2020-21 Russian Ladies' Figure Skating | Page 821 | Golden Skate

2020-21 Russian Ladies' Figure Skating

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Anna and KV are safe if healthy. We also have to remember who they are coached by.

The only thing that could change for either of them are injuries or if one of them bombs next season which is like a 1 in a million chance of happening.

Shcherbakova and Valieva the safest of the 3 senior national medalists this season for Olympic spots next year because they are doing the difficult content and they are consistent, like you said "if one of them bombs next season which is like a 1 in a million chance of happening." I think Shcherbakova and Valieva being so consistent could be what helps Trusova for the Olympic team, because if they have 2 'safe bets' with Shcherbakova and Valieva then the third spot can be gamble pick on someone who isn't consistent.
 
I think so too. Consistency is important. Last time Sasha had a clean skate was at Junior Worlds two seasons ago (I think :scratch2:). And that's crazy when you think about it.

She wasn't clean at her last junior worlds, but she was clean of falls/pops at Japan Open last season and Nepela Trophy - Nepela was her last clean (no falls/pops) until nationals this year, so over a year.
 
Right I know Sasha and T/M's weaknesses, but what are Anna's, Kamila's and Sui/Han's? As far as I can tell they have none or if they do they're easily overcome not like Sasha's poor spins, skating skills and lack of artistry or T/Ms lack of emotions and terrible program choices.

I just find it so frustrating that when my faves try their best to address their weaknesses it doesn't make a lot of difference or sometimes they do even worse. Never forget Candyman
LOL! Don't get frustrated. Cheer on your faves, and accept your enemys - that's the recipe.
 
Shcherbakova and Valieva the safest of the 3 senior national medalists this season for Olympic spots next year because they are doing the difficult content and they are consistent, like you said "if one of them bombs next season which is like a 1 in a million chance of happening." I think Shcherbakova and Valieva being so consistent could be what helps Trusova for the Olympic team, because if they have 2 'safe bets' with Shcherbakova and Valieva then the third spot can be gamble pick on someone who isn't consistent.
Great point! I've never thought of it that way. The fact that those two are consistent might give Sasha an edge and RusFed will add her as a gambling chip!
And why not, after all Sasha has the tech arsenal. She might succeed, you never know.
 
Right I know Sasha and T/M's weaknesses, but what are Anna's, Kamila's and Sui/Han's? As far as I can tell they have none or if they do they're easily overcome not like Sasha's poor spins, skating skills and lack of artistry or T/Ms lack of emotions and terrible program choices.

I just find it so frustrating that when my faves try their best to address their weaknesses it doesn't make a lot of difference or sometimes they do even worse. Never forget Candyman
I mean people talk about Anna's weaknesses all the time. Her jump technique, her SS. There are a few people who consistently deny these issues ( they have their reasons) but most people would acknowledge the obvious weaknesses. Kamila doesn't have great edges ( although she has nice flow) and is rather weak at musical interpretation. Also her 4T is wonderful, but her 3Lz/ 3F and combos are rather iffy on technique. People also address this on this forum. Sui / Han have problems with SBS jumps. Basically, it isn't' just your favorites who get criticism. I am not sure why you take it so personally. Not everyone will love the same skaters.
 
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I am not sure why you take it so personally.
I guess I look at the wrong posts, 🤔 it just seems there's loads of people willing to overlook the weaknesses of Anna, Kamila and Sui/Han for whatever reason whereas Sasha and T/M's weaknesses are the kiss of death.

My impression of the situation is "Who honestly cares if Anna has a flutz or Kamila has a slightly wonky edge or Sui/Han have trouble with their SBS? All their other qualities make up for that."

Whereas Sasha's and T/M's weaknesses are fatal and until they fix them they don't deserve to win despite all their other qualities.
 
Are you kidding? RusFed may be crazy but they are not so crazy that they would leave Sasha, the lady skater with the best jump arsenal in the world, out of an Olympic team, as long as she's healthy and doesn't bomb next season, I think her spot is probably safe.
But isn't that the sticking point? Sasha can jump all those quads by themselves, but the second she tries more than 2 different ones in a program it goes to Hell.

She also can't do the 3A in a program yet.

So unless the IOC decides to have a jumping contest Sasha has no better claim to an Olympic spot than Daria, Aliona or Maia (their PCS potential is way higher and their jumps more GOE worthy). She could get it over Liza T if course, but not the other three.
 
I'm not surprised that TT are keeping Bolero as Kami's FS. There are some parallels between Kami and Alina's Olympic journey's and I think they are trying to exploit that and it could turn out to be a good strategy for the mental game.

As for the program itself, I personally don't have strong feelings for it, I don't love it or hate it and I don't think Bolero works great as skating music, but I've come to appreciate what Kami has done with it and I've come to enjoy it. Maybe I'm just a bit biased.

And if Eteri thinks it's good enough and has the potential for an Olympic FS, then it's good enough for me. She seems to have a good instinct about these things and they're probably going to tweak it to it's full potential by the time the Olys come.

For Kamila's SP, I would like to see her do happier, less serious music, as she recently mentioned in an interview that she would like to try a program where she can have fun and smile like in her mime program a few season's ago.
 
My impression of the situation is "Who honestly cares if Anna has a flutz or Kamila has a slightly wonky edge or Sui/Han have trouble with their SBS? All their other qualities make up for that."
Don't you remember the 15 pages of this thread dedicated to Anna's flutz after Nationals? Some people don't care about their flaws but PLENTY do. Some people think Sasha's improved a lot, some people don't. Idk if anyone gets universal love except maybe Hanyu.
Shcherbakova and Valieva the safest of the 3 senior national medalists this season for Olympic spots next year because they are doing the difficult content and they are consistent,
They're likely to be less consistent next season when they're trying triple axels and possibly more quads in real international competitions.
 
But isn't that the sticking point? Sasha can jump all those quads by themselves, but the second she tries more than 2 different ones in a program it goes to Hell.

She also can't do the 3A in a program yet.

So unless the IOC decides to have a jumping contest Sasha has no better claim to an Olympic spot than Daria, Aliona or Maia (their PCS potential is way higher and their jumps more GOE worthy). She could get it over Liza T if course, but not the other three.
I think the sweet spot for Sasha is 3 quads, any more and it's usually too many and the falls become almost inevitable.

Right, she hasn't been able to stabilize the 3A yet but it's good that she's been trying it in competition all season and it gives her an edge over her competitors who currently don't have it or might add it later. It took Rika like 2 seasons to stabilize hers and increase her success rate.
 
Don't you remember the 15 pages of this thread dedicated to Anna's flutz after Nationals?
That was like one person though? And we all think that person is nuts.

Plus anyone who pointed that issue out was firmly informed Anna would have won anyway.

And Sasha who finally got some clean skates in didn't even get named to the World's Team for her efforts. She may as well have gone for all the quads and got some practice in. Maybe she would have landed them all and won, on the other hand I guess it's a helpful reminder to those who pick on Sasha for doing all those quads that the reason she does it is not just because she loves them (though she clearly does) but because she needs to.

There's always a lot of 🙄 whenever Sasha's planned program comes out, it's annoying. I'm just hoping that Nats will put to rest once and for all the idea that Sasha is foolhardy for wanting to do all the quads and she could be a winner if she just skated smart.
 
You consider this skater's skating skills:




better than this skater's skating skills?





You claim the skater in the first video is faster, more fluent, precise, using more edges, one-foot and multi-directional skating, with more variety, difficulty and intricacy in her footwork, more effortless and expressing the music better?

Is this what you see in above videos? :coffee:

the first video is blocked and given your argument i’m expecting it’s the Rostelecom FS right?

And you probably chose this program because of the weak step sequence? The step sequence is not the only part of the program to assess SS.

Alyona’s flow and glide (I found a version of the Rostelecom FS that isn’t blocked) is better. Anna’s flow and glide really aren’t bad honestly (better than Sasha) though. But the speed is the big difference for me. Alyona’s FS this season really didn’t showcase her wonderful skating skills as well but it cannot hide her good speed. Again her crossovers are so effortless and she gains a lot of speed from them. I know crossovers aren’t the only thing to consider but I don’t want to write a long paragraph so I’ll just say, look at their crossovers: Anna’s are very labored, Alyona’s are effortless. Edge-wise Anna has good edges in some steps, notably loops not done at the ends of clusters and brackets by themselves as well. her edges in one-foot skating clusters is much weaker. And still in terms of speed, Alyona, despite this messy free skate, has better speed through the step sequence. And her edges weren’t great in that FS, but in the SP they were good. deep edges through all the clusters and no loss of speed. Same goes for the gala.

My knowledge of SS is a bit rudimentary but even I can clearly see that Alyona, even though she’s struggling a bit this season, is far better than Anna or Sasha in SS.

If you want to argue that Anna’s a better skater I’d suggest you use musicality or facial expression as the topic. It’s common knowledge at this point that SS is Anna’s weakness and Alyona’s strength.
 
this belongs in the pairs thread but ne reason i think everyone brings up candy man is because that was the worst music choice ever. like it literally cost them an olympic medal. It’s the epitome of just the most questionable decision ever.

Their mistakes (a fall, and a popped SBS) cost them the individual medal. Candyman didn't actually bother the judges as much as it did us lol.
 
The hype machine is in full force.
The upcoming event was the lead story on the morning news.

 
Their mistakes (a fall, and a popped SBS) cost them the individual medal. Candyman didn't actually bother the judges as much as it did us lol.
I enjoyed Candyman I thought it was fun.

People seem to forget just how this came about, for a good two seasons T/M were merciless mocked for being the most boring skaters ever. (Personally I never thought that) But in every competition they appeared at that's all you heard how deathly dull they were and woe! Russian pairs fans were doomed forevermore to watch this drab lifeless pair.

You don't think T/M's team read that garbage and thought they had to do something about it? Was Candyman a piece of art, no, but people only got crueller to the point where there were posts wishing that they'd fail spectacularly so the wonderous sport of pairs figure skating wouldn't be forever besmirched by the disgusting spectacle that was Candyman.

Well they all got their wish, while Zhenya Tarasova's heart broke into a million pieces people on this forum were positive crowing and gloating and laughing about how fabulous it was that those two embarrassments were kept off the podium.

And ever since any time T/M try something different they're ridiculed while in the very same breath they're called the most boring team in history.

I'll never forget how horrible people were to them.
 
I'm not surprised that TT are keeping Bolero as Kami's FS. There are some parallels between Kami and Alina's Olympic journey's and I think they are trying to exploit that and it could turn out to be a good strategy for the mental game.

As for the program itself, I personally don't have strong feelings for it, I don't love it or hate it and I don't think Bolero works great as skating music, but I've come to appreciate what Kami has done with it and I've come to enjoy it. Maybe I'm just a bit biased.

And if Eteri thinks it's good enough and has the potential for an Olympic FS, then it's good enough for me. She seems to have a good instinct about these things and they're probably going to tweak it to it's full potential by the time the Olys come.

For Kamila's SP, I would like to see her do happier, less serious music, as she recently mentioned in an interview that she would like to try a program where she can have fun and smile like in her mime program a few season's ago.
My impression about Bolero is that it is strongly effective live, in the arena, more than from the video. Exactly the repetitiveness with every repetition being stronger than the previous is what makes live audience to clap, swing in the rhythm etc. You can feel it (or at least I feel it) more from the vids recorded from the audience, it adds big atmosphere at the place that for some may not be transferable via the screen.

That's BTW one of the factors, that some things impress more in the arena and some on TV.
 
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