Let's hope that she will be fit to join the gala exhibition. Loena deserves this moment with the amazing audience and the audience deserves Loena's amazing skating
2024 Worlds: Women's thoughts and comments
- Thread starter gsk8
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3020 is too far ahead for me to think about. But then I'll be dead.
- Joined
- Sep 14, 2008
This is probably the worst era of women's skating. Very little interesting artistically, combined with a regression in technical content and quality. The jumps are lower than in the past, there are no +3Lo combos, and the speed and flow on the triple-triples are worse. Almost nobody bothers to hold out landings anymore either (since the judges don't reward it). Even someone like Kaori who used to show a nice extended landing is now always doing a "cheated" exit on her triple-triple, with a quick little turn out that is allegedly supposed to be a "transition", but is just masking the lack of total stability at the end of the jump.
The spins and footwork that don't have artistic or musical cohesion continue to be a plague on the sport, but even beyond that there is a certain lack of vision and personality happening in the performances too. The programs don't have a connection between the movements and are failing to create big moments. There is a lack of attention to line and posture as well. Levito is being labelled the current "balletic" skater, but she is constantly in lackluster positions. It's far from the refinement Michelle Kwan and Sasha Cohen displayed.
Another note - it's bizarre Loena Hendrickx keeps being given Level 4 for her Layback spin that only has 3 features. She would have to be hitting the "clear increase of speed" feature to get Level 4 without a sideways position or difficult entrance/exit, and what she's doing shouldn't qualify.
The spins and footwork that don't have artistic or musical cohesion continue to be a plague on the sport, but even beyond that there is a certain lack of vision and personality happening in the performances too. The programs don't have a connection between the movements and are failing to create big moments. There is a lack of attention to line and posture as well. Levito is being labelled the current "balletic" skater, but she is constantly in lackluster positions. It's far from the refinement Michelle Kwan and Sasha Cohen displayed.
Another note - it's bizarre Loena Hendrickx keeps being given Level 4 for her Layback spin that only has 3 features. She would have to be hitting the "clear increase of speed" feature to get Level 4 without a sideways position or difficult entrance/exit, and what she's doing shouldn't qualify.
I'm not a spin expert but compared to EC where she got level 3 for the said spin she did more revolutions in Biellmann position (10 rev. vs 8 rev. in EC).
Maybe that counted as "clear increase of speed". Just saying.
Having precise measurements for that would indeed be better than just saying
- Joined
- Dec 3, 2014
Did not get to see the event live, but seeing Kaori in the FS, for the first time, I really loved that program on her. Almost like a black Ink doing a calligraphy on ice. So beautiful. 
Shame about all the other splats in the final group though. Was hoping for a clean final group.
Shame about all the other splats in the final group though. Was hoping for a clean final group.
- Joined
- Jun 21, 2003
Welcome to the forum!
I think that the panel of judges concurred that Levito's skate was all that, though not to be compared to the thorough mastery shown by Kaori Sakamoto.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I personally felt that Chae-yeon Kim's performance was the equal of Levito's, and also was technically excellent.
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- Jan 17, 2022
Kaori literally didn't even do a turn transition out of her 3F+3T in the Free... But yeah, I guess "always"...
- Joined
- Mar 12, 2007
I do think Isabeau gave us two enchanting performances. I have grown to really enjoy her, despite the wonky jump technique. I think she loves what she's doing, and it shows.
I watched an event in December where in the free skate no skater in the top 13 fell on a triple.
- Joined
- Sep 14, 2008
She did in the SP and it's something I've noticed in general these recent years. Jumps aren't presented like they used to be.
- Joined
- Jan 17, 2022
See, the problem with that is that you didn't just say "Jumps aren't presented like they used to be" (which I agree with) but said that the turn is supposed to be "masking the lack of total stability at the end of the jump" and trying to use Kaori now "always" doing that transition on her 3F+3T as an example - But in fact, she doesn't even use it at all on the 3F+3T in the Free, so she clearly does not really need it to mask a "lack of stability", so the argument doesn't quite work that well anymore, no?
- Joined
- Jun 21, 2003
This is true. Jumps are hardly "presented" at all these days. In the past (say the 1980s and 1990s) men would go all out to "present" and showcase their triple Axel. This produced a choreographic exclamation mark and and program highlight. This is missing from current programs, which tend to be of uniform intensity throughout with no big high points to cheer.
Although, a program like Alina Zagitova's Don Quiote was quite successful, IMHO, at substituting a whirlwind flurry of jumps at the end for a couple of well-presented individual jumps. There are more than one way to skin a cat.
Jinxed.
- Joined
- Aug 12, 2014
Isabeau skated clean. Just to clarify.Did not get to see the event live, but seeing Kaori in the FS, for the first time, I really loved that program on her. Almost like a black Ink doing a calligraphy on ice. So beautiful.
Shame about all the other splats in the final group though. Was hoping for a clean final group.
- Joined
- Sep 14, 2008
Why are you continuing to repeat semantics. The majority of the time in recent years she has been turning out of her combo instead of holding the landing, including in the SP at these Worlds. It's something most people are doing these days on their jumps and the judges don't judge it correctly, as usual. Yet another example of how the scoring system and judges are failing. So we are stuck with a sport where people are no longer trying to achieve an objective high level of quality and artistry, but instead just whatever meets the superficial and misguided rubric. And it shows in the performances. Everything looks disjointed and predictable, there isn't freedom and purpose and inspiration on the ice anymore.
- Joined
- Jan 5, 2014
IMHO it would not be at all a smart decision for Loena to participate in gala and to aggravate her hip injury even more than she already has done but, it seems, she will skate indeed as a gala schedule is up and Loena is in.Let's hope that she will be fit to join the gala exhibition. Loena deserves this moment with the amazing audience and the audience deserves Loena's amazing skating
- Joined
- Apr 23, 2018
No. It doesn't.
Yuzuru Hanyu won the 2018 Olympics (albeit on half an ankle, painkillers and grit but he did) and then withdrew from the 2018 worlds. Nathan Chen won the 2022 Olympics and promptly... stopped for whatever reason (and yes, I am sure they were fine reasons, I'm just making a point here, he didn't formally retire so was still technically in competition) and therefore wasn't at 2022 worlds. Whether or not one thinks the people who won said worlds were or weren't better than their Olympic superiors has nothing to do with whether they should have their results as conditional.
Any World Championship is by its nature a competition of the world's best who are there and are eligible to compete. If people are daft enough not to understand understand that, that is their problem. If the US basketball team were banned from the next Olympics, and Lithuania won, Lithuania would be the Olympic champions. Full stop, no asterisk.
Coulda woulda shoulda has no place in official rules, that way madness (even more than the shonky judging and manufactured 'greatests' with fake PCS already causes) lies. The Russian woman were not eligible to compete in 2024. Therefore, whether or not they coulda woulda shoulda podiumed is irrelevant. Kaori is the World champion, suck it up buttercups.
While I agree about Armstrong, the young Germans of the late 1940s and the star-studded US team of 1961 could not compete through no fault of their own. The athletes who get swept up in a boycott whether they agree or not could not compete through no fault of their own.
- Joined
- Nov 11, 2019
I found Worlds enjoyable, though I have been watching on catch up due to timezone differences. My favourite performances from the women were Haein Lee's Seirenes SP - she was brilliant in it - and both of Olga Mikutina's, as her choreography is so creative, with wonderful details, like the little relevé on her toe pick as she transitions out of her second spin in her free. I really enjoyed both of Hana Yoshida's programmes too; Koo Koo Fun is, well, a lot of fun, and her FP step sequence, where she mimics the crane, stands out for me.
Congratulations to Kaori - the fact that she could laugh at her mistakes in the short is deeply endearing, and also, I think, meant that she was in the right sort of headspace to keep on performing her programme, instead of letting disappointment dampen her. She was very determined in the free, and I cheered when she landed the 3F-3T after last year's 1F-3T.
I loved the reactions of Ekaterina Kurakova, Kimmy Repond and Isabeau Levito after their free skates. The joy, the relief, the surprise, the release of all that pent-up tension and emotion. On the other hand, I really felt for Loena - she had such a bubbly, energetic SP, and then seemed very tense in the free. The pressure of realising that if she skated clean she might win a Worlds title? I hope she can have a good rest during the off-season, heal her hip injury, and come back refreshed and happy next season.
Chaeyeon Kim continues to impress me - she's technically solid, makes her jumps look easy, and earned a level 4 on her step sequences in both the short and the free, which I don't think many of the other women did.
Congratulations to Kaori - the fact that she could laugh at her mistakes in the short is deeply endearing, and also, I think, meant that she was in the right sort of headspace to keep on performing her programme, instead of letting disappointment dampen her. She was very determined in the free, and I cheered when she landed the 3F-3T after last year's 1F-3T.
I loved the reactions of Ekaterina Kurakova, Kimmy Repond and Isabeau Levito after their free skates. The joy, the relief, the surprise, the release of all that pent-up tension and emotion. On the other hand, I really felt for Loena - she had such a bubbly, energetic SP, and then seemed very tense in the free. The pressure of realising that if she skated clean she might win a Worlds title? I hope she can have a good rest during the off-season, heal her hip injury, and come back refreshed and happy next season.
Chaeyeon Kim continues to impress me - she's technically solid, makes her jumps look easy, and earned a level 4 on her step sequences in both the short and the free, which I don't think many of the other women did.
They voluntarily chose not to compete.
They would be Olympic champions, but clearly not the best team in the world, or have the best players, the best league.
When people write about that gold medal 50 years from now, they would add a little note -- Team USA was forbidden to compete through no fault of the players.
It is possible to be both Olympic champion and the best skater/athlete/team in the world, but being Olympic champion does not necessarily make you the best in the world.
I'm talking about unofficial rankings.
They did compete in other competitions, under the same rules as ISU competitions, so we can assess their performances and compare them to the performances in ISU competitions. Kaori is the champion of the ISU but in terms of unofficial world rankings we can compare performances in different competitions I would say she is #3 in the world at the moment.
In all other sports people make these types of comparisons across leagues and competitions, but seems very controversial in figure skating.
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