Fernandez: ‘Anything is possible’

[Ender]

To me, for example, the problem of PCS scoring of Fernandez FS at IdF, is not that he fell twice on jumps, but that before and after those he had several mistakes with sloppy landings, being a little bit slower than usual and not so clear and sure in every transition, too, and in general giving the impression of fatigue to carry on the performance.
In fact, already in the first 4T landing, the free leg was so low that in the end touched the ice (+2 GOE for two judges, J1 and J9). He recovered in the transitions before and after and in jumping the 4Scombo, but then he had a sort of twofooted landing in the 3A, a slight loss of balance in the first part of the CSSp (+3 GOE again for J1 and this time J7), the foramentioned fall on the 4S and a general slowdown in steps and movements that lead to a not beautiful landing on the 3F, the second fall in the second 3A, missing also the combo, and again sloppy landings in the last triples combo. Step sequence was good, but not brilliant as Javier could do. To me all these factors affected PE, IN and a little bit SS and CO.

The judges had for sure a different opinion: http://skatingscores.com/2018/gpfra/men/long/
J1, the spanish Delfa, obviously gave him 9.50 in SS and TR, 9.75 in CO e IN, giving maybe the only (to me) right score in PE, i.e. 8.75.
But also J9, Ms. Numanova from Uzbekistan was not joking about it, because she gave again 9.50 in SS, TR and CO, 9.75 in IN and ....9.25 in PE!
Also J6 (GEO) and 7(KAZ) scored Fernandez PCS very high, with PE at 9.25.

I ask my self and to you how this is possible, without any intention to bash the skater, that surely gave all he had in the competition, or wanting the usual and general complain about the judging system: I would like just understand the logic under this scores, if there is one, because sometimes I have the impression that I am still missing some rules or that maybe I wachted different performances (also if I know that wachting via videos is different than watching live in the arena).

It’s not just the fall but the overall presentation as well.

Come to think of it... that Spanish judge, Daniel Delfa has been judging in many big competitions and he seems to be close to Fernandez... and why no one question his credibility?

 

[skylark]

:
All-in-all, for me Voronov at NHK and Misha here have had the the most impactful and deserved wins/medals from a spectators viewpoint.

If you'd add Rippon's silver medal performance at NHK, I would agree with you. But I also would want to add Nathan Chen's gold medal performance at Rostelecom. (it seems so long ago

This is purely a perspective of one person who watches the sport. But viewers do count for something.

I agree, and so does Javier. He said at Worlds 2016 that having people enjoy his skating programs was the most important thing to him. He wants people to be happy watching his programs, and he wants to be happy skating. From the current article:

"After coming from my first grand prix, I think I needed to have a good skate and be able to smile and be happy,”​

The following also addresses the effect that feeling successful in the program can have.

"When the program starts to go down, you start getting more tired, and when you get tired, you make more mistakes.”​

 

[Jaana]

Come to think of it... that Spanish judge, Daniel Delfa has been judging in many big competitions and he seems to be close to Fernandez... and why no one question his credibility?

I´d guess that there are not that many Spanish judges to choose from, because skatingwise Spain is a very small country and in that little skating circle people know each other. Especially Javi who has been a skater for a long, long time, LOL. Besides, it´s ISU which selects judges for competitions, not Spain or Javi...

 

[eppen]

The national federations nominate the judges for the selection processes. But, yeah, Spain has 3 ISU level judges, Delfa is also ok for referee, two can do ice dance. Figure skating is a small world probably even in the bigger countries, people are bound to know each other.

Plus if you care to follow how the judges from the skater's own country score, you will notice soon enough that somehow it is their duty to give their own skater a high score. I have kept an eye on that since last fall when it became possible to connect scores with judges and it really does happen and literally everyone does it. From the earlier periods, there are some studies that indicate that if the panel contains a judge from the skater's country, he/she/they are likely to get scored higher.

E

 

[rabbit1234]

The national federations nominate the judges for the selection processes. But, yeah, Spain has 3 ISU level judges, Delfa is also ok for referee, two can do ice dance. Figure skating is a small world probably even in the bigger countries, people are bound to know each other.

Plus if you care to follow how the judges from the skater's own country score, you will notice soon enough that somehow it is their duty to give their own skater a high score. I have kept an eye on that since last fall when it became possible to connect scores with judges and it really does happen and literally everyone does it. From the earlier periods, there are some studies that indicate that if the panel contains a judge from the skater's country, he/she/they are likely to get scored higher.

E

Expanding the discretion of the discretion of the judges of GOE and PCS is why this sport becomes political and uncertain.

 

[Tutto]

I've come to conclusion that judges look at PCS in totally different way from us, fans. We take Interpretation, Performance and Composition too literally and too seriously but judges who are hard pressed for time, assess mostly SS and Tr as these are technical and less subjective (they judge a sport discipline after all) and simply fill in the other three components in line with the first two. Of course, there are exceptions when some really outstanding performance would earn higher PCS than normal for that skater (e.g Giada Russo LP at Euro 2016). Judges take PCS as the opportunity to reward or punish skaters for things that not covered by TES.
What they do not like in my observation is:
lack of speed
poor ice coverage
obvious lack of stamina
jump telegraphing
The good example would be Li Zijun, a beautiful graceful skater, who never seem to get any love from judges, now look at my list and sadly she ticks every box.
In reverse the skaters who demonstrate good ice coverage, speed, flow, deep edges and don't seem to be dead by the middle of LP get rewarded as a rule.

 

[fireovertheice]

@eppen wrote

Plus if you care to follow how the judges from the skater's own country score, you will notice soon enough that somehow it is their duty to give their own skater a high score. I have kept an eye on that since last fall when it became possible to connect scores with judges and it really does happen and literally everyone does it. From the earlier periods, there are some studies that indicate that if the panel contains a judge from the skater's country, he/she/they are likely to get scored higher.

One matter of fact is that the major part of them is doing it, another matter of fact is saying that is their "duty". Personally, I don't think so, maybe because I am Italian and I recognise in this a certain way to do things in my country that I cannot stand at all. And it is a way to judge/score that in the long run is detrimental for the athletes too: I think that they deserve better.

Plus, for example, I have seen that while this "distort" or at least questionable method in FS is followed in major part by the big federations (USA, Russia and Canada), as well as by small federations that have to prop up very few skaters at international level (for example Italy or Spain), this is not true, or done in a much lesser grade, for Japan and other small federations not former in the URSS.

On this subject is interesting what you can read here regarding the last and the first part of the season, explained also with very clear graphics: https://bunniko.blogspot.it/2017/11/figure-skating-scores-judging-and.html

About the sometimes different approach of Japanese judges see also this example: https://www.instagram.com/p/BahHfJIBQzO/?hl=en&taken-by=skatingprotocol

However: I did't want to take here the discussion, but I'd rather like to speak about PCS scoring and if and how falls can affect PCS scores following the current rules or guidelines. There is nothing about it? Or people is just speaking still having old 6.0 system in mind?

 

[lappo]

I've come to conclusion that judges look at PCS in totally different way from us, fans. We take Interpretation, Performance and Composition too literally and too seriously but judges who are hard pressed for time, assess mostly SS and Tr as these are technical and less subjective (they judge a sport discipline after all) and simply fill in the other three components in line with the first two. Of course, there are exceptions when some really outstanding performance would earn higher PCS than normal for that skater (e.g Giada Russo LP at Euro 2016). Judges take PCS as the opportunity to reward or punish skaters for things that not covered by TES.
What they do not like in my observation is:
lack of speed
poor ice coverage
obvious lack of stamina
jump telegraphing
The good example would be Li Zijun, a beautiful graceful skater, who never seem to get any love from judges, now look at my list and sadly she ticks every box.
In reverse the skaters who demonstrate good ice coverage, speed, flow, deep edges and don't seem to be dead by the middle of LP get rewarded as a rule.

I often have the same feeling and I wish there were ways to assess SS and TR (who are more linked with the technical side of the skate) in a separate way from the other three, as they would result in a fairer assessment of what a skater can do at the moment and which areas he/she needs to improve.

 

[rabbit1234]

I think that reviving compulsory is one way. Currently we are judging too many items simultaneously in one program.
Skating skills are the foundation of figure skating. Besides SP and FP, compulsory may be revived.

 

[fireovertheice]

I've come to conclusion that judges look at PCS in totally different way from us, fans. We take Interpretation, Performance and Composition too literally and too seriously but judges who are hard pressed for time, assess mostly SS and Tr as these are technical and less subjective (they judge a sport discipline after all) and simply fill in the other three components in line with the first two

I am not sure about this: they look at PCS in different way from fans for sure, but while for some skaters the tendence in the range of scoring PCS is given by SS and TR, for a lot of others is the opposite and is the capacity to move well the upper part of the body and to project to make rise all the other PCS scores.
Just look at some scores vs. real TR and SS of some of the top men and ladies in single discipline in the last and in this season.

You are right that they don't like what do you have listed, but sometimes those aspects are enough for them to score high TR also when they are lacking in difficulty or variety, or SS when there is a general stiffness and/or too much two-feet skating and so forth.

In general they simply use the more technical part of PCS, i.e. SS and TR, to score skaters in the same subjective way of the other three components... IMO

 

[Tutto]

I often have the same feeling and I wish there were ways to assess SS and TR (who are more linked with the technical side of the skate) in a separate way from the other three, as they would result in a fairer assessment of what a skater can do at the moment and which areas he/she needs to improve.

I think they could just put these other three together under one heading: artistic impression (like in good old times ha ha) and be done with this so called separate assessment of each category because lets be honest it never happens

 

[Jaana]

The national federations nominate the judges for the selection processes. But, yeah, Spain has 3 ISU level judges, Delfa is also ok for referee, two can do ice dance. Figure skating is a small world probably even in the bigger countries, people are bound to know each other. E

Yes, but after that? Isn´t it ISU which makes the decisions by one way or another about which judges of various ISU countries will appear as judges in which competitions? E.g. at Europeans 2017 there were 15 persons in the judging panel and skaters were from 17-18 various countries:

http://www.isuresults.com/results/season1617/ec2017/SEG002.HTM

That means of course that there are no persons at the judging panel for many skaters and the number of actual judges is only 9.

 

[eppen]

For the major championships there is a draw in the fall. ISU members with ISU level judges can participate for disciplines where they have had skaters to complete at least the short the previous year. 13 countries are drawn for each discipline and then the final panel of 9 is drawn an hour or so before the competition starts. The remaining judges get to work on the FS day - the changing nations are selected by draw.

For the GP series the system is slightly different, the countries of the skaters are usually represented and then some others if there are not enough based on the skaters.

In a perfect world there would be no biases for nationality or reputation, but unfortunately we are a long way away from that. Thanks for the blog links, they were interesting reads!

 

[discombobulated]

Misha's skating is so beautiful and so reminiscent of an era bygone where there was room for a skater to breathe and be artistic amidst pure simple but beautiful technical elements. Will be interesting to see Javi when he is fully healthy and training, hopefully at the GPF? Shoma is always so humble, as are most Japanese skaters. I am sure that was not an easy skate for him but I do not imagine he will be down for very long.