2023 Skate Canada Men's Free Skate

[yuumagical]

I just watched Jun. Oh, my. It has shades of the French Grand Prix disaster Shoma skated when he was without a coach.

I'm sure it's discussed elsewhere, but I wonder why Cha left Orser? I didn't know he had.

It appears to be a practical decision from my point of view. Jun can't train outside of Korea because he's a university student there and he has to keep studying there in order to get funding and remain on the Korean team (I hope I've got this right, @Ichatdelune).

As a Shoma fan, I don't think this was quite as bad as the IdF disaster, though I don't want to think about what Shoma did back then at all. Jun...still had that beautiful Ina Bauer going for him...

 

[4everchan]

YOu know on the right day Keegan could have won a world bronze. He had the skating skills and charisma. He is not a lyrical skater or classical skater but really wonderful spins, edging and explosive power and one of th e most genuine personalities. He didn't rely on dramatic stairs and flowy costumes.

I have always put Keegan in the 5-15 bracket. His issues: no second quad made it almost mandatory for him to use the flip, for which he had a bad edge call almost all the time. The guys right now are trying to add quads. Of course Keegan was fast, had great spins though he rarely got level 4 for all 3 of them in his programs, and had great charisma. His PCS window was higher and that's what made him a bit more of a secure bet... but I started following skating with Orser and pretty much every year, Canada had a real contender or if not every year, it wouldn't take 5 years or more... I feel that since Patrick retired and even before the Olympics when he got into a funk, Canada hasn't had a contender. So it's what now? 6 years since 2017. What I can agree on is that Keegan was by far superior to what we have seen so far this year within the crop of younger skaters... mind you, Younger Keegan was not very competitive... Wesley and Gogo are junior age, Aleksa went to junior worlds (19) last year too... The oldest skaters are Roman and Conrad, 24 and 23 respectively. They will probably stick around another two years and that will have meant two olympic cycles without a contender for Canada. That's a long time.

This being said, I 100% support our guys and admire their efforts and wish them the best. As mentioned in other posts, Skate Canada needs to send them to more competitions. These guys didn't compete a lot considering that Keegan was the leader in the last few years.

 

[CrazyKittenLady]

Shaidorov incorporated cartwheels into both his SP and FS. Imo, he should have ended up with a medal here. And if he were from a more influential fed, he probably would have. As it is, he will need a couple more competitions with consistent skating to earn a reputation, but then the medals will come.

Loved Matteo's redemption free skate. Not a fan of the colour composition of his costume, the dark blue shirt looks terrible with the black trousers. The skating was fantastic though!

 

[icewhite]

I my god, this looks like a very rough event.
And what a horror for Jun.
Was it in Shanghai where he actually had a very good skate?

Happy for Matteo, will have to rewatch his program later.

 

[apgold]

YEs and know. The pairs and dance were far better at Skate Canada and the scoring more fair in dance. But the singles skating was a bit of a gong show especially in the men. But I guess we could say in the ladies the gold medallist here skated more like a gold medallist champion in Kaori but the others on the podium were ho hum compared to Skate America. But Skate America certain did not live up to the glory days of yesteryear. I think whether we want to admit it or not - not having russia compete really affects the podium and level of skating. THough they are not so much of an influence in men they do make a dent their but in the other events they are hugely influential.

I was referring to the Men's FS only since this was the thread for that, to clarify. The other disciplines were very good at SCI this year.

 

[surimi]

@surimi did you watch?? Your boy Sota just got his first ever GP gold medal

It was in the early morning hours for me, so no, I didn't watch, but I was so nervous after waking up that I took to the internet and GS straight away, to find out how Men ended. A notification about your post was the first news I saw. So, thank you for putting me out of my anxiety, and with such fantastic news! I'm so happy right now, and I can't wait to watch the archived competition (though I do feel sorry for Kazuki and Jun, I saw the result list and I wonder what happened).

 

[Ruthypegs]

Seriously? Ouch. That's brutal. So the men are going to be very untrained in terms of performance experience by nationals. That does not bode well. To be honest, men's skating in Canada is even weaker than I thought, and I knew it was pretty weak right now. I'm not even sure who I'd pick if it was up to me. Really sad.

#comebackkeegan

 

[Ruthypegs]

Wesley… just made a case to be chosen for Senior Worlds for Canada. 220+ and 7th is not bad.

Conrad… sadly…. I have in 3rd behind Stephen. This was a missed opportunity. He has quads. But, loses so many points in other elements.

Sadly Wesley and Stephen are still eligible for Junior Worlds.
That is why I need Conrad and Roman to do better.

Aleksa… down to 6th behind Roman and Matthew Neuman. That was a bad free skate

Aleksa shows a lot of promise, I think - and well done to him for stepping up at the last minute and skating his first Grand Prix at home - can't have been easy, but he showed a lot of composure.

Fingers crossed, Roman will start to realise his full potential - he has fantastic expression and has the technical arsenal - what's missing is consistency, sadly. Time to switch coaches? (Stephane Lambiel, possibly?)

 

[RatedPG]

Aleksa shows a lot of promise, I think - and well done to him for stepping up at the last minute and skating his first Grand Prix at home - can't have been easy, but he showed a lot of composure.

Fingers crossed, Roman will start to realise his full potential - he has fantastic expression and has the technical arsenal - what's missing is consistency, sadly. Time to switch coaches? (Stephane Lambiel, possibly?)

Yup. Aleksa has potential and I’m glad he was chosen to skate at this event. It will be a good learning experience for him. He landed some of the harder jumps in the first half. He just lost his focus on the second half.

What frustrates me about Roman is his discipline in training. He even mentioned it one time in a Romsky video. He compared the discipline in Japan when it comes to skating as being cultural. They have limited ice time in Japan and the skaters make the most of their ice team with run throughs, etc. To me, it was shocking to see how he was shocked with this cultural difference. The fact he stated it, proves he doesn’t work as hard. He has a soft coach. A bit of strictness and more run through programs would do wonders for Roman. I would be happy if he switched to an international camp.

 

[Ruthypegs]

Kevin Reynolds is a fantastic commentator - he has it all - professional insight, tact, intelligence and a beautiful speaking voice and calm disposition.

 

[Ruthypegs]

I feel terrible for Jun. He has to re-group or something has to change. This is unlike him.

Tomono's skate was enjoyable and I liked how he used his arms.

I wonder if something's going on in his personal life and it's mental wellbeing that's undermining him? It was awful seeing him fall and struggle.

 

[sworddance21]

It appears to be a practical decision from my point of view. Jun can't train outside of Korea because he's a university student there and he has to keep studying there in order to get funding and remain on the Korean team (I hope I've got this right, @Ichatdelune).

As a Shoma fan, I don't think this was quite as bad as the IdF disaster, though I don't want to think about what Shoma did back then at all. Jun...still had that beautiful Ina Bauer going for him...

Thanks. That makes sense (and I agree about not thinking about the Shoma disaster AND the Juna Bauer!)

 

[lariko]

Can't wait to see everything! Was too tired to watch real life yesterday

 

[lariko]

Gosh, Rizzo's 4Lo shown as triple and then 3A invalidated

 

[lariko]

Oh my god! Watching disaster after disaster, how could they push Shaidorov into 5th?! That's terrible judging. Were they *that* anxious that Miura or Cha won't medal that 4Lz with +3 GoE suddenly becomes underrotated? that's just egregious

 

[sk8coachus]

He is much better than this music and this program. I hate all this emo male ballad type music. Do something that sticks out. Jazz, or tango, or classical, or something. But not this. His programs last year were fantastic.

Am I mistaken, or didn’t he skate to Michael Jackson or was that last season? Nothing wrong with The Batman soundtrack except a cover version of Nirvana? Oh no.

 

[4everchan]

Can't wait to see everything! Was too tired to watch real life yesterday

really? I would skip most of the men. Planning to watch everything else again but the men

 

[4everchan]

Oh my god! Watching disaster after disaster, how could they push Shaidorov into 5th?! That's terrible judging. Were they *that* anxious that Miura or Cha won't medal that 4Lz with +3 GoE suddenly becomes underrotated? that's just egregious

Simply because he doesn't have much else than jumps to offer. These types of skaters will need to earn their PCS and rightly so. I don't think it's unfair judging unless he is not rewarded for well done jumps. Already with 74 in PCS he was rewarded on the same page as Mark and Liam who both have better basic skills then he does. Of course, I have never seen him live, I have seen the two above-mentioned skaters live and they are nice to watch. From the stream, I don't think I would say the same about Shaidorov.

 

[lariko]

Simply because he doesn't have much else than jumps to offer. These types of skaters will need to earn their PCS and rightly so. I don't think it's unfair judging unless he is not rewarded for well done jumps. Already with 74 in PCS he was rewarded on the same page as Mark and Liam who both have better basic skills then he does. Of course, I have never seen him live, I have seen the two above-mentioned skaters live and they are nice to watch. From the stream, I don't think I would say the same about Shaidorov.

I like him, though I also haven't seen him life . But with all due respect, his 4Lz was gorgeous with basically the same GoE that Malinin got last week for his 4Lz, versus Rizzo's loop that even judges thought was tripple and who held his arms down for the first 30 seconds of the program until he put in his 2 quads. Watching hard splat after hard splat vs clean program, and with audience reacting very positively to Shaidorov's skate...I am pretty darn sure people buy his artistic vision for CB. And how Tomono manged to even skate to the end... who knows. And that Cha was 7 points ahead with a fall in the short.... anyway, I can't disagree more with the judging.

This damn zigzagging in judging is frustrating. We want clean and pretty programs, not falls on big jumps...oops, nope, when it comes to Shaidorov, we'd rather have falls.

I mean I would have understood it if everyone skated beautifully like Malinin, but in an event when nobody else (literally!) except Shaidorov put 2 clean skates, actually, it was a splatter fest, and Shaidorov didn’t go clean by cheating and jumping doubles and triples, not rewarding this is obnoxious.

 

[Ares]

Shaidorov can jump, yes, but not much else

My exact sentiments too. I thought music was too big for him as well. I'd enjoy him skating to something different than freaking Carmina Burana more I am pretty sure.