In theory, it's the same. But in reality, doing the 3Lo as the 2nd jump would most likely earn an extra bullet point for GOE due to difficult entry into the jump element. It may not be much but it should add up to about +1 in GOE more than the 3Lo+3T combo.
Major Changes Expected in Single Skating in 2010-2011
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In theory, it's the same. But in reality, doing the 3Lo as the 2nd jump would most likely earn an extra bullet point for GOE due to difficult entry into the jump element. It may not be much but it should add up to about +1 in GOE more than the 3Lo+3T combo.
And several of these women, including, Harding and Nakano will have their 3A downgraed close to 100% of the time if they are been scrutnized using today's standard. That's why Nakano gave up on the 3A in the last few years of her skating and we never see Ando trying the 4S again.
And the Russians are known to greatly exaggerate and predict many things that never come close to materialize. There is no such thing as guarantee in this sport when it comes to something 4 years from now. Many things could go wrong with these girls. If Michin so good, why was Irina Slutskaya the only Russian woman in the past decade who had any resemblance of being an elite contender? Was Michin taking a vacation for the whole time? Look, he isn't omnipotent. The ultimate jumping machine, Midori Ito, had Triple Axel when she was 14. How old are these Russian girls? Can they rival Midori Ito? Since Ito, the women who claimed to have Triple Axels have been very disappointing, most of them gave up on that jump eventually. I don't think Mao Asada's 3A will ever make the judges feel comfortable. It's almost always too close to call and almost always have judges thinking it's either borderline or UR, even when it's ratified by the Technical Panel. When these Russian girls are 17 or 18, then wake me up if they still claim to have a Triple Axel, not before. Many girls lose the ability to do ALL their jumps as they enter puberty, it can be quite traumatic for them and may take years to recover. Cynthia Phaneuf is such an example and you can see she is much taller than most of her competitors. Aside from the physical issues, there are also mental issues as well. All in all, this is a very complex process and anyone who guarantees any sort of result 4 years from now should be sued for malpractice.
wallylutz, I totally agree with you. There is no guarantee that any of those girls will be able to perfect 3A by then. But I know Russian girls are working on it And working really hard.It takes not only the physical strength but also mental strength as well. For that reason. i admire Mao Asada to be able to execute them at the Olympic. But if so many girls start doing 3A, it becomes so norm that judges' way of looking at 3A may change as well.
I think your posts are really interesting because it highlights the ambivalence that many, whether ISU officials or fans, still feel about admitting what figure skating is, and conversely what it is not. Some thoughts:
-saying that what 'artistry' there is resides purely in the choreographer and that the skater is just doing what he/she is told is like saying that Rostropovich was just a cipher and that it was all Prokofiev (who wrote pieces for him). Or, in another aspect, it's like saying it's all the conductor (I suppose one could read "coach" here) and not even partially about the first cellist. Where there is a performance aspect in the arts (as opposed to say, plastic arts such as sculpture), and yes, I do maintain that skating is, and should be, as much art as it is sport, the performer is an expressive artist in his/her own right.
-I do agree that in the main, younger performers, including skaters, are necessarily less artistically developed, but that's exactly what I said in my previous post. If we agree on this, then I'm not sure I fully understand what you mean when you say that there exists a premise that technical is marked higher than PCS to give the little girls a chance for a medal. If anything, I would say that the majority of officials or viewers don't want skating to be dominated by very young jumping beans with, as you say, 'no clue what artistry is'.
-I'm aware of what PCS is. And what is performance/execution, which has to do with the emotional and intellectual involvement of the skater, her style and personality, and projection? Or choreography/composition, dealing with concept and vision, unity and phrasing of performance, and orginality? Or interpretation, referring to the appropriate expression of the music's characteristics, nuance, and facility and ease of that expression? It can be called components, or presentation, but it's artistry pure and simple, to call it by its older and truer name. I think it's reasonable to say that skating skills and transitions/footwork are relatively more amenable to mapping to specific physical skills, but even here I would argue that "artistry" has (a now subterranean) influence. My own view is that this busy slicing and dicing and linguistic pasteurization of the criteria is a fig leaf, guilty of both false precision and intellectual bad faith (although of course the ISU had its historical reasons, hehe).
-An obvious sign that skaters recognize the importance of the impressionistic aspect for scoring is the time and effort put into costumes, make-up, and the widespread choice of those flesh-colored covers to improve line (I'm not a fan of the latter choice, myself). Frankly, it would be more practical to wear those black practice outfits for performances; skaters wouldn't have to be pulling down their skirt flaps all the time in between elements
. In no other Olympic sport is this concern over impression considered important. (I remember seeing an old vid of a runner from the Soviet bloc days who, while looking like a miniature Schwarzenegger, incongruously wore eyeliner and earrings. But I suspect the purpose for that was entirely different 
). Is this faux art? Then they might as well get rid of the avian-inspired costumes in Swan Lake.-For me, the most interesting question is whether artistry is simply "in the mind of the beholder", and an "opinion" meaninglessly bandied about. In the context of figure skating, the official skating world has, in my view, bowed to the in vogue assumptions about value relativity and its sometimes ugly stepchild, political correctness (although the proximate cause was the quite justifiable concerns over cheating and manipulation). What's telling, though, is that they couldn't bring themselves to eliminate those (artistic) values entirely, knowing either consciously or subconsciously that such a move would morph figure skating into something quite ordinary and uninteresting. Their solution was to disguise these artistic values in words that sound more specific and objective (at least, more objective than presentation or artistry). Smoke and mirrors.
Why is it that we as figure skating fans sometimes seek to deny the deepest and most intrinsic reason for skating's allure, what makes it unique in sport, and the reason that it has always been the centerpiece of winter Olympic competition? Is it because judgments that do not have to do with physically measurable fact are somehow seen as illegitimate, and therefore makes us unable to hold up our heads in the face of "objective" pursuits such as biathlon? In the classical world, the concept of figure skating would have been understood very well. The drama competitions of ancient Athens were a huge deal in that time, and it's hard to argue with the results when the most frequent winners were Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides. The example may shed some light, I believe, on the conundrum of modern figure skating: putting aside the purely metaphysical question of whether art is/is not merely subjective and in the eyes of the beholder, artistic judgments work in practice where some significant communality of values exists, even when the reasons for those values are not fully articulated or even articulable (a Nietschzean insight). I would argue that this is the reason that the Athenian dramatic competitions worked then, and why figure skating works now. This common "skating culture", inculcated at some level even in the general public through years of watching Olympic competitions, allows for workable, and dare I say even successful judgment (I have speculated on a "wisdom of crowds" theory of figure skating judgment, but that's a separate topic :sheesh
.I agree with you that "artistry" is not the only thing that matters, but my own opinion is that the strange and active chemistry between the athletic and aesthetic is what produces the reactions to figure skating which are almost sui generis; the absence, or the incorrect proportion, of one or the other would, I fear, result in something altogether inert.
Sorry for the extremely long post, but I wanted to explain my point of view more carefully, as I realized that the brevity of my previous post may have given the impression that I was being peremptory in my reply, which wasn't my intention. Because the topic is quite meaningful to me, I would actually greatly appreciate a more detailed view on the opposite side of the issue. :yes:
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Actually no. This is what I have for Yuna without 3Lo.
3Lz-3T
3F
2A-2T-2Lo
3F-2T
3S
3Lz
2A
only 0.7 point loss from the current layout. of course, with adding 3Lo, she can now do two 3-3s which will be totally awesome.
Interesting thinking here, I plug your suggestion in my spreadsheets and confirm that it's only 0.7 lower than her previous layout, ignoring the effect of 10% bonus on jump combos. On paper, you are correct the base value only drops by 0.7 and your work around shows that she doesn't have to rely on easier doubles for the 7th jumping pass. That said, the BV on paper is one thing. BV analysis alone does not take into account the effective risk that the skater bears based on their choice of elements. This is one of the shortfall of looking at the BV of the elements but under-estimating the risks involved. Please read more on this topic here: http://www.icenetworkincrowd.com/sreply/9295/t/Long-Program-Base-Value-Comparison-for-Men.html
<<The consideration of this question must takes into account the amount of risks taken by the skater already, which has not been analyzed and cannot be revealed using the Base Value Comparison methodology. In other words, a skater who achieves a total BV of 74~75 without using a Quad is generally considered less risky than one who has to do 1, if not 2 Quads in a program. If Lambiel doesn't have a Triple Axel in his program, he will end up having a lower BV than Patrick Chan even if the Swiss includes two Quads and the Canadian, none.>>
Along these lines, my thinking is the replacement of the 2A+3T by 3F+2T seems like a reasonable work-around on paper and I applaud your creative thinking. My intuition tells me such alternative would make Brian Orser somewhat uncomfortable. While the value of 3F+2T is lower than 2A+3T, from the standpoint of Yu-Na Kim, the 3F is a much harder jump for her than the 3T or the 2A. Her success rate on the 3F is much lower than either the 2A or 3T. I notice that Japanese skaters in general seem to focus almost exclusively on the math of the TES but failed to consider the practicality of their elements or the relative strengths/weaknesses of the skaters in question. For example, doing a FCCoSp4 gets 0.5 more than doing FSSp4, then you would see the Japanese skaters aiming for that even though almost no one else do it in the LP. This is why the flip side of the coin in IJS, aside from the math, is to properly manage the risks. See the discussion here: http://www.icenetworkincrowd.com/topic/537?page=1
<<The base value analysis is revealing to a certain extent but one of the flaws of these numbers is they don't tell us how these men acheive their base value listed above. In other words, the numbers above express the rewards for completing all their 13 elements but they tell us little about the risks borne by these men. Take example of Brian Joubert, who has a base value of 76.30 - sounds good on paper but this number in facts assumes that Brian lands two Quads, one Quad Toe and one Quad Salchow. Brian has not landed a Quad Salchow in the last two years. Compared this to someone like Patrick Chan who can get 74.83, only about 1.5 BV behind Joubert without a single Quad, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that Joubert is taking on much more risk, meaning he has a greater probability of failing to complete all his elements cleanly.
Skaters need to a do a realistic assessment of what they can reasonably do in a competition while maximizing their base value without compromising on the GOE or else, what sounds good a paper will fall flat in competition. Some of these men have programs that look good on paper but not very realistic in the context of the Olympic Games. Plushenko's success is due in part to his rather smart planning and balancing of difficulty and execution, unlike what many people have imagined, the Russian-Olympic Champion DOES NOT take on excessive risks, unlike some of his competitors. The Olympic Men's Champion in 2010 will have to be someone who understands this and play it smart, I have no doubt about this. >>
Notice, this was written in January 2010. It turned out, the eventual winner of the Olympic Gold did just that - the winner ended up being the guy who managed the risks properly as opposed to someone who tried to shoot the moon and fell.
Along these lines, I am a little concerned that the 3F+2T comes at too much of a risk for Yu-Na Kim. The BV on paper didn't drop by much but the overall risk level of her program probably went up quite a bit. This means lower return for higher risk - still a less than desirable outcome but probably better than having to reintegrate 3Lo back into her FS as her success rate on the 3Lo is even less than the 3F.
- Joined
- Jan 22, 2010
walleylutz, thanks for your insighfult analysis. I have one comment though: the 3F success rate for Yuna has always been pretty high (she used to do 3F-3T), except for this season. I know she changed her entrance into it a little to make the take-off edge clear, but I feel that it was fine at TEB, then after the incident in the LP, she began overthinking it and started having issues with it. By Olympics and Worlds though, it was pretty consistent (She landed all 4 attempts with one possibly iffy landing at worlds but otherwise great). So, hopefully 3F-2T is not too much of a risk for her.
ETA: In fact, out of 10 attempts over 5 competitions this year, she only missed it 3 times (TEB LP, SA LP, GPF SP)
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- Dec 28, 2006
indeed. if she still has a mental "thing" about the flip next season as she did this season, getting past one in each program is hurdle enough. Doing two, with one presumably in the second half of the program, in combonation seems even more daunting. That said, Yu-na will have much less pressure to be perfect as she had last year and let's face it, she could pop/double the flips and still beat everybody else easily.
She actually got her 3F downgraded in the SP in Torino. That mistake probably caused the lapse in focus that led her to miss the Layback spin and then, her Spiral Sequence. It's better than 3Lo for sure, higher BV and lower risk from the perspective of Yu-Na Kim. A jump could be low in BV but consider high risk for a said skater, for example Kristi Yamaguchi and her Salchow - just never works for her no matter how hard she tries. Therefore, the concept of risk in figure skating jumps, as measured by historical success rate and other considerations, is a skater specific measure. For me, the Axel is an easier jump than the Lutz. Still, the comparison of the 3F is made against the Triple Toe Loop and the Double Axel, both of which are less risky to Yu-Na than her Triple Flip. In that sense, the theoretical risk she has to bear most definitely goes up.
In other words, two skaters with the same base value in their TES may end up having very different risk profile, hence the example used above between Patrick Chan vs. Brian Joubert. If Chan matches Joubert's TES without a Quad while the Frenchman is forced to have two in order to stay with the Canadian, then one can reasonably conclude that Joubert's overall probability of completing all his program cleanly will be lower than the Canadian. That's also why complaining about the obvious unfairness of the IJS in treating some combination of easier elements (e.g. 2A and 3T) to equal or greater than obviously hard elements (e.g. Quads) is pointless. TES was never been advertised as who has the most risky or difficult program. Rather, if a said skater and his/her coach wants to be stupid and get a poor return / risk ratio, it's their problem. The smart one will do the best to minimize risk and maximize return, that's what it takes to gain an edge under CoP and one of the essence of the new system.
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No, you missed that at the Torino World, her 3F was downgraded and received negative GOE in the SP. That makes her batting average only 60% on that jump in the 2009-2010 season, not awful but not great either. Still, historical success rate is only one consideration in the risk assessment. It is not the only consideration and shouldn't be since past doesn't always predict the future. Only her coach, Brian Orser, would be able to tell us more because he gets to know Yu-Na Kim a lot better than any of us. Maybe her success rate in practice is close to 90% or higher. Using the historical rate of success as a proxy, having to do 3 Triple Flips per competition, if the 3F+2T is added as a work-around, means on average, she will miss 1 Triple Flip attempt per every 3 attempts or 1 miss per competition. I think this proxy illustrates in more simple terms the kind of risks she will face using this alternative to deal with the loss of the 3rd Double Axel in the LP knowing that her success rate on the 2A+3T combo is historically, very high, almost 100%.
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- Jan 22, 2010
Oh yeah, I forgot about the downgrade at Worlds. Thanks for clarifying. I see what you mean and yes, I agree that 3F+2T would be riskier than 2A+3T for her. But that would probably be her only option if she does not want to bring back the 3Lo or downgrade to a 2F or 2Lz. Still, the risk of the 3F-2T is lower than that of the 3Lo and its reward is higher than 2F/2Lz, so it may be the best option.
How about having a 3S+2T or a 3T+2T then? those would net her a loss of 1.7 or 2.2 points in BV, the combination bonus notwithstanding.
3S is not a very good jump for Yu-Na Kim. She doesn't get a lot of height on the Salchow and is at a higher risk of seeing that jump downgraded. She also will not get very high GOE on that jump, plus she is known to miss that jump either stepping out or falling. So the 3S+2T is a very questionable choice, in addition to the lower BV value.
Doing another 3T combo is obviously a safer bet but at this point, the deficit in base value starts to add up. Difference of 2.2 is not trivial. If she wants to play it safe, depending on her postion after the SP, this may be workable if her lead is large. If she is going to do a 3T combo, she can probably upgrade it to 3T+2Lo since the first jump is easy enough for her that the 2Lo shouldn't change the risk profile of the element too much.
Re: loop combo vs. toe combo
I hope that's the case. However I remember in most cases the 3loop combos not getting as much GOE as 3toe combos, probably as the former tend not to (by nature? I don't know I'm just guessing) cover as much ice, and the landing tend not to go as smoothly. I think the difficulty of doing a loop jump at all ('difficult entry' as you say) should be rewarded, but I'm not sure if it is.
Miki Ando 2007 Worlds SP 3lutz/3LOOP, receiving GOE+0.86 (11.86)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJcbAvphGpk&feature=related
Yu-na Kim 2007 Worlds SP 3flip/3toe, receiving GOE+2.0 (11.50)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j-8A7f6bZ34
http://www.isufs.org/results/wc2007/wc07_Ladies_SP_scores.pdf
*Obviously Yu-na's wonderful 3flip/3toe has so much height in both jumps, speed in and out, etc. I'm just saying it must be much more difficult ('by nature' like I said above) to do the same with a loop combo.
I hope that's the case. However I remember in most cases the 3loop combos not getting as much GOE as 3toe combos, probably as the former tend not to (by nature? I don't know I'm just guessing) cover as much ice, and the landing tend not to go as smoothly. I think the difficulty of doing a loop jump at all ('difficult entry' as you say) should be rewarded, but I'm not sure if it is.
Miki Ando 2007 Worlds SP 3lutz/3LOOP, receiving GOE+0.86 (11.86)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJcbAvphGpk&feature=related
Yu-na Kim 2007 Worlds SP 3flip/3toe, receiving GOE+2.0 (11.50)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j-8A7f6bZ34
http://www.isufs.org/results/wc2007/wc07_Ladies_SP_scores.pdf
*Obviously Yu-na's wonderful 3flip/3toe has so much height in both jumps, speed in and out, etc. I'm just saying it must be much more difficult ('by nature' like I said above) to do the same with a loop combo.
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It is definitely much harder to do loop combos than toe combos. With loop, you must jump up again without any assistance of left toe.It is much harder to utilize the momentum from the first jump. I believe that loop combos should get much more credi than toe combos.
I made a new thread on +3loop combos as this is getting off topic.
http://www.goldenskate.com/forum/sh...ing-of-the-past-under-CoP&p=500169#post500169
http://www.goldenskate.com/forum/sh...ing-of-the-past-under-CoP&p=500169#post500169
- Joined
- Jun 21, 2003
I think we are making a mountain out of a molehill in this triple Axel discussion.
Ladies are already permitted to do triple Axels, if they are able. They are already permitted to do two triple Axels in the long program. They are already permitted to do a triple Axel in the short program, either in combination or out of footwork. The only change in the proposed rules is to add "or as a substitute for the double Axel" to the previous sentence.
I do not think that this change will cause a sudden rush of young skaters and their coaches to say, well, I didn't give two hoots about the triple Axel when it was allowed only twice in the LP and once in the SP substituting for another jump in combination or out of footwork. But -- whoa -- now I can substitute if for the double Axel in the SP!!! That's for me!
I also do not see how the discussion of how few ladies can do a fully rotated triple Axel is relevant. If nobody can take advantage of the new rule, that's life. If a few adventurous souls want to try, more power to 'em.
OT -- a challenger to 100yen's "best sentence" crown.
Ladies are already permitted to do triple Axels, if they are able. They are already permitted to do two triple Axels in the long program. They are already permitted to do a triple Axel in the short program, either in combination or out of footwork. The only change in the proposed rules is to add "or as a substitute for the double Axel" to the previous sentence.
I do not think that this change will cause a sudden rush of young skaters and their coaches to say, well, I didn't give two hoots about the triple Axel when it was allowed only twice in the LP and once in the SP substituting for another jump in combination or out of footwork. But -- whoa -- now I can substitute if for the double Axel in the SP!!! That's for me!
I also do not see how the discussion of how few ladies can do a fully rotated triple Axel is relevant. If nobody can take advantage of the new rule, that's life. If a few adventurous souls want to try, more power to 'em.
Robeye said:
OT -- a challenger to 100yen's "best sentence" crown.
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- Joined
- Feb 21, 2010
I support these proposals with the exception of the changing in the spirals. I think spirals should still be a required element for the ladies SP. It's one of the most beautiful elements in ladies skating.
I totally support the imposition of a limit to the number of double axels a skater can perform in the LP. Remember all the discussion about Laura's LP in Torino?
In the last couple of season's most people have been talking about a regression and these rules will probably help increase the competitive side which is something very welcomed in my opinion.
I totally support the imposition of a limit to the number of double axels a skater can perform in the LP. Remember all the discussion about Laura's LP in Torino?
In the last couple of season's most people have been talking about a regression and these rules will probably help increase the competitive side which is something very welcomed in my opinion.
Mao already performs a triple axel in the form of a combo in the short program. It would be a step down for her to perform it as a solo jump since she can't repeat it again in a combination. The rule change does give her a significant score advantage if she performs it as a solo jump (~5 points in TES depending on how her program is structured). So since Mao is the only female skater who performs the jump, I'm wondering what the real purpose of the rule change is: advancement of the sport or a thinly disguised attempt to reward the one skater?
I also agree that the triple axel will likely never become the norm in ladies skating. Midori Ito is the only skater who had success with the jump. I think it's because she gets such enormous height in her jumps and I'd would conjecture that it's partly because of her light physique. Even Mao had more success at 15 years old than today. Most female skaters today are not built this way.
It's kind of obvious that the rules have been rewritten to advantage one skater and disadvantage another. I'm a little disgusted that the rule system is being used in this manner. I'd also think that there would be a lot of opposition to the new changes if only for the reason that they are radical.
I also agree that the triple axel will likely never become the norm in ladies skating. Midori Ito is the only skater who had success with the jump. I think it's because she gets such enormous height in her jumps and I'd would conjecture that it's partly because of her light physique. Even Mao had more success at 15 years old than today. Most female skaters today are not built this way.
It's kind of obvious that the rules have been rewritten to advantage one skater and disadvantage another. I'm a little disgusted that the rule system is being used in this manner. I'd also think that there would be a lot of opposition to the new changes if only for the reason that they are radical.
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- Joined
- Jun 21, 2003
^ This rule change does not really benefit Mao Asada very much at all.
Here is her present jump layout:
3A+2T
3F
2A
18.5 points in base value
Under the new rules she could do
3F+2T
3Lo
3A
20.0 points.
The only thing she gains is the difference between a triple loop and a double Axel.
However, it would make for a better program. Mao -- or any skater of the future who might come along -- could concentrate on doing a really good triple Axel without worrying about doing it in combination or out of footwork. Then she could concentrate on doing a really nice 3F+2T and a pretty 3Lo. To me, it is the audience that is the big gainer -- they get to see a better-constructed program.
As for Yu-na Kim, with
3Lz+3T
3F
2A
19.0 points in base values, before GOEs,
she has nothing to fear from the new rules.
Here is her present jump layout:
3A+2T
3F
2A
18.5 points in base value
Under the new rules she could do
3F+2T
3Lo
3A
20.0 points.
The only thing she gains is the difference between a triple loop and a double Axel.
However, it would make for a better program. Mao -- or any skater of the future who might come along -- could concentrate on doing a really good triple Axel without worrying about doing it in combination or out of footwork. Then she could concentrate on doing a really nice 3F+2T and a pretty 3Lo. To me, it is the audience that is the big gainer -- they get to see a better-constructed program.
As for Yu-na Kim, with
3Lz+3T
3F
2A
19.0 points in base values, before GOEs,
she has nothing to fear from the new rules.
