Controversial Olympic Competitons

[gkelly]

I don't see this. I thought he made a small bobble of several seconds, and while his face took a little while to recover, to me it looks like his body was right back into the program. She's so fast, that had he not kept up with her, it would have been blatantly obvious, and I don't see much distance between them.

Looks to me like they were back in synch by the second jump of the sequence -- 2 seconds, from 1:01 to 1:03 in this clip
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0z5fWd7Fu5o

(although I don't quite understand what a +3 [for lack of a better term] back death spiral is),

Not sure what you mean by this -- what you don't understand about it. Please clarify?

 

[hockeyfan228]

Not sure what you mean by this -- what you don't understand about it. Please clarify?

I've never understood what qualifies as the right position for a back death spiral. I understand that B&S entered and exited the DS smoothly, that her edge was controlled, and that he maintained beautiful posture and control in the transition from one hand to another and a solid pivot, but I'm not sure how low she's supposed to be or what her back position is supposed to look like or how low he's supposed to be in the pivot. Come to think of it, I don't understand the same position issues for a front death spiral, since one of the things I've been reading is that this year's rules for death spirals mean that the woman has to lose the arch in her back.

I do know that despite the hand change, she didn't look like a sack of potatoes being dragged around.

 

[blue dog]

I've never understood what qualifies as the right position for a back death spiral. I understand that B&S entered and exited the DS smoothly, that her edge was controlled, and that he maintained beautiful posture and control in the transition from one hand to another and a solid pivot, but I'm not sure how low she's supposed to be or what her back position is supposed to look like or how low he's supposed to be in the pivot. Come to think of it, I don't understand the same position issues for a front death spiral, since one of the things I've been reading is that this year's rules for death spirals mean that the woman has to lose the arch in her back.

I do know that despite the hand change, she didn't look like a sack of potatoes being dragged around.

LoL there was no hand change in that DS. The DS in 1998 was an outside DS, which is considered more difficult than the inside DS. In fact, Kazakova/Dmitriev were having trouble with their DS, which some people questioned why they were ahead of Wotzel and Steuer after the short.

 

[escaflowne9282]

There is so much work one has to do to answer these merged threads. from different posters. Is it worth the time? I think the Mods should give a lesson on how not to waste so much time.


original by escaflone.
But Joe...M&D were clean that night in 1994 and it was G&G who made errors. Katia Gordeeva said in "My Sergei", that M&D got slightly more applause at the medal ceremony and that it bothered her.
Kwan and Lipinski were both clean in 1998, and while Lipinski may have been more "on fire" that night, there were still 3 judges who preferred Kwan, which means there was still some room for disagreement. I guess I'm just not convinced there ever was a "must skate clean" standard.

As to SLC, I would have given S&P the technical mark, and B&S the edge on presentation( I agreed most with the Chinese judge).I never had a strong opinion at the time as to who should have won, but it got a bit tiring to see all the hysteria and it made me dislike S&P for quite a while(though I've warmed to them and have started to like them since '06).

There is always the inherent bias of taste among people and judges are included.
I believe that is the reason for having so many judges so that the majority choice is the winner.

If you judged that night and realized that the two most successful teams are competing with each other, there is nothing one can do except select the team without mistakes. Not unusual in Skate Dance.

I saw the flub that Anton made as a minor mistake but I did not like the way he lost control of the program for 20 seconds thereafter. Go to the youtube and see what I mean.

At the conclusion I would say S/P deserved to win that night, but B/S remained the better team, imo. S/P really took on much more as Pros.

Joe

What can I say? I simply just don't see the same thing you do. He seemed pretty much on target with the rest of the program, and their synchronization was perfect in the next jump. To me it looked as though they had more speed, took fewer strokes to cover the same amount of ice, and quite frankly utilized the ice more constructively. I think S&P were cleaner and had a nice performance quality to their program, but I felt like Love Story with it's lack of choreographic skating content left enough aspects of the second mark on the table, that it is feasible for a judge to say no on the night .

Vive la difference! I guess? It's been six years and yeah my opinions on that competition have never really changed, so the horse is still dead and I fear we both are still beating it ...
Onto Baiul vs Kerrigan... (it is the off season after all )

 

[Ptichka]

I don't recall his comments after 1994 Pairs but DO recall his comments after 2002................he clearly thought SP should have won. I remember him saying before their last throw.....land this throw and the gold medal is theirs (said in his usual enthusiastic manner.

He also thought Yagudin could have been placed below Goebel...

 

[heyang]

No one who ever saw Trixi Schuba skate figures would have questioned her huge lead coming out of figures in the old system.

I read somewhere that they had Trixie perform her figures during the gala exhibitions to show why she won the gold medal.

 

[icedancingnut31]

I can tell you why I never believed in that particular conspiracy theory. The idea there was that France supported B&S in pairs in exchange for Russia's support of A&P. However, it would be absurd (IMHO) for anyone to trust Alla Shekhovtseva to vote for anyone other than Lobacheva & Averbukh in dance. Because of her connection to ice dance (she is, after all, not only the ice dancing judge for Russia but also Piseev's wife), Russia cares about ice dance more so than about any other discipline, pairs including. Furthermore, Shekhovtseva is a good friend of Linichuk (L&A's coach) - during the 90's, she helped her grow her school to the point of becoming the most (if not only) dominant ice dancing school in Russia, seriously hurting the discipline in the process (Linichuk would pretty much sink some teams so that others could swim). The conspiracy theory argument, of course, went that Shekhovtseva only voted for L&A at the Olympics because by then the scandal broke anyway, and she did it to cover her tracks and because she thought that the whole deal was off. Frankly, that to me sounds a bit too far fetched. If anything, the results being so close between A&P and L&A show how ridiculous the system is/ was.

It's not a conspiricy theory. There are several articles online on the topic. Other taped conversations include Tokhtakhounov assuring Anissina and her mother that Anissina would win gold, ESPN said, and later speaking with a member of the Russian delegation in Salt Lake City, who told Tokhtakhounov after the disputed pairs competition that "everything is going the way you need it. http://www.sltrib.com/sports/ci_8998648 also Tokhtakhounov was named Time person of the week in 2002 and more info on the interaction between Anissina and him can be read http://www.time.com/time/pow/article/0,8599,333290,00.html

 

[heyang]

Simple answer is national allegiance. Both teams were both Russian, so no one was rooting for one over the other on nationalist grounds, and the results couldn't be blamed on nationalist bloc judging.

Many fans did prefer Mishkutionok/Dmitriev's style and thought they should have won because they made fewer obvious mistakes. But some of us could be persuaded by arguments that G&G had better basic technique in general. So not enough for mass outrage.

I remember debating this with people at work. It really was a style issue. M/D's was much more dramatic but they were a bit sloppy in line and scratchy. G/G's performance was quiet and technically spot on. So, I wouldn't have questioned either team winning.

If anything Loyld Eisler felt cheated. If the 2 Russian pairs had not re-instated, he and Isabelle were the odds on favorite for gold. He did not like his scores. While they were always fun to watch, they loaded their programs with strength moves.

 

[KwanFan1212]

As I remember it, right after the Olympics Sale and Pelletier tried to organize their own tour, cashing in on all the publicity. But they overestimated the interest of the public in yesterday's news, they had problems with their managers and agents, they couldn't get it together in a timely fashion, and most of all, they priced themselves out of the game.

So they basically lost a full year of what should have been the most profitable time of their career.

Actually, their agent at the time was the one trying to set up all that stuff for them. They wanted to tour IIRC but after watching all that time pass by with nothing much happening, Jamie & David fired that agent and moved onto someone else who I believe still works with them. That whole situation wasn't entirely their fault (I do think some of it was inexperience for them in dealing with all the publicity but IMO most of it was their agent trying to do too much) and obviously they've done fine ever since they made that switch.

 

[Ptichka]

It's not a conspiricy theory. There are several articles online on the topic. Other taped conversations include Tokhtakhounov assuring Anissina and her mother that Anissina would win gold, ESPN said, and later speaking with a member of the Russian delegation in Salt Lake City, who told Tokhtakhounov after the disputed pairs competition that "everything is going the way you need it. http://www.sltrib.com/sports/ci_8998648 also Tokhtakhounov was named Time person of the week in 2002 and more info on the interaction between Anissina and him can be read http://www.time.com/time/pow/article/0,8599,333290,00.html

Without actually seeing the transcript of the conversation, I cannot agree or disagree with those conclusions. For example, if he said "Don't worry, she is certain to win gold" - that could either mean that he was setting up the results, or that he was actually calming down and reassuring a friend.

 

[Tonichelle]

Actually, their agent at the time was the one trying to set up all that stuff for them. They wanted to tour IIRC but after watching all that time pass by with nothing much happening, Jamie & David fired that agent and moved onto someone else who I believe still works with them. That whole situation wasn't entirely their fault (I do think some of it was inexperience for them in dealing with all the publicity but IMO most of it was their agent trying to do too much) and obviously they've done fine ever since they made that switch.

I remember all of that... that was before they signed on with IMG, right?

 

[hockeyfan228]

LoL there was no hand change in that DS. The DS in 1998 was an outside DS, which is considered more difficult than the inside DS. In fact, Kazakova/Dmitriev were having trouble with their DS, which some people questioned why they were ahead of Wotzel and Steuer after the short.

You're right -- I was confusing this with one of the death spirals in the 2002 LP, but all but the hand change were qualities I observed in the 1998 SP to "Swan Lake": good speed and control going in and out of the death spiral, solid pivot and fine posture on his part, and great edge control on hers. I just don't know what her back is supposed to look like and how low she is supposed to get.

 

[Buttercup]

He also thought Yagudin could have been placed below Goebel...

Yes, I remember him saying that Yagudin was conceding the LP to Plushenko and couldn't afford to finish behind Goebel, too (towards the end of the program), which was simply laughable . Obviously saying that S/P had won made much more sense, but the NBC team was very over the top in how they expressed their views.

 

[Buttercup]

Thanks for the link. Very interesting. So...did they play the Russian national anthem first, or Canada's?

This is sad, but I actually checked. Answer to the trivia question: the Russian anthem.

 

[Joesitz (RIP)]

I don't see this. I thought he made a small bobble of several seconds, and while his face took a little while to recover, to me it looks like his body was right back into the program. She's so fast, that had he not kept up with her, it would have been blatantly obvious, and I don't see much distance between them.

The 1998 Olympics SP is a different story, although he really only lost about 4-5 seconds on the fall, and she slowed for him. However, the quality of all of the other elements was top-notch (although I don't quite understand what a +3 [for lack of a better term] back death spiral is), and I find this one of the most satisfying musical interpretations I've ever seen in skating.

It's not the bobble alone, if you check out the program, he seems to be in a daze and Bereznaya is helping him to collect himself.

I have not changed my mind about that time in the championship. SP won but BS remained the better team. These things happen in all Sports. If we fall back on the favorite, and their past performances, then there is no need for a competition. An Award for the Body of Work should be given out at a Gala Dinner Party every year.

escaflone quote Vive la difference! I guess? It's been six years and yeah my opinions on that competition have never really changed, so the horse is still dead and I fear we both are still beating it

i'm not beating it. I have never initiated a thread on that competition. I just reiterate my views. No one is going to change their opinions. I would not like to see this entire topic again, but it will come back again and we will all see that none of us has changed our minds. The skaters in question, have all gone on in life.
Joe

 

[gkelly]

I just don't know what her back is supposed to look like and how low she is supposed to get.

As far as I know there wasn't a prescribed position and variations were seen. Americans and especially Canadians seemed to prefer that even the back outside death spiral be as low as possible, e.g., the lady brushing the ice with her hair, but not everyone had to achieve that for it to be an acceptable element.

The new system has more specific guidelines:

http://www.usfigureskating.org/content/ISU First Aid Pairs.pdf

...the man in low pivot position (this is when his buttocks are not higher than the knee of the pivot foot) and the lady on a clean edge with lowest hip and head not higher than her skating leg knee...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KN2aPUH1C2E

Looks like they certainly met that criterion, and held it for almost 3 revolutions.

 

[Ptichka]

This is sad, but I actually checked. Answer to the trivia question: the Russian anthem.

For some extra trivia. When the Russian anthem was played at the original ceremony, Elena mouthed the new words (words of the Russian anthem, only introduced in 2000), but Anton actually mouthed the words of the Soviet anthem (as president Putin, in his infinite wisdom, decided to keep the same music so beloved by the whole worldhwell.

 

[cassieandcheetah]

It's not the bobble alone, if you check out the program, he seems to be in a daze and Bereznaya is helping him to collect himself.

I have to disagree. Like another poster said, I Think he collected himself quite well after his mistake: he was right in sync with the next double jump. What's so frustrating is people don't give B/S enough credit for the fact that they tried a completely new program. If by "daze" you're talking about the fact that they looked less comfortable than normal, I would say doing a new program was the reason, and that it was shared by elena as well. But I think overall, it was a valiant effort by both of them. I don't think Anton was in a daze at all.

And I don't mind the fact that people still talk about the 2002 scandal. Yes, those involved have moved on, but it was such an unprecented event and so unwarranted, rewarding a second gold, and I think it was detrimental to people's respect for the sport that it happened so quickly and so readily, and I have to blame the north american media for it.

 

[Mathman]

...I think it was detrimental to people's respect for the sport that it happened so quickly and so readily, and I have to blame the north american media for it.

But I think there is another way to look at it. The "North American Media" has no responsibility to protect the reputation of figure skating or to foster respect for it. The ISU does. In fact, the main job of "the media" is to sell newspapers and get people to turn on their television sets.

I fault the ISU for perpetuating a corporate culture where it's OK to cheat but scandalous to get caught.

 

[escaflowne9282]

But I think there is another way to look at it. The "North American Media" has no responsibility to protect the reputation of figure skating or to foster respect for it. The ISU does. In fact, the main job of "the media" is to sell newspapers and get people to turn on their television sets.

I fault the ISU for perpetuating a corporate culture where it's OK to cheat but scandalous to get caught.

I think it's 50/50
I wish the ISU had been able to stand up to the media, investigate the judges, determine guilt and accountability, and then award a second gold if warranted. They didn't ,and they buckled to public pressure, while also not investigating any of those who are alleged to have been corrupt. To me that is just plain illogical.

At the same time,I have to disagree with you on one thing, and that is about the "North American Media". Many of the members/pundits of the NA media were former skaters and people who worked in the sport. To me, those particular members of the media did have some professional responsibility to not be overly sensationalist in their coverage.