2021-2022 Russian Men's Figure Skating

[flanker]

Three clean russian men skates (plus Morisi nearly clean skate). I wonder when we saw that for the last time

 

[vorravorra]

And want to. Because, like, Mozalev literally doesn't want to do anything else... oh, well.

There is a ranking on FSO I (mostly) agree with. There are two genuine top-level skaters in Russia who look like a proper fit in the top flight at Worlds - Kolyada and Aliev. Mozalev and Danielian are a step below that, they have time to develop, but the basics are there. Kondratiuk and Semenenko are in a category below the above two, and I don't see them fully bridging the gap (putting aside mushrooms), this is something that requires work starting from a much earlier age. This is by no means a ranking of skaters in the order of my personal preferences which are subjective, I like Semenenko for instance but I can see where he's weak. All this just makes me frustrated that genuine skill and talent is not rewarded the way it should be.

 

[lariko]

There is a ranking on FSO I (mostly) agree with. There are two genuine top-level skaters in Russia who look like a proper fit in the top flight at Worlds - Kolyada and Aliev. Mozalev and Danielian are a step below that, they have time to develop, but the basics are there. Kondratiuk and Semenenko are in a category below the above two, and I don't see them fully bridging the gap (putting aside mushrooms), this is something that requires work starting from a much earlier age. This is by no means a ranking of skaters in the order of my personal preferences which are subjective, I like Semenenko for instance but I can see where he's weak. All this just makes me frustrated that genuine skill and talent is not rewarded the way it should be.

I think in terms of the Olympics team, Kondratyuk's short is better fit, if they want someone tag-team with Kolyada. I just want Mozalev to get access to the international competitions. I want to see him skate on big ice and stop being put through the ringer. I don't know if his 4S stabilized sufficiently, but I think his programming and performance is very much au par with other men who receive 2 GP events and participate in the second half of the season.

 

[vorravorra]

I think in terms of the Olympics team, Kondratyuk's short is better fit, if they want someone tag-team with Kolyada. I just want Mozalev to get access to the international competitions. I want to see him skate on big ice and stop being put through the ringer. I don't know if his 4S stabilized sufficiently, but I think his programming and performance is very much au par with other men who receive 2 GP events and participate in the second half of the season.

I don't see Mozalev in the team event SP, considering this was his first clean SP of the season. But are they even going to substitute men? The general belief is that they are substituting women and dance, women primarily as more deserving of two golds, and dance because of Katsalapov's back. Nobody cares that skating two events back to back well is unrealistic, men's individual event is expendable, as are men in general in Russia unfortunately.

 

[icybear]

Wow 3 clean Russian men in 1 day all scoring 99 points. Kolyada need to watch his back. He's been staying afloat on his inconsistency for far too long. If he wasnt Russian his pcs would have plummeted from constant poor outings. Its about time for him to feel his place is in jeopardy

 

[lariko]

I don't see Mozalev in the team event SP, considering this was his first clean SP of the season. But are they even going to substitute men? The general belief is that they are substituting women and dance, women primarily as more deserving of two golds, and dance because of Katsalapov's back. Nobody cares that skating two events back to back well is unrealistic, men's individual event is expendable, as are men in general in Russia unfortunately.

Oh, okay.

Well, if they do, I think Kondratyuk would do great.

 

[vorravorra]

Wow 3 clean Russian men in 1 day all scoring 99 points. Kolyada need to watch his back. He's been staying afloat on his inconsistency for far too long. If he wasnt Russian his pcs would have plummeted from constant poor outings. Its about time for him to feel his place is in jeopardy

There is this odd idea floating about that Kolyada doesn't skate cleanly with more than one quad because he can't be bothered to. This apparently doesn't apply to any other skater in existence, just to Kolyada. What makes you think he's not aware he needs to watch his back? He's always been following the competition very carefully and is working on upping his tech.

 

[vorravorra]

More on the topic. There are plenty of skaters who are missing a certain component that would allow them to rise to great heights. Could be talent for tech, could be one for PCS, could be psychology. Kolyada has the type of personality which makes competing an uphill battle for him. Apart from that and exacerbating the problem, he's never had jumps that are particularly easy to control and land, it's been so since he was a kid with bigger jumps than he was tall. Now they are trying to decrease the speed of entry for better control but that is preventing him from fully rotating which never used to be a problem, and Kolyada has never been able to land underrotated jumps because he never needed to learn to do so at the right age for such things, he could easily rotate in the air. So we are talking about a skater with certain weak spots, not someone who doesn't want to deliver. I don't understand why that's proven so hard to grasp for people.

 

[Artemisa]

Congrats to the 3!!!

 

[Flying Feijoa]

Keep it up in the free guys!!

 

[Mauvedreamer]

Mozalev oh he delivered at last. so pleased. Beautiful skating. Mark was great too. Great to see all 3 on the podium. Congratulations .

 

[Lzbee]

I just caught up on the Russian men's SP and omg Mozalev was clean and it was beautiful and I'm so happy we got to see him looking not stressed afterwards. @lariko your balloons worked, please keep them alive for the FP

Kondratiuk and Semenenko did great too, it's going to be an exciting competition on Friday. Good luck to everyone!

 

[lariko]

I just caught up on the Russian men's SP and omg Mozalev was clean and it was beautiful and I'm so happy we got to see him looking not stressed afterwards. @lariko your balloons worked, please keep them alive for the FP

Kondratiuk and Semenenko did great too, it's going to be an exciting competition on Friday. Good luck to everyone!

Three balloons at home, one in the office. I'm thinking handing them out to the random strangers on the bus would be an overkill. I feel that as long as he does well enough in the free to secure a strong start of the next season, which he really needs vs Kondratyuk-Kolyada-Semenenko atm, it would be a resounding success, no matter the final placement. By the responses from both him and Davydenko, it sounds that they indeed had a short notice, but they were training since the 3rd, because they took 1st Alt position very seriously. Great job from their whole team.

 

[elektra blue]

Okay, I confess that I put up the 4th balloon this morning when I came into the office. I am so happy to see all 3 of the young men doing so well, and each in his own style, the Steady, the Soulful and the Spontaneous. It was really fantastic! I did not at all expect Mozalev pull ahead, but this is such a fantastic development, how close and clean they were. Just beautiful.

remind me to ask you to put up some baloons for me when i have something important to do.

Three clean russian men skates (plus Morisi nearly clean skate). I wonder when we saw that for the last time

in our wildest dreams

 

[lariko]

in our wildest dreams

I dunno. My dreams can be pretty wild.

 

[flanker]

I dunno. My dreams can be pretty wild.

Poor Andrei

 

[lariko]

Poor Andrei

I have a sneaking suspicion he wouldn't be particularly opposed to medaling in a couple of GPs and jumping just a few centimeters higher for more secure landings...

 

[anonymoose_au]

The Russian judge scored Andrei below Mark and Zhenya. Tells you all you need to know. What does RusFed have against skaters who can skate?

Yeah OK, that's just nasty.

Are you seriously claiming neither Mark nor Zhenya can skate?

Why do people always have to exaggerate? You can say you perferred Andrei, but do you have to be a jerk to Mark and Zhenya to do so?

 

[flanker]

Small medals:

 

[lariko]

Yeah OK, that's just nasty.

Are you seriously claiming neither Mark nor Zhenya can skate?

Why do people always have to exaggerate? You can say you perferred Andrei, but do you have to be a jerk to Mark and Zhenya to do so?

This Russian judge was coached by Alexei Mishin. She also scored Mozalev’s every technical element as 2, even when 8 other judges scored it as 3 and 4, yes, even his 4T-3T. All seven of his technical elements. They all can skate, yes, but Mozalev was called up last minute, and scored 3rd by Russian judge, and 4th by Azerbaijani judge (after Kvitelashvili).