2024-25 German Figure Skating

[CrazyKittenLady]

Most JGP assignments have now been released, one spot each for the singles disciplines at JGP Ljubljana will be determined at a later date based on the results of the skaters assigned to the first three spots.

Wow, I'm excited for Genrikh, I never thought I'd see him at a JGP. On the other hand, I'm bummed Hugo didn't get anything yet, he carried German junior men's skating last season. Hopefully he gets lots of other opportunities to compete.

 

[lilimum]

Wow, I'm excited for Genrikh, I never thought I'd see him at a JGP. On the other hand, I'm bummed Hugo didn't get anything yet, he carried German junior men's skating last season. Hopefully he gets lots of other opportunities to compete.

Luca Fünfer didn*t get no spot neither. He won the last season German Nationals, Deutschlandpokal, and was the best of the German TEam at Bavarian Open. it is so ridiculous.

 

[CrazyKittenLady]

Luca Fünfer didn*t get no spot neither. He won the last season German Nationals, Deutschlandpokal, and was the best of the German TEam at Bavarian Open. it is so ridiculous.

That's true, Luca would also deserve a spot as national Junior Champion. But the fed seems to base everything on the results of the test skates and the skaters' current form.
Let's keep our fingers crossed that more spots will be won for next season at least.

 

[Jumping_Bean]

That's true, Luca would also deserve a spot as national Junior Champion. But the fed seems to base everything on the results of the test skates and the skaters' current form.
Let's keep our fingers crossed that more spots will be won for next season at least.

The fed is very transparent about the criteria:
https://eislauf-union.de/files/user...ngCHSJGP_24-07-181.pdf?jsn_mobilize_preview=1

Only problem - That doesn't help if everything else (from results to finances) is very much not transparent.

Luca is probably the skater 4th in line and will be given the last JGP spot if none of the other skaters finish high enough to warrant a second JGP.

 

[ladyjane]

While I am not sure the interest in this thread will be very big, with there now being multiple medal contenders again among the German skaters, I thought it would be nice to have one thread for the entirety of German figure skating.

The German National team is subdivided into multiple tiers, so let's go from the highest to the lowest:

Olympic-level squad (OK)
Pairs
Annika Hocke (23) / Robert Kunkel (25)
Minerva Hase (24) / Nikita Volodin (24)

Perspective squad (PK)
Men
Nikita Starostin (21)
Kai Jagoda (22)
Ice Dance
Jennifer Janse van Rensburg (31) / Benjamin Steffan (28)
Charise Matthaei (23) / Max Liebers (24)
Darya Grimm (17) / Michail Savitskiy (20)

Supplemental squad (EK)
Women
Kristina Isaev (23)
Pairs
Letizia Roscher (19) / Luis Schuster (23)

Youth squad (NK1 & NK2)
Women
Anna Gerke (13)
Julia Grabowski (17)
Nikol Kalugina (14)
Olesya Ray (16)
Valentina Andrianova (15)
Marie Bierwert (13)
Helen Böhm (11)
Jekaterina Brinster (13)
Sophie Erhardt (14)
Frida Herrmann (13)
Leyla Tosun (12)
Jara Tanaya Wabner (15)
Adelina Voroteliak (12)
Diana Ziesecke (12)
Men
Luca Fünfer (18)
Hugo Willi Herrmann (16)
Arthur Wolfgang Mai (19)
Soner Öztürk (14)
Leon Rojkov (15)
Emil Eiffler (13)
Richard von Göler (14)
Robert Wildt (16)
Pairs
Aliyah Ackermann (16) / Tobija Harms (22)
Sonja Löwenherz (15) / Robert Löwenherz (20)
Katalin Janne Salatzki (19) / Lukas Röseler (22)
Anna Kopp (14) / David Beck (15)
Sophie Krebs (12) / Ilia Trofymov (16)
Ice Dance
Karla Maria Karl (17) / Kai Hoferichter (22)
Alexia Kruk (17) / Jan Eisenhaber (18)
Lilia Schubert (19) / Nikita Remeshevskiy (20)
Enikö Kobor (15) / Zoard Kobor (15)
Mia Lee Mayer (16)

Grand Prix Assignments
Pairs
Annika Hocke / Robert Kunkel - Skate Canada & NHK Trophy
Minerva Hase / Nikita Volodin - Grand Prix de France & Cup of China
Ice Dance
Jennifer Janse van Rensburg / Benjamin Steffan - NHK Trophy

Junior Grand Prix Assignments

	#1 Riga	#2 Ostrava	#3 Bangkok	#4 Ankara	#5 Gdansk	#6 Ljubljana	#7 Wuxi
Women	Anna Gerke	Sophie Erhardt	-	-	Olesya Ray	TBD	-
Men	Genrikh Gartung	Soner Öztürk	-	-	Leon Rojkov	TBD	-
Pairs	Janne Salatzki / Lukas Röseler -	Janne Salatzki / Lukas Röseler Aliyah Ackermann / Tobija Harms	-	Sonja Löwenherz / Robert Löwenherz* -	Aliyah Ackermann / Tobija Harms Sonja Löwenherz / Robert Löwenherz*	-	-
Ice Dance	Darya Grimm / Michail Savitskiy -	Lilia Schubert / Nikita Remeshevskiy Nelly Hemcke / Artyom Sladkov*	-	Darya Grimm / Michail Savitskiy Alexia Kruk / Jan Eisenhaber	Lilia Schubert / Nikita Remeshevskiy Enikö Kobor / Zoard Kobor	Alexia Kruk / Jan Eisenhaber Enikö Kobor / Zoard Kobor	-

*Teams will only be allowed to compete after another monitoring session

Very much interested in this thread!

 

[Weathergal]

Very much interested in this thread!

Same!

 

[Jumping_Bean]

Hocke/Kunkel's Free is set to a Falco medley - So far, they've only announced one of the pieces, so feel free to guess the other two

 

[CrazyKittenLady]

News from Oberstdorf, singles edition:

The baby skaters
- Reigning German Novice Champion Adelina Voroteliak is working on a 3A.
- Sophie Erhardt changed coaches from Ulanovsky to Florian Just. Her new SP will be "Libertango".

The elite
After tearing multiple ligaments at an unsuccessfull 3A landing at the Merano Trophy in February, Kai Jagoda had to go through three months of treatment and physical therapy in Berlin. He has been back on the ice for four weeks now. 3T and 3S are still giving him trouble, and he doesn't dare to go for 3A yet.
Kai is a bit disappointed since prior to the injury work on the 4T was very fruitful, but is now, naturally, on pause.
He leaves open whether he'll start at Nebelhorn or take a bit more recovery time. The goal for the season is defending the National title and qualifying for the ISU Championships.

 

[CrazyKittenLady]

And, btw, here is the link to the German Local Event calendar:

DEU Datenassistent

deu-info.de

 

[text_skate]

The Russian Fed has released 16-year old Genrikh Gartung to Germany

Do you know, if he has German heritage. The name sounds very German (it's a russified form of Heinrich Hartung)

 

[CrazyKittenLady]

Do you know, if he has German heritage. The name sounds very German (it's a russified form of Heinrich Hartung)

I was wondering the same, but I don't know any details. Maybe if he does well at the JGP we'll get an interview in Pirouette magazin or on the DEU homepage and learn more about his background and connection to Germany.

 

[Bluediamonds09]

Is it true that there aren't any young German female skaters because of school restrictions in Germany? Like, you can't train as much as the Americans or Russians because there's no time around school duties?

 

[Jumping_Bean]

Is it true that there aren't any young German female skaters because of school restrictions in Germany? Like, you can't train as much as the Americans or Russians because there's no time around school duties?

There are many young female skaters - Just not many who successfully make it to Seniors. On the National team alone there are 14 girls between the ages of 12 and 17.

School is mandatory in Germany until technically 18 (16 in practice, as finishing grade 10 or a 2-year vocational training also lifts the mandate). Homeschooling is generally not allowed (in some very specific cases, online school or travelling teachers are allowed), but sports schools do exist. Now, sports schools are not schools with lower academic requirements like in some other countries, but school hours are adjusted to accommodate training and there is more flexibility afforded to these young athletes (being able to take work packs with them when travelling, classes and exams offered during holidays, longer total number of school years, etc.).
Many athletes also don't attend sports schools, but regular schools (like the Kóbor twins), so accommodations are a bit more limited - Work packs or online schooling while travelling and writing exams later yes, but adjusted school hours no.

Young skaters definitely do stop skating because it's very difficult to juggle both, but way more skaters quit skating after finishing school and/or higher education - As an athlete in a fringe sport, you get very limited funding and combining high-level sports training and work is even harder to do, unfortunately.

 

[lilimum]

Is it true that there aren't any young German female skaters because of school restrictions in Germany? Like, you can't train as much as the Americans or Russians because there's no time around school duties?

It is true that homeschooling or distance learning is not possible in Germany but there is a good infrastructure of schools with so called Leistungssportklassen. There are the "Eliteschulen des Sports" and "Eliteschulen des Fussballs" supported by the DOSB (Olympic Sports) and DFB (soccer). Only kids that are selected by their sports federation have access to this schools and the fed have to have a contract with the school and taking care of the transport, facilities and coaching during morning training sessions. For figure skating in Bavaria that means you have to move to Oberstdorf (less than 10.000 habitants, the most southern community in Germany and access to the boarding house only for National team) that is the only place where the figure skating fed has contracts with the schools. Beside this there are some public and private schools that are offerering"Sportklassen"
The bigger problems are the access to ice and the overall costs. So only a very small number of supported kids are reaching the junior level and even a smaller number is reaching the senior level. Due to the early selection of promoted kids there is no chance for non promoted to reach the same level to a later point. Even Eva-Maria Fitze would have no chance today because she was already seven when she started with figure skating, in this age the selection is already done (different for skater coming from abroad). Fun fact: the most successful femal senior skater at the moment is Julia Sauter, living in Germany and competing for Romania.

 

[norwegianfairytale]

Do you know, if he has German heritage. The name sounds very German (it's a russified form of Heinrich Hartung)

His name makes me think of Damian Hardung, a German actor, who has trended so hard the last couple of months on social media

 

[norwegianfairytale]

It will for sure be interesting to follow Gartung, I saw he was doing a quad on Peak Ice Camp.

 

[Jumping_Bean]

Senior monitoring is currently taking place in Oberstdorf and both the German Federation and many of the German skaters have been sharing behind-the-scenes content on their IG stories

Including, of course, Jenny's adorable dog And Hase/Volodin's brand-new 3FTh

We'll get some more official content (pictures and reports) in due time.

 

[lilimum]

Senior monitoring is currently taking place in Oberstdorf and both the German Federation and many of the German skaters have been sharing behind-the-scenes content on their IG stories

Including, of course, Jenny's adorable dog And Hase/Volodin's brand-new 3FTh

We'll get some more official content (pictures and reports) in due time.

only 2 senior men ? and 1 senior women ? Where are Anna, Hanna and Sarah ? I want to cry.

 

[Jumping_Bean]

only 2 senior men ? and 1 senior women ? Where are Anna, Hanna and Sarah ? I want to cry.

Woah, slow down. The photo shooting and the monitoring itself are two separate events that are being combined for convenience purposes.

The photo shoot is only for the National team and the pictures will replace the ones currently up on the website, while the monitoring usually includes additional skaters on top of the National team skaters.
Last year, three men and one woman not on the national team took part in the monitoring session - We'll see how many there will be this year.

Important to note - Skaters not on the National team have to notify the German Skating Union that they wish to take part, the German Sating Union only sends out invitations by name to National team members (this is different than in other countries).

 

[Jumping_Bean]

Ice Dance: