2020-21 Russian Ladies' Figure Skating

[colormyworld240]

I love Anna so much, I was worried she'd lose her attack and expressiveness because there is no audience to perform for. It's her best skate this season, the -3Lo was fully rotated and her spins are so much more centred. That being said, she (and also Liza and Sasha) received some generous calls. If you call Kaori's 3Lz an e, Anna really should get a ! for flat edge. But on the other side, some people are saying she should get an e, which isn't correct either.

Can someone explain what's wrong with Anna's crossovers, I always thought they looked okay. She's not the fastest skater but she isn't really hunched over and she keeps her upper body quite still.

Sasha's mental game is really starting to remind me of Alina with the super clean and difficult practices (adding extra quads and combos) and then bombing in competition. It was like deva-vu. I hope she can overcome that, it was difficult to watch Alina go through it. The first season is always the easiest when you just happy to be there and don't have to worry about crazy expectations and haters.

 

[nussnacker]

Of course it's impressive. But this is just part of the training process.



It's not serious, come on First of all in this case she will have about 78 BV, and Anna's FS BV on RusNat was 81.88
But most important without spins, StSq, ChSq it would be a terrible blow to the PCS, obviously. I guess no one will ever make such a crazy program

I don’t think she will actually leave all of that out

 

[Skatesocs]

There were claims of Kaori's SS superiority over Anna. My point (among others) is that SS do not exist in the vacuum.

I agree that SS don't exist in a vacuum, and I agree that Kaori's program isn't good. But since we are talking about skating skills not choreo/interpretation/performance, Shcherbakova had an obvious stumble in the step sequence. It's hard to believe that would still leave her ahead of the skaters who in general do show better pure skating. Since they don't exist in a vacuum, how did she still come out on top?

 

[florin]

I don’t think she will actually leave all of that out

Of course I just want to remind obvious thing: making 5 quads to music and making 5 quads inside a complete FP is a big difference. Why did people decide that Sasha is capable skate full FP with 5 quads? Here people were seriously discussing it.

 

[chasingneverland]

It is indeed weird that we don't have as much of the hypothetical scoring scenarios as usual today. But I kind of want at least a rough estimate of what Sasha is facing going into the free skate. I think it looks more or less like this: she is 14 points behind Liza after the short program. Liza, with a clean 3A and clean 4S say, probably wouldn't score higher than... 146? Which means that in order to get a bronze Sasha would need to get a 160? And then the question is how many clean quads does that require.

I'm intentionally being approximate so that sharper minds can correct me.

By the way -- and I'm not just pandering -- I looked at some youtube comments recently, like the comments on the rehearsal videos posted by TSL. There is some nasty stuff out there. By comparison this forum is much more well behaved (thanks in part to moderation of course) and much more constructive.

Sasha doesn't need to be clean to get a 160+. She got a 161 at GPF with a 4F, 2S (popped the 4S), 4Lz, 2A+3T, and backloaded 4T+1Eu+3S, under-rotated and fell on a backloaded 4T, and backloaded 3Lz+3T. She'll be 160+ with 3 clean quads (depending on what everything else is like.) Her PCS will be higher too.

 

[Scott512]

I’m going to leave this here and go to bed. But I came on here as an amateur skater and fan wanting to learn more about the top figure skaters we all follow and look up to. I posted for the first time in this group, bc I love and admire the Russian female skaters, and have followed many of your posts over the past year. But you know what? I wish I hadn’t. Besides for one or two kind poster’s responses, this has just been an ugly back and forth. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but have some couth, guys. I’m out.

It will be better tomorrow. Give it another shot.

 

[starlight97]

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Anna's interview today, for those who haven't seen it yet and would like to. Hope it hasn't been posted yet.

First of all: noting her impressively decent level of English considering her circumstances and lack of time for "real" school, bravo!
To the fellow non-Russian speakers here, I wanted to ask if you have a similar experience as me.
I have seen many interviews of the Russians in their language and translated on the spot or in writing, but hearing Anna speak for more than 2 sentences in a language I actually understand, I felt like for the first time I'm actually hearing her voice. As in seeing her personality in what she says and how she says it, even if it's contradictory, as she can express herself way less in English, than she could if I was reading another translation from Russian.
What a lovely young woman.
Are there any interviews with 2nd and 3rd place after the short?

 

[[email protected]]

I agree that SS don't exist in a vacuum, and I agree that Kaori's program isn't good. But since we are talking about skating skills not choreo/interpretation/performance, Shcherbakova had an obvious stumble in the step sequence. It's hard to believe that would still leave her ahead of the skaters who in general do show better pure skating. Since they don't exist in a vacuum, how did she still come out on top?

We compare her with Kaori. For me a part of skating skills (in addition to speed, edges, coverage etc.) is the technical ability to express the music. Anna made a stumble - that's a technical issue as it detracted from the image she tried to convey. Was she punished for that? She did not get 10s - not a single one. I assume she lost 0.25 for that from every judge. And Kaori had quite a wonky landing - she was not perfect as well.

And one more thing about the so-called experts. They try to establish their world of reasoning as the only "true" one here. And I don't agree with that. This never-ending appeal to crossovers, those slang words like "muscled jumps". I think this one was specifically invented for Zhenya because after she stopped to be the one and only I can't rememember I read about "muscled jumps" by any other skater.

What crossovers? I just watched Anna's interview. Her landings were shown. Look how cristal clear they are. Look at her free leg after the jump. And now look at Rika's landings. Why bring up obscure crossovers argument when it is obvious that today Rika URed and dropped the free leg and Anna did not?

Judges look at various aspects to form their view. Yes, there is country bias - sometimes it's obvious. Sometimes Russians win from this bias sometimes non Russians. But when all judges give better SS mark to one skater, come on guys, just give a chance to the idea that may be you are missing something.

 

[nussnacker]

Legendary Maiia the backpack video

https://www.instagram.com/p/CM0Ap3wprTW

 

[Fluture]

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Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.

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Anna's interview today, for those who haven't seen it yet and would like to. Hope it hasn't been posted yet.

First of all: noting her impressively decent level of English considering her circumstances and lack of time for "real" school, bravo!

Her pronunciation is particularly impressive, everything she says is clearly understandable and she doesn‘t make a lot of grammatical errors either. Really admirable that she has this level of a foreign language at 16 while training full-time as an elite skater.

 

[Blades of Passion]

Anna made a stumble - that's a technical issue as it detracted from the image she tried to convey. Was she punished for that? She did not get 10s - not a single one.

Not getting 10's doesn't mean people are being scored accurately. Hardly anyone deserves to even be in the 9's. Only a few people and only when they skate their absolute best.

 

[alexocfp]

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Anna's interview today, for those who haven't seen it yet and would like to. Hope it hasn't been posted yet.

First of all: noting her impressively decent level of English considering her circumstances and lack of time for "real" school, bravo!
To the fellow non-Russian speakers here, I wanted to ask if you have a similar experience as me.
I have seen many interviews of the Russians in their language and translated on the spot or in writing, but hearing Anna speak for more than 2 sentences in a language I actually understand, I felt like for the first time I'm actually hearing her voice. As in seeing her personality in what she says and how she says it, even if it's contradictory, as she can express herself way less in English, than she could if I was reading another translation from Russian.
What a lovely young woman.
Are there any interviews with 2nd and 3rd place after the short?

The press conference had a lot of English too.

On a side note, if they ever put Anna up for adoption, please make sure to call me. Haha

 

[chasingneverland]

I see. Thanks
Then it's not clear why people talk so much about it, as if she's capable of skating a complete FP with five quads. They need to be realistic.

She has practiced full 5 quad programs and landed them cleanly. At least in the past.

 

[esteticlove]

Addressing the music?? The way to know for sure is when the music gets changed and the program stays the same. That's all I'll say to you.

You will be surprised how many programs there are that can go with different kinds of music without needing any changes in the choreography. In previous years, when I had more free time, I was doing this quite a lot - picking a program with a beatiful choreo and play a music of choice. One of the programs that I "abused" the most was the first FP of Savchenko/Massot. If you haven't seen it, go and check it. I cosnidered it really musical but still when I was using my own songs of choice, it was still working. So, I don't see why it has to be any different with Anna's program.

 

[Scott512]

Yeaaaaah that's up for debate, but.

If the Olympics scoring is as inflated than usual, she could score well above 240 depending on the scoring favorability she receives. 250 would probably be a theoretical possibility. 260 would be tough, she'd need to build momentum over the course of the season.

I'm sure alyona it is watching and thinks if she gets it back together again she will be the favororite.

If she gets back to good form like last season then she has a better chance to skate cleanly than the other top girls do. I know that you know that most importantly AK knows that. The trick will be getting her triple axel back.

 

[Ziotic]

I’ve been lurking here for awhile, but rarely post. But I want to get some input from you experts here. If all three ladies skate a perfectly executed, clean SP and FS, what order would the podium be? (Hypothetical competition, not Worlds). Considering both base value and PCS, and assuming Sasha Trusova does a clean 5 quad FS. Kamila Valieva, Alexandra Trusova, and Anna Scherbakova.

Domestic or international?

 

[[email protected]]

Not getting 10's doesn't mean people are being scored accurately. Hardly anyone deserves to even be in the 9's. Only a few people and only when they skate their absolute best.

I don't care about absolute scores. I care about relative scores in the SP and overall placements after FP. I am fine if the skater that I believe is the best wins with the score of 210 rather than 250, if she wins.

Looking at Rika's landings in slo-mo I would give a slight edge to Anna today.

As I said in the competition thread, maybe 2 points is too much - maybe 0.5 point difference would be more fair. But I still think that with all the planned big jumps the FP variance in scores of Anna, Rika, Liza, and Sasha will be much bigger than 2-3 points so that the skater who will deliver a stronger free program will win. Well, maybe with the exception of Sasha as 16 points seems to be an insurmountable obstacle.

 

[cohen-esque]

2:06 this video: https://www.instagram.com/p/CKYU2_NKZGj/

Same exit, isn't it? Actually, the spiral might be a more challenging one.

It is a cheated counter.

It's possible that she intentionally did just a three-turn, though. But a counter would be superior to it I'm sure, so I'm not sure why she'd intentionally perform an edge change into three-turn(which is a very common way to cheat a counter) instead of a counter. Mind explaining it to me when you are so much more familiar with it?

Oh yeah, I clearly have an inability to recognize steps and turns...

Sure. My impression of your first few posts with Skatesocs, for some reason, was that you were saying she botched a standard back outside counter exit directly from the landing edge (a “counter exit” like so), which is obviously not what she attempted. From your follow up linking the IG video and direct reply to me, I believe I may owe you an apology for the snark, since it nows seems to me like we're in agreement about the content she attempted.

Anyway, I would say that Miyahara exits the loop with three moves: an edge pull/change of edge and back inside counter into the catchfoot spiral. The GPF video in my view has a clear shallow inside entry edge that flattens out as she starts physically turning; the edges around the turn are pretty much like what Shcherbakova had above (in reverse), just with a comparatively much shorter entry curve and maybe a flatter entry into the turn for a millisecond. It's not her strongest attempt (this was better, for instance), and I suppose you could say she botched it based on being too flat for the entry. But she still doesn’t turn from an outside edge and I think what she does is distinct from an accidental three turn-like counter, it's a sort of turn we see get credited in step sequences all the time. Unfortunately, there aren’t any better quality videos from that GPF with a good close up or slow mo throughout the turn or a shot of the tracing.

If someone was interested in evaluating Miyahara's overall quality with that exit, she did it in every event that season.

In any case, it wasn’t messier than the IG video you linked.

 

[Tally]

Either/or. Potentially both

 

[chasingneverland]

It was a jumps-only calculation, in the same way as Wong did in his pre-competition analysis. Obviously one needs to also factor in spins and step sequences. In theory they shouldn't make much of a difference, but if certain skaters are not penalized for their StSq stumbles that could provide an extra cushion against Trusova's 5 quads.

But it makes a difference.

Also, it's still wrong regardless because Anna's going for 3 quads.

Also I find it interesting that you cited Wong, as he said in his live notes didn't call Anna for the 3Lz edge at all. He also said in his live instagram that Anna's edge is maybe a ! and could go either way - he didn't call it. Also, he didn't even mention Anna's StSq stumble. He did; however, notice Rika's 3A q in real time and say that Kaori's 3Lz e was definitely a wrong edge on replay. He also did have a lot to say abut Sasha's PCS being too high. (And Rika's as being too low.)