The Tutberidze Effect

[Sugar Coated]

Not to create further drama, but when I said "Eteri's methods" I was referring to a few things that I've seen from documentaries and interviews. There is the strictness and yelling, but of course almost all top coaches around the world do this. However, what I really have a problem with is the way they talk about restricting food and water for teenage girls. But this has been rehashed multiple times and my original comment was really to praise Eteri's ability to determine unrealized talent.

 

[Orlov]

However, what I really have a problem with is the way they talk about restricting food and water for teenage girls

What are you talking about? Who are these "they"? Coaches from the Tutberidze group? Please, give a link with "they talk about restricting food and water for teenage girls". Please, do not bring Alina’s words about the Olympic days - this is irrelevant information, because this is the Olympics - the highest peak of the sport confrontation, a short period of time.

As far as I understand, you are saying that the Tutberidze group coaches monitor the nutrition and water consumption of their skaters all the time, right? If so, please justify your opinion.

 

[hanca]

You do realise that not all Tutberidze’s skaters make it. They usually leave sooner or later. Sometimes she sends them to pairs or ice dance, other times they keep trying other coaches. I remember so many of them....
Gerasimov, Tarasenko, Skirda, Zenko, Egorov, Udalov, Julia Lee, Daria Kapustina, Katia Mitrofanova, Kolganova, Novakhova, Emelianova....even Panenkova had only two decent junior seasons and never got to any bigger competition such as junior worlds.

 

[zenskate]

Please, do not bring Alina’s words about the Olympic days - this is irrelevant information, because this is the Olympics - the highest peak of the sport confrontation, a short period of time.

Yes, I also want to point out that Alina never said she didn't drink water, she said she controlled her intake of water.

Video of a water-drinking pre-competition Alina for the concerned
https://www.instagram.com/p/ByhYGTBCFm1/

 

[Mathman]

The only thing I worry about is that the success of Tuberidze's group will prove once and for all what we fear to be true: that figure skating is a child's sport. In "ladies'" skating, what is most valued are the skills that only little girls can do.

 

[Edwin]

Which is what I think could be the result of long exposures to The Tutberidze Effect. Progress comes at a price: the loss of traditional values and ways.
The trend towards more athleticism is easier to set and follow thru with younger athletes you select and train from young.

USSR set the standard in gymnastics for many decades, their gymnasts getting younger and younger until 14 year olds became senior World Champions.
Romania under Ceaucescu rule was the only nation that successfully countered, but their 'Rombot' gymnasts were always criticised for their cookie cutter gymnastics, perfectly cloned and often when the team score counted, top of the medal rostrum. Communist China had its bouts of success, but never really pulled through.

And in gymnastics there is this same dilemma of young ones throwing the difficulty the older ones cannot match.
Nowadays however, athletes are have learned to make themselves competitive and to have longer, healthier careers.

In figure skating the young athletes receive the higher TES and the older the higher PCS, even though some juniors are equally good in artistry and expression. And the ISU rules are non discriminatory by age and gender.
So if you want to suppress the juniors, impose a limit on their TES scores by facilitating the rules?

Anyway, #TeamTutberidzeForProgress is here to stay for a few more decades, and if nobody really catches up, The Tutberidze Effect will work on many more skaters.
Hopefully with equal results in the men. That would be the ultimate recognition, right?

 

[Mathman]

^ Still, I for one lament it. The sport becomes less interesting, to me.

I will give an example. Last night on television there was a boy who set the world record for doing a Rubik's Cube in 32 seconds with his feet. I am pretty sure that no one over the age of 16 is practicing this skill.

I would not want figure skating to become an X-games sport, like skateboarding for instance.

 

[Orlov]

The only thing I worry about is that the success of Tuberidze's group will prove once and for all what we fear to be true: that figure skating is a child's sport. In "ladies'" skating, what is most valued are the skills that only little girls can do.

"for all what we fear to be true"

??

Are you sure? About we?

They are not child, they are athlets. I don't see here child, I see wonderful athlet, and wonderful skate.

And 15 year old is not a child! I am 23 year old, and for me this age - 15 year old - is not far from me. So I still remembered myself. I was not a "child" when I was 15 years old. For me, this was the most amazing age. I was always good in physics, participated in regional physics Olympiads (I have a silver medal in my region). I remember my 14-15 years - there was an intellectual explosion inside me. At 13, I was still a child, but after a year or two my intellectual abilities became such as they are now. There was incredible energy inside me (now I am much more lazy ) - I could think about a task or problem for hours or even days, literally days, until the problem was solved. I myself studied differential and integral calculus in the 9th grade (two years earlier than they study in school). I was not a "child" at this age, and would be very offended if you called me that People different and some in 15 years older than some people at 30.

And these athletes are not random teenagers. These are the best representatives of Russia. They are disciplined, they know how to plan their activities for the whole year. They can not be compared with the average 15-year-old teenager (who often, yes, behave like irresponsible child especially in prosperous societies where parents indulge their children and 15-year-olds can be treated like 8-10 year-olds).

 

[flanker]

I was responding to comments in @Orlov’s and @Georgya’s posts. I find it very difficult to cut and paste on my iPad (as in I don’t know how) and I took the time for the explanation hoping the comments might help, both here and when they pop up in other threads.:yes:

And those posts were again response to another posts. I find it interresting that when somebody posts a thread about what makes Tutberidze's team successful, comments appear not about "here is why I agree/disagree with the conclusions in the first comment" but about "here is why I don't care yet I have to write why I write (only) critical posts about her even when I don't care"

Side note: Most of us probably got it already that you don't care/follow even when from the number and length of your posts someone could get different (and of course completely wrong) impression that in fact you care and follow.

 

[doublequad]

Which is what I think could be the result of long exposures to The Tutberidze Effect. Progress comes at a price: the loss of traditional values and ways.
The trend towards more athleticism is easier to set and follow thru with younger athletes.
USSR set the standard in gymnastics for many decades, their gymnasts getting younger and younger until 14 year olds became senior World Champions.
And in gymnastics there is this same dilemma of young ones throwing the difficulty the older ones cannot match.
Nowadays however, older athletes are have learned to make themselves competitive and to have longer, healthier careers.

In figure skating the young athletes receive the higher TES and the older the higher PCS, even though some juniors are equally good in artistry and expression. And the ISU rules are non discriminatory by age and gender.
So if you want to suppress the juniors, impose a limit on their scores by facilitating the rules?

Anyway, #TeamTutberidzeForProgress is here to stay for a few more decades, and if nobody really catches up, The Tutberidze Effect will work on many more skaters.
Hopefully with equal results in the men. That would be the recognition, right?

didn't gymnastics rack up the minimum age as a response to that?

 

[dante]

The only thing I worry about is that the success of Tuberidze's group will prove once and for all what we fear to be true: that figure skating is a child's sport.

I think at worst they will prove that 0.8 is a too low PCS factor for ladies.

In addition, PCS should be taken more seriously by judges themselves, not just as a like/dislike slider, and no more bonuses for recognition and consistency.

 

[Alex65]

The only thing I worry about is that the success of Tuberidze's group will prove once and for all what we fear to be true: that figure skating is a child's sport. In "ladies'" skating, what is most valued are the skills that only little girls can do.

Successful children - successful teens - successful adults. Such I see the path of Tutberidze. Since the path from a child to an adult is hardly less than 10 years, I suggest giving the Eteri team an extra avance in time to fully realize their plans. You can certainly criticize her for the fact that she did not go all this way to the end with each of her pupils, but maybe you just have to wait? Eteri did not come with a kitchen book of ready-made recipes for success. Like for others, for her it run through the success and errors.

 

[Mathman]

And 15 year old is not a child! I am 23 year old, and for me this age - 15 year old - is not far from me. So I still remembered myself. I was not a "child" when I was 15 years old. For me, this was the most amazing age. I was always good in physics, participated in regional physics Olympiads (I have a silver medal in my region). I remember my 14-15 years - there was an intellectual explosion inside me. ...

I am thinking of figure skating's future as a spectator sport. Yes, as a participatory and recreational sport it is amazing what young people can be taught to do. I am impressed that you were good at physics at 15. But to me, this is a different question from whether I want to watch you doing physics on TV.

 

[Georgya]

didn't gymnastics rack up the minimum age as a response to that?

I don't know how this idea got legs but it's more of a myth. At present in gymnastics 80% of the girls are under 20 yeard old. Those over 20 really stand out because you can actually count them on your fingers. And usually those over 20 yo target mostly olympics not worlds or other competitions because of injury related fears.

Also a false idea discussed here to advance the rising of minimum age in figure skating it's that in gymanastics was done to protect child athletes from injury. Wrong!

FIG (Fédération Internationale de Gymnastique) raised age requirements from 14 to 15 in 1981, and then to 16 in 1997 because of a series of controversies with regard to gymnast ages - mostly age falsification in the '80 and '90. I mean at the end what is the difference between a 15 yo competing at olympics and a 16yo. A year doesn't change anything. Like at 17 you are a minor, a child, but at 18 you magically transform into a adult. It's mostly symbolic.

Since 1994, the average age of female gymnasts went up from 16.49 to 18.10 in 2006, now is maybe 19-20, but this didn't end the trend of gymnasts retiring young, under 20yo. Also gymnastics allows another very important trick and this is a recent phenomenon - to train and specialise a certain apparatus, like only beam or vault - it reduces considerably the risk of injury. Now propose somthing similar in figure skating

Gymnastics and Figure skating are unique sports for women, I made my pace with it

Edit My take on the fact that the average age of female gymnasts raised from '90 - better doctors, better means to deal with injuries, better training methods, better coaches, but most important a new code of points that allowed a gymnast like Sanne Wevers to beat Simone Biles on beam. Maybe something similar should be done in figure skating - a way do gain more points from the artistic side

 

[Orlov]

I am thinking of figure skating's future as a spectator sport. Yes, as a participatory and recreational sport it is amazing what young people can be taught to do. I am impressed that you were good at physics at 15. But to me, this is a different question from whether I want to watch you doing physics on TV.

Firstly, I’m very worried about your emphasis on the word spectator Cuz, you know - russian fans still, as we say here, "wiping sweat with a ushanka" after Zhulin's words:

“It’s interesting for me to watch female figure skating, when not the teenage population competes, but the skaters with the formed feminine parts of the body that men are pleased to look at”

cuz, you know, people who want to admire women's parts visit other places and events But if yours is not so ... simple-minded, let's say, views on figure skating like that of Zhulin, why do you deny in advance the entertainment of the sport with 15-year-olds skater? For me, skating 15 year old Kostornaya is at the top world level in terms of beauty, emotional involvement.


Secondly, when I said that a 15-year-old is not a child and cited my own experience as an example, I wanted to say that the formation of a person in general ends in 15-16 years. I am now emotionally and intellectually (in terms of abilities and perception of the world) the same as I was 15 years old. I only gained knowledge and skills. And this is (formation of a person) especially true of talented, disciplined teens who actually already have a profession. Therefore, it is not surprising that Kostornaya skate better than the vast majority of participants in WC-2019.

 

[mathlike]

Secondly, when I said that a 15-year-old is not a child and cited my own experience as an example, I wanted to say that the formation of a person in general ends in 15-16 years. I am now emotionally and intellectually (in terms of abilities and perception of the world) the same as I was 15 years old. I only gained knowledge and skills. And this is (formation of a person) especially true of talented, disciplined teens who actually already have a profession. Therefore, it is not surprising that Kostornaya skate better than the vast majority of participants in WC-2019.

23yo claiming from "their own experience" that 15yo is emotionally and intellectually formatted person is interesting.

Dear friend, unless you're seriously ill, health-care worker or a soldier, you ain't seen, felt, experienced ANYTHING yet, believe me. You don't know what it's like to get up every day just to spend another day in pain in your back, stomach or legs due to overtraining as a child. You don't know how it's to not be able to use a bathroom by yourself due to coaching mistake. You don't know how it's to live with screws in your spine, legs, arms in need of daily massages, anti-inflammatory drugs or medical assistance placed inside your body due to overtraining or injuries in youth.
Do you think, at 20yo, Elena Mukhina was intellectually and emotionally prepared for how her life was going to change?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nvScuvCexAQ

Do you really think 15yo kid is?

 

[nussnacker]

23yo claiming from "their own experience" that 15yo is emotionally and intellectually formatted person is interesting.

Dear friend, unless you're seriously ill, health-care worker or a soldier, you ain't seen, felt, experienced ANYTHING yet, believe me. You don't know what it's like to get up every day just to spend another day in pain in your back, stomach or legs due to overtraining as a child. You don't know how it's to not be able to use a bathroom by yourself due to coaching mistake. You don't know how it's to live with screws in your spine, legs, arms in need of daily massages, anti-inflammatory drugs or medical assistance placed inside your body due to overtraining or injuries in youth.
Do you think, at 20yo, Elena Mukhina was intellectually and emotionally prepared for how her life was going to change?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nvScuvCexAQ

Do you really think 15yo kid is?

15 year old is a 100% still a kid. a 23 year old saying 15 year-old is not a kid is a little funny, since 23 year olds in general haven't had much life experience yet to speak on topic whether or not 15 year olds are children or not.

However you are mixing things up here. I think Orlov did not mean that 15 year olds are responsible adults, who should be able to make their own life decisions,
but spoke about 15 year old's maturity as a performer, and that some 15 year olds can perform without any less maturity compared to 20-23 year old skaters, which is indeed possible.
Some 15-16 year olds do indeed have some performance factor that some 20 year olds lack.
Some child actors have more performer talent and show better performances than some adult actors.
Should I say, Evgenia Medvedeva at 15 could perform better than someone like Ksenia Makarova (once a russian national champion) at the age of 20.

This has no relation to whether or not 15 year old are capable or should be capable of handling important issues regarding their life and health, this should be handled by their parents.

Mukhina however is also not really a good example here.
Mukhina have not met a coach, but a person who essentially tortured and abused her and ruined her life.
Mukhina was not just 'overtrained'.
Her coach literally got her out from hospital in her neck brace, despite doctors' protests and made her train, which instantly led to her getting paralyzed.
Another factor that played a part was that she basically was an orphan, her grandmother did not actively participate in her life,
which essentially allowed her coach to abuse her.
After she got paralyzed, she said that she's happy that she can finally be free from constant demands of her coach, which is quite telling that this is not a simple 'overtraining' issue.

That's a very extreme example, and there's a difference between a strict but reasonable coach and an abusive and cruel one, who sucked out all of the joy of life and sports for a kid.

 

[Mawwerg]

23yo claiming from "their own experience" that 15yo is emotionally and intellectually formatted person is interesting.

Dear friend, unless you're seriously ill, health-care worker or a soldier, you ain't seen, felt, experienced ANYTHING yet, believe me. You don't know what it's like to get up every day just to spend another day in pain in your back, stomach or legs due to overtraining as a child. You don't know how it's to not be able to use a bathroom by yourself due to coaching mistake. You don't know how it's to live with screws in your spine, legs, arms in need of daily massages, anti-inflammatory drugs or medical assistance placed inside your body due to overtraining or injuries in youth.
Do you think, at 20yo, Elena Mukhina was intellectually and emotionally prepared for how her life was going to change?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nvScuvCexAQ

Do you really think 15yo kid is?

I am not sure I know anybody who is prepared for such changes. And I'm not sure people should.

 

[Mathman]

I am not opposed to young athletes doing everything they can to excel in sports. Good for them.

What I do not feel so happy about is the direction that the sport itself has taken. Not to hit the physics example too hard, but an intellectually precocious teenager who is a whiz at science -- well, I would hope that there is something more to it than that. I would hope that there is room for serious adult scientists to push back the frontiers of human knowledge -- that sort of thing.

In figure skating I think the danger is that a 14 year old skater says, "I can do 4 quads." That's the end. What more will she ever accomplish that can beat that?

 

[Baron Vladimir]

23yo claiming from "their own experience" that 15yo is emotionally and intellectually formatted person is interesting.

Well, according to the developmental psychology 15yo is intellectually (cognitively) formed person, for sure. Emotional (sexual) and social develpoment could last a year or two longer of cognitive development, and generally development is (for some) a never-ending process (it ends when life ends), but in a developmental sense you can't say 16yo is a child. The difference between 16yo and 30yo is mostly only in a life expirience and in that sense you can claim that 30yo are not mature (life-expirienced) eather if you compare them with 50yo. topic: