of the first things I thought of, but not the best for sure

But I think if there is a limit for everyone, it could work. Would it work right away? No. But lots of people said you couldn't make hockey players wear helmets, (yes, I'm old enough to remember when they didn't) they wouldn't wear them, it's not safe, but with enough regulation -- like, you can't *compete* unless you do this that or the other thing -- it can work.

Now is it a good idea? That can be debated, and I suspect we'd be on different sides of the debate, but that's But it could work.



I don't know about US skating parents, I am not a US skating parent. I am a US skating fan and I have been arguing for limits for quads on young skaters. For Alysia, for Stephen, for any of the Russian skaters, for any of the Japanese skaters, for anybody.

I'm a one person example of consistency.



I agree:thumbsup: any limitation needs to be done on a macro scale, the effects of the limitation need to be consistently applied at comps, and parents and coaches need to buy in.

Oy

OT but her name is Alysa, not Alysia. I've seen it a few times and thought it was a type or autocorrect. So just FYI!

 

[colormyworld240]

Then it should be that a child who is so irresponsible either is luckily rewarded by defeating everyone when she turns 18, or she defeats everyone when she is 14 but unluckily is too injured to defeat others when she turns 18. Just because a child loves doing quads doesn't mean they are entitled to do them in competition.

In response to everyone else arguing with me....

honestly, at this point I wish they would just bring back figures as 20% of the competition, and use computers to ensure that they are judged accurately. They are the foundation of the sport. The ability to use technology to judge them will add accuracy and entertainment for TV audiences. Skaters will have to train figures and spend less time risking injury on jumps. The sport can evolve without quadsters peaking at 15 and retiring at 18, which is sadly what seems to be preferred by some people. A sport where you ought to retire by 18 is a sport for the Youth Olympics, not the regular Olympics. Not sure what the problem with that is.

The highlighted statement can apply to all jumps, not just quads. A child is irresponsible for jumping triples as well, and also doubles and singles. So should there be an age that is set that skaters should start jumping at all? It's not just quadsters who get injured and retired by 18, I would say more triple and double jumpers have. And I'm sure skaters have been injured from doing figures before as well. It's a sport, and yes more advanced jumps are riskier, but that does not make triples safe either.

For someone who likes to jump quads, if increasing the age limit won't keep them from doing it, then what is the motivation for age increase? Is it so that seniors = women? If so, to quote what SarahSyncho once said: where is this magical barrier for when a girl becomes a woman? If we're talking about puberty, that ranges anywhere from 10 - 16. Then you have early bloomers and late bloomers. So is 18 even appropriate? What about the girls that develop way later. If increasing the age limit is to even the playing field, then surely it would have to be up to in the 20s to be inclusive.

 

[Happy Skates]

Honestly on this whole age limit thing, I think a lot of the arguments are flawed. If you think that jumps are too heavily rewarded and artistry/SS not enough, then complain about the scoring system - its not like suddenly people turn 18 and have great skating skills and interpretation, and its not like there are not great artists at 16. If you think there is too much jumping, then the issue you have is with the IJS, not the age limit. If you think that kids will get injured practicing quads to a greater extent than on triples, well we still need to wait for the data on that, but even so, its their (and their parents') right to choose to take that risk. Figure skating is not the only sport where kids that age are doing things that dangerous - take artistic gymnastics for one. But most importantly in my opinion, it is not fair to deny someone the who is the best in the world the chance to compete with the best in the world. And its not a given that anyone - no matter how much they are pacing themselves and being safe - will still be at that level at age 18. There is no magic formula to longevity, especially in a sport like this. We hail people like Carolina Kostner, but she is the exception, not the rule (not to mention she only can do what she does because she comes from a country with no competition). Figure skating is a sport where people will have natural peaks. Some might peak at 22, but some also might peak at 16, and they should be given the opportunity to compete with the best when they are at their best. And then there is the financial aspect; I just don't believe its fair to skaters and their families to delay their opportunities to make money even later by not allowing them to compete in senior competitions until they are 18, not when so many families struggle so much with supporting them.

 

[Alex65]

I have never understood the argument that "young skaters will do it [such as training quads] anyway".

Really? Have any of you ever raised a teenager?

You will not have your car if you continue to train that many quads every day at practice, I will take away your cell phone if you continue to train that many quads at practice, I will withdraw you from whatever rink you are training at and I will not give my permission for you to travel to any competitions if you continue to train so many quads at practice. I don't care if you win Olympic gold or not. I don't care if every other girl in every other rink wins and you don't.

*That's* how you limit it.

There are a million gazillion things that can be done to limit the training of young teens or teens. Whether or not someone *wants* to do that is another question. Whether someone making a decision for a 15 year old approves of the training regimen is another question. Whether an adult wants to defer to a 14 or 15 year old in making this decision is another question.

But to think that it simply cannot be limited, is, well, extremely naive.

It is either naive or false. Why talking about quad? Triple are not harmful? Are twos helpful? I can break myself something just by wearing skates and going out on the ice. Where is this border? Following your logic, a child must be up to 18 years old in a cocoon of security, so that when he becomes an adult enough, he must decide for himself whether to wear skates or not. This is absurd.

 

[Georgya]

I have never understood the argument that "young skaters will do it [such as training quads] anyway".

Really? Have any of you ever raised a teenager?

You will not have your car if you continue to train that many quads every day at practice, I will take away your cell phone if you continue to train that many quads at practice, I will withdraw you from whatever rink you are training at and I will not give my permission for you to travel to any competitions if you continue to train so many quads at practice. I don't care if you win Olympic gold or not. I don't care if every other girl in every other rink wins and you don't.

*That's* how you limit it.

There are a million gazillion things that can be done to limit the training of young teens or teens. Whether or not someone *wants* to do that is another question. Whether someone making a decision for a 15 year old approves of the training regimen is another question. Whether an adult wants to defer to a 14 or 15 year old in making this decision is another question.

But to think that it simply cannot be limited, is, well, extremely naive.

I logged in just to say that THIS IS NOT OK TO RAISE A TEENAGER! This is how you train an animal, kids are not stupid, you can talk and explain things to them, they have emotions but also intellect. Not all teenagers have cars, it's mostly a north american thing. In this day and age taking a phone from a teenager is more harmful to the parents, they lose contact with him/her. And congrats! With threats like "I will withdraw you from whatever rink" you will make her/him hate you and he/she would not be able or confident to talk to you.

It must be a cultural thing but in some places of the world people deal with teenagers differently than threats with punishments. And yes you can set limits for them, but in other ways.

 

[Arbitrary]

I logged in just to say that THIS IS NOT OK TO RAISE A TEENAGER! This is how you train an animal, kids are not stupid, you can talk and explain things to them, they have emotions but also intellect. Not all teenagers have cars, it's mostly a north american thing. In this day and age taking a phone from a teenager is more harmful to the parents, they lose contact with him/her. And congrats! With threats like "I will withdraw you from whatever rink" you will make her/him hate you and he/she would not be able or confident to talk to you.

It must be a cultural thing but in some places of the world people deal with teenagers differently than threats with punishments. And yes you can set limits for them, but in other ways.

You may buy a pet to a teenager, train both the dog and the skater... Results will vary.

 

[Scott512]

Thank you; I may be wrong, but at least I'm consistently wrong

I've never said what these girls are doing is not impressive, of course it is. I'm willing to admit I scare easily But I scare easily on behalf of everybody.

And the age sure isn't getting raised this year, so we still have an extraordinarily competitive Russian ladies' field.

The age limit won't be raised anytime soon because of Alysa Liu. The ISU powers-that-be will want an American to compete with the top Russian girls at the next Olympic Games.

 

[esteticlove]

The age limit won't be raised anytime soon because of Alysa Liu. The ISU powers-that-be will want an American to compete with the top Russian girls at the next Olympic Games.

Just curious - will Alisa be age eligible for the next Olys? It will be very interesting if she does keep her 3A and presumably quads. The same goes to Eteri's girls. I think that at the time she faces Trusova, Sherbakova and who knows who, it will show that hard technical components is not everything, Eteri's winning because of the whole packaging.

 

[Lunalovesskating]

Just curious - will Alisa be age eligible for the next Olys? It will be very interesting if she does keep her 3A and presumably quads. The same goes to Eteri's girls. I think that at the time she faces Trusova, Sherbakova and who knows who, it will show that hard technical components is not everything, Eteri's winning because of the whole packaging.

Yes. She will be eligble for Beijing 2022

 

[silveruskate]

Not to comment on age requirements, but it is no way in hell true that all elite sports are bad for your health, at least in the same way or anywhere close to each other. THAT is naive. Are elite football, swimming, hockey, badminton, basketball, diving, or zillions of other sports as bad? Not even thinking about young vs old, but whichever way you cut it, figure skating puts unique pressures on an athlete's body. Look at how many skaters comment on how even 100/200g can completely change the ability to jump, that would be crazy if they even said 1/2kg but no this is 100/200 grams!! ...affecting both adults and teens. That type of relationship between weight and performance alone is absolutely unheard of. This is not even mentioning the effect on joints from the force of the landings which increase incredibly for each extra revolution, as well as the psychological effect. They make a lot of massive sacrifices for us to perform how they do and give us what we want, the least we can do is respect it.

 

[Tolstoj]

Have you ever even watched Anna Shcherbakova skate?....

Yes and it's all part of the packaging. (a very nice one)

I think they are all trained to not overreact on the ice, which is common in figure skating, not stone face but not crying either, but that's both good and bad in my opinion: I'm personally all for Plushenko's steps sequences when he gave all on the ice and it's always nice when a skater tries to engage the audience, it should be considered more by the judges in the performance mark.

Sofia is also all about that, you can tell how happy she was at Europeans when all her jumps were done.

https://youtu.be/1bW65xKfyQY?t=203

 

[Tolstoj]

x

1) Part of that is a consequence to Tutberidze's approach, she showed you can win more with 15-16-17 years old girls than with senior woman, and also a change of generations: Mao Asada, Yuna Kim, Carolina Kostner, Kaetlyn Osmond, Ashley Wagner are all retired now (or about to retire).

2)

- Why even differentiating seniors with juniors then, what's the point? They all skate the same these days.

- Like i said on previous comments, with this 2-3 years cycle, it's more and more about the coaches and less about the athletes: casual fans will not remember all these skaters 20 years from now, while they all remember Midori Ito, Michelle Kwan, Irina Slutskaya, Yuna Kim, Mao Asada.

I don't think skaters struggle financially because of long lasting careers by the way, that's a generalization, it could be for many reasons, and they can study and practice. Tamara Moskvina often stressed how she wanted all her skaters to study a lot also because she wants to make sure they have a life after figure skating.