State of Russian Men's Figure Skating 2015-2016

[chuckm]

After the JW Men's SP, Russia's Dmitri Aliev and Alexander Samarin were 1-2 with 80.74 and 80.31, but both men folded in the free skate. They just could not sustain the strength they showed in the short program.

Daniel Samohin (ISR), 9th in the SP, scored 165.38 in the FS to win gold; Nicolas Nadeau (CAN), 8th in the SP, scored 150.86 in the FS for silver; and Tomoki Hiwatashi (USA), 6th in the SP, took bronze with 147.55.

 

[gmyers]

Just like last year they folded because of bad coaching bad environment. Its not the skaters its the system. Do they train their whole free skate?

 

[gmyers]

Kolyada in shock is in final group for free skate! Gave his all in the sp! Skated second of all skaters. Impressive. Kovtun flopped. He's a bad jumper on a technical level.

 

[Sugarpova]

hehehe the state isnt in such disastrous place!
its alive & kicking!

 

[blue_idealist]

So Kovtun and Kolyada have both had 4th place finishes at Worlds now. Hopefully one will end up on the podium in the coming years. I think Kolyada is a better all-around skater than Kovtun, though.

 

[gmyers]

I was really surprised at how a "bad" kovtun skate doesn't look much different than a "good" kovtun skate. Kovtun skating really always looks like it did last night. Kolyada had perfect jumps. Kovtun never has that.

 

[LRK]

I was really surprised at how a "bad" kovtun skate doesn't look much different than a "good" kovtun skate. Kovtun skating really always looks like it did last night. Kolyada had perfect jumps. Kovtun never has that.

So, does this mean that you see a glimmer of light in the darkness?

 

[merrywidow]

I am very impressed with Kolyada & think he is the real deal for Russia. Continued good luck to him in the future.

 

[gmyers]

So, does this mean that you see a glimmer of light in the darkness?

With the perfect jumps absolutely. When kovtun was 4th it was because he had a good day with terrible technique.

 

[Tutto]

Updated ISU Personal Best (total) shows that Plushenko no longer holds the highest result for Russian men - Kolyada's 267.97 earned at Worlds 2016 moved Plushenko down to 15th place. Kolyada is in 11th. Kovtun in 27th.

Meanwhile the reaction of Russian federation to Kolyada's success at Worlds has been somewhat lukewarm:

Mr Lakernik's comments:
http://www.sports.ru/others/figure-skating/1038782672.html
''Kolyada of course skated very well in Boston. He also did well at Euros so he had a good season but now he needs to prove by same success in the next season that it was not a fluke, to upp the tech ie second quad and it seems it is already there, so the situation is difficult but not without hope.'

Mr Mutko, the Minister for Sports was more generous:

http://tass.ru/sport/3171871

"Very pleased with Mikhail Kolyada's debut, excellent performance and also kept for Russia two spots for next Worlds, that is great. As regards to Maxim Kovtun, it was of course, upsetting. I think in the near future, I will communicate with him - I want to understand what is going on there"

Oleg Vasiliev, the coach, expressed his hope that Kolyada and Chebotareva will be left alone to work in peace and that nobody will try to take Kolyada from his coach:
http://www.sports.ru/others/figure-skating/1038849640.html

Wouldn't CSKA love to do just that...

 

[bramweld]

Could they get Deniss Vasiliev to skate for Russia? Now him and Kolyada, they could do stuff

 

[moriel]

Could they get Deniss Vasiliev to skate for Russia? Now him and Kolyada, they could do stuff

Kolyada only is ok, as he is a sort of a sign that the russians technically can have good men singles. More will follow =)

 

[Abstractor]

Kolyada received too much at the PCS side, they could have arranged the transition of the team leadership from Kovtun, let's see how he could justify that advance in the coming season.

 

[Li'Kitsu]

This "Kolyada was overscored in PCS" thing is so weird I can't even take it seriously enough to argue with it, it just makes no sense. If there was any skater who was scored fairly - compared to the majority being overscored - it was Mika. Too bad if you can't see the quality that is there.

 

[silverfoxes]

Could they get Deniss Vasiliev to skate for Russia? Now him and Kolyada, they could do stuff

No, Deniss is going to do for Latvia what Javier did for Spain. Latvia needs him & supports him.

And as much as I love Deniss & like Mikhail, can we please not do this again, pretending like Mikhail is the only hope for Russia. This is why I try to stay away from this thread. Dmitri Aliev is incredibly talented, Adian Pitkeev is incredibly talented, there are other very good men...

 

[Tolstoj]

Could they get Deniss Vasiliev to skate for Russia? Now him and Kolyada, they could do stuff

No, the competition in Russia is still tough and he couldn't skate at Worlds sometimes: CSKA has Kovtun, Pitkeev, Voronov and Samarin, Olympic school has Kolyada and Alyiev, there are only 2 spots for worlds.

Also this is better for Latvia, now they have two good skaters like Deniss and Angelina.

 

[Abstractor]

This "Kolyada was overscored in PCS" thing is so weird I can't even take it seriously enough to argue with it, it just makes no sense. If there was any skater who was scored fairly - compared to the majority being overscored - it was Mika. Too bad if you can't see the quality that is there.

He is much better then Kovtun and don't get oversrored for PCS that much (Kovtun's marks at the Euro 2016 are a joke), but the basic quality of skating is just average (and that could hardly be upped after 20).

 

[gmyers]

Updated ISU Personal Best (total) shows that Plushenko no longer holds the highest result for Russian men - Kolyada's 267.97 earned at Worlds 2016 moved Plushenko down to 15th place. Kolyada is in 11th. Kovtun in 27th.

Meanwhile the reaction of Russian federation to Kolyada's success at Worlds has been somewhat lukewarm:

Mr Lakernik's comments:
http://www.sports.ru/others/figure-skating/1038782672.html
''Kolyada of course skated very well in Boston. He also did well at Euros so he had a good season but now he needs to prove by same success in the next season that it was not a fluke, to upp the tech ie second quad and it seems it is already there, so the situation is difficult but not without hope.'

Mr Mutko, the Minister for Sports was more generous:

http://tass.ru/sport/3171871

"Very pleased with Mikhail Kolyada's debut, excellent performance and also kept for Russia two spots for next Worlds, that is great. As regards to Maxim Kovtun, it was of course, upsetting. I think in the near future, I will communicate with him - I want to understand what is going on there"

Oleg Vasiliev, the coach, expressed his hope that Kolyada and Chebotareva will be left alone to work in peace and that nobody will try to take Kolyada from his coach:
http://www.sports.ru/others/figure-skating/1038849640.html

Wouldn't CSKA love to do just that...

Lakernik is talking about getting kolyada world championships medals or euro titles or russian titles. He does need at least two more quads. One more in sp at least one more in lp. So kolyada can be fourth whit his current content Lakernik is about what is next. What makes him beat Fernandez? I don't think kolyada should rush and destroy himself! I don't think he should be kovtun and do the most atrocious quads in technique just to do them. His statement could be support for kovtun. As long as kovtun is trying five quads he will be number one.

 

[vorravorra]

Lakernik is talking about getting kolyada world championships medals or euro titles or russian titles. He does need at least two more quads. One more in sp at least one more in lp. So kolyada can be fourth whit his current content Lakernik is about what is next. What makes him beat Fernandez? I don't think kolyada should rush and destroy himself! I don't think he should be kovtun and do the most atrocious quads in technique just to do them. His statement could be support for kovtun. As long as kovtun is trying five quads he will be number one.

According to his coach, Kolyada can already do quad salchow (which is what Lakernik is referring to), and it is going into the program next year. They are also planning to spend the next year learning quad lutz. Mikhail said in an interview that he'd tried it and he could do the four rotations but not the landing, so they were going to work on that. So the future doesn't look too dim at the moment.

 

[Abstractor]

I fear if they swap Kovtun for Kolyada as the 1st russian man they could start putting to much pressure on him and all that hype that follows up which might not bode well for the skater.