The Underrotated Jumps of Evgenia Medvedeva

[Imagine]

I may hate her programs but wow, you people are so salty. I almost want to see her tano and underrotate her way to another world record just to watch this place completely melt down.

 

[Krislite]

Has anyone Tano'd a half loop

I don't think so, but if anyone is gonna try it, it's probably Young You. She really took the Tano'ing to the extreme and puts it on every triple--even more than Evgenia: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jl0e-zmlAvA

 

[Alexz]

I may hate her programs but wow, you people are so salty. I almost want to see her tano and underrotate her way to another world record just to watch this place completely melt down.

I agree with your every word. Literally with every word. Thanks for putting it in such 2 elegant, dry and short sentences. *handshake*

Med is not my cup of tea, I'm personally more Pogo kinda guy, but Jesus-Marry-n-Joseph after reading some of the posts here I kinda unintentionally starting to want Medvedeva to win over and over again. With here childish and friendly smile, "in our face" style.

 

[TGee]

I think calling it a "witch hunt" and an "anti Russian campaign" is a little ridiculous. At least here on GS. There are occasional trolls, sure, but nothing awful. As for the rest of the interest - it doesn't need to ruin discussion here. Yulia Lipnitskaya is very loved here. So are allllll of the Russian pairs. Not to mention how intense the fandom is for Elena and Ruslan. Criticism of Russian skaters doesn't not equal anti-Russian. Granted, the most successful skaters are going to undergo the most scrutiny, and that's just normal. During Tara versus Michelle in the late 90s people started picking on Tara for having a flutz. People hated her. But everything turned out okay.

Hi Andromache,

I hope that I can say this in a constructive way, because I really find that you are generally one of the moderating and constructive voices on GS....

Here goes, best effort...

There really can be a great deal of leaping to suspicion, calling of bias, unfair judging with regards to certain countries. This begins to feel that there is a anti whatever country sentiment on GS.

I can only say how it makes me feel to see the way Canadians are constantly critiqued for bias, unfair judging, and "skating while Canadian". It makes me feel fairly awful to be frank. And I chose GS over the other forum because I felt it had on average better tone, and better moderation.

I really regret that GS has made me realize how much bitterness there is against Canada out there. It makes me want to walk away, and I know many Canadian fans have walked away over the years....and so I can only imagine what it feels like for the Russian fans...

The way the analysis on the men's thread on Skate Canada has gone since last evening is an example of what I mean. When I logged off last night, a number of Canadians including myself, were trying to understand, with reference to the latest ISU regs, why Kevin Reynolds was scored the way he was on his REPs and combinations. There were Canadian fans sincerely asking whether he had been overscored and if he had would it have impacted placement.

[BTW Our conclusion was that he was not overscored because he got no credit for his second attempted combo and had a jump BV reduced to 70%, and that even if the last extra jump was not counted, placement would not have been affected....But we were entering in a calm, not nationalistic analysis because we felt the question was sincere and calmly put.]

And this was despite, earlier in the evening, an example of excessive and instant suspicion of hiding something when the protocol was late being posted because an American skater and his federation had asked for a technical review on one jump as the rules provide for.

But when I logged on this morning, the thread was all about how one skater was overscored and the other was robbed. Accusations of biased judging were flying fairly indiscriminately in my view. So, I'm not looking at that thread and I'm wondering how much I want to be on GS.

And by comparison, when the American fans had a "best Skate America ever" thread, I don't recall that Russian or Canadian fans rushing to make accusations about biased judging panels, or USFSA only choosing competitors that would make their skaters look good.

So sincerely, if folks really want this to be a multi-national English language forum, we need to tone down the amount of leaping to accusations of bias that are going on. It's not just the occasional troll...

And I'd like to close this by saying again, that you personally have been a moderating influence, taking it back to concrete and neutral analysis, and we need more voices like yours to keep folks like AlexD and me coming back...

 

[Nathan13]

I may hate her programs but wow, you people are so salty. I almost want to see her tano and underrotate her way to another world record just to watch this place completely melt down.

 

[nolangoh]

I'm waiting for the half-Tano/half-helicopter arm positions in the air. Can't wait to see how the judges score that.

aka the Bharatanatyam arm position! :agree:

http://bharatanatyam.co/images/123.jpg

 

[Blades of Passion]

If something is under-rotated at the end of the jump, it's easy to spot, but what are the real-time signs that something is pre-rotated?

Look at people's feet when they take off, pretty much. You can see it in real-time, although some skaters more than others. The skater often has a swingy quality to their upper body too in these cases (look at how Medvedeva's torques her right shoulder and clenches that right fist before the jump).

If you're seeing a performance live and are close to where the skater jumped you may even see the takeoff mark on the ice, but this is less reliable of course. In fact, watching live is actually just hindrance much of the time, because wherever you sit, you're inherently going to be farther away from the skater at some point. When a skater does something next to the boards by the judges, the judges actually can't see the skater's feet at that point (and of course this is why people often do their Lutz in a corner of the rink on the judge's side of the rink...another trick Medvedeva's team uses).

I wouldn't say under-rotations are any easier to spot, if it's not a drastic underrotation and the skater landed cleanly. Unfortunately slow-motion is needed for exact accuracy in either case. In real time you can usually just sense something is "off" with the look of a jump, though, when it is cheated in either way. The jump won't fill the air as much as normal.

I have addressed the pre rotation too many times and most people ignore it. I remember you also protected Shoma and Satoko for doing the same "technique".

Huh? I've called out Satako's faulty jump technique ever since her Junior days and was highly critical of Shoma's Quad Flip earlier this year, although the ones he did at Skate America were rotated enough and the jump seems to have gotten better actually, even though he still does a swingy entrance.

Well it's just Skate Canada. I guess Satoko won't get called UR again at NHK.

Hopefully that is no the case. Also, ALL of the top Canadian ladies have correct technique on their Toeloops. And they jump huge. Let's see how consistent all of these other girls would be if they actually tried to jump properly.

 

[chuckm]

Alaine Chartrand double-foots many of her jumps, including the toe loops.

 

[andromache]

Hi Andromache,

I hope that I can say this in a constructive way, because I really find that you are generally one of the moderating and constructive voices on GS....

Here goes, best effort...

There really can be a great deal of leaping to suspicion, calling of bias, unfair judging with regards to certain countries. This begins to feel that there is a anti whatever country sentiment on GS.

I can only say how it makes me feel to see the way Canadians are constantly critiqued for bias, unfair judging, and "skating while Canadian". It makes me feel fairly awful to be frank. And I chose GS over the other forum because I felt it had on average better tone, and better moderation.

I really regret that GS has made me realize how much bitterness there is against Canada out there. It makes me want to walk away, and I know many Canadian fans have walked away over the years....and so I can only imagine what it feels like for the Russian fans...

The way the analysis on the men's thread on Skate Canada has gone since last evening is an example of what I mean. When I logged off last night, a number of Canadians including myself, were trying to understand, with reference to the latest ISU regs, why Kevin Reynolds was scored the way he was on his REPs and combinations. There were Canadian fans sincerely asking whether he had been overscored and if he had would it have impacted placement.

[BTW Our conclusion was that he was not overscored because he got no credit for his second attempted combo and had a jump BV reduced to 70%, and that even if the last extra jump was not counted, placement would not have been affected....But we were entering in a calm, not nationalistic analysis because we felt the question was sincere and calmly put.]

And this was despite, earlier in the evening, an example of excessive and instant suspicion of hiding something when the protocol was late being posted because an American skater and his federation had asked for a technical review on one jump as the rules provide for.

But when I logged on this morning, the thread was all about how one skater was overscored and the other was robbed. Accusations of biased judging were flying fairly indiscriminately in my view. So, I'm not looking at that thread and I'm wondering how much I want to be on GS.

And by comparison, when the American fans had a "best Skate America ever" thread, I don't recall that Russian or Canadian fans rushing to make accusations about biased judging panels, or USFSA only choosing competitors that would make their skaters look good.

So sincerely, if folks really want this to be a multi-national English language forum, we need to tone down the amount of leaping to accusations of bias that are going on. It's not just the occasional troll...

And I'd like to close this by saying again, that you personally have been a moderating influence, taking it back to concrete and neutral analysis, and we need more voices like yours to keep folks like AlexD and me coming back...

I completely agree. (And thank you for finding my posts constructive! :agree

I hate seeing accusations of bias thrown around in every single competition thread no matter who wins. There is a certain amount of bitterness that arises when someone's favorite loses, and people find it easier to criticize the results and the judging instead of acknowledging that, even though their favorite is their favorite, someone else might have had a better performance on the night. People often talk about biased judging for skaters when a competition takes place in the US, Canada, Russia, and (to a slightly lesser extent) Japan. The bias is probably real, but I think we can all accept that skaters from the big federations have a fairly equal advantage because they all benefit from bias depending on the location of the competition.

Posters are often complaining about the preferential treatment of US, Canadian, and Russian skaters when someone scores higher than they like or higher than their favorites. However, I almost never see accusations that the forum itself is anti-American or anti-Canadian, while the notion that Golden Skate is anti-Russian is pretty prevalent. I have no doubt that there are posters here who are "anti-Russian" and others who are anti-American and anti-Canadian, but I don't think they are actually anti-X-ethnicity, they're just bitter fans whose faves lost. And there seem to be a pretty even amount on all sides. Russian fans probably feel especially targeted because of the outcry against Adelina's (IMO, deserved) win in Sochi. Looking beyond that though, Russian ladies have been soooo successful that they are receiving more criticism - because the more you win, the more you're making skating fans bitter that their favorites didn't win. Are people anti-Russian? No, they're just anti-X-skater because X skater keeps beating their faves. And people need to grow up and not get soooooooooo worked up over a sport that is, ultimately, subjective. No scoring system will ever be perfect. Sometimes the subjectivity favors one skater and sometimes it favors another.

We as fans should be able to make reasonable critiques in our discussion of skaters without claiming that it's rigged or that someone is a cheater or that X poster is a hater or anti-Russian because they acknowledge that some skaters pre-rotate their jumps and other don't. Acting like your subjective opinion is superior to the judges and that judges are somehow objectively wrong IN EVERY EVENT is just ridiculous. Explain why you disagree with the judges, why you liked skater X's performance over skater Y, and move on.

In this thread, I think taking a closer look at Evgenia's jumps is educational. It helps make sense of how she is so consistent and lets us better understand her technique. Acting like she's the only skater who benefits from a large amount of pre-rotation and being mean about wins is just bitter, but it's also un-constructive to claim that Evgenia has the best jump technique in the world and that everyone who says otherwise are just haters.

Honestly, on a forum that I'm not allowed to curse on, I expect a certain amount of decorum from posters but I probably expect too much. This is the internet, after all.

 

[TGee]

Alaine Chartrand double-foots many of her jumps, including the toe loops.

Hi chuckm,

You seem to be somewhat out of date...

Alaine Chartrand used to do a brief two foot on a significant proportion of her jumps....

It was fairly well recognized, and I heard it noted by commentators from many countries. And the judges were alert and penalized her for it.

And as many of us who are following the Canadian women closely are aware, she has had a significant coaching transition over the last few years. And that team has clearly been working to improve her technique in a number of areas, including jumping. The difference is visible if one compares recent competitions to the GP season two years ago for example.

It's been discrete, rather than splashy, but definitely significant. While she maintains an approach of taking in a number of voices, Michelle Leigh, Brian Orser and Robert Kazimir are now her coaching team.

Going back to BOP's point, I would prefer that the scoring system be more even handed on some of these issues that require confirmation with the slow motion video replay. That way, the risk vs reward in taking apart technique as Alaine has done would shift more toward the reward for all skaters....

 

[Mathman]

Humbug! I just saw Skate Canada on the big little screen. Evgenia skated like the world champion she is. Anyone who doesn't like it, let them come onto the ice and challenge her.

 

[fruitbasket]

Evgenia Medvedev Understated jumps

I am afraid that if the witch hunt continues like that, that there will be no more Russians left at this forum. I have seen this whole Anti Russian campaign start prior to the Olympics, where at the Europeans Russian fans were attacked and the most disgusting moment in FS history, surely happened after Sochi, where a petition against the Olympic Champion Adelina Sotnikova, received two million signatures... I am speechless about so much hate from so called "fans", people who have no heart and only follow the sport so that they can insult skaters.

It has totally nothing to do with Russia or any country, specifically. Skater fans want to see fair scores from ISU judges...Skater fans expect to see fair scores go to deserve athletes. Figure skating is a beautiful sport. Inflated scores ruins this sport.

As you mentioned, Think about.. getting two million signatures are big numbers. It is old story, but at least two million people feel Sotnikova rec'd inflated scores....

 

[[email protected]]

I completely agree. (And thank you for finding my posts constructive! :agree

Are people anti-Russian? No, they're just anti-X-skater because X skater keeps beating their faves.

I do appreciate your contributions but I have to disagree with you on that one. There are both russophobia and picking on Russian fans on this board. Big kudos to moderators who try to make GS an impartial environment. And many posters have to deal with that unlike, say, Yahoo. Unlike Yahoo, here the argument: "You are Putin's troll" is used as the last resort (on Yahoo it is the weapon of the first choice) but, alas, it is still used. I myself received "titles" more than once. There are people who come here just to write anti-Russian stuff.


And there is another "popular weapon" - whenever you point to some russophobic statements you immediately get back: "the Russians always whine".

 

[temadd]

I think calling it a "witch hunt" and an "anti Russian campaign" is a little ridiculous. At least here on GS. There are occasional trolls, sure, but nothing awful. As for the rest of the interest - it doesn't need to ruin discussion here. Yulia Lipnitskaya is very loved here. So are allllll of the Russian pairs. Not to mention how intense the fandom is for Elena and Ruslan. Criticism of Russian skaters doesn't not equal anti-Russian. Granted, the most successful skaters are going to undergo the most scrutiny, and that's just normal. During Tara versus Michelle in the late 90s people started picking on Tara for having a flutz. People hated her. But everything turned out okay.

Agreed. And just one week ago, there were many negative comments being thrown around about Ashley Wagner after she won Skate America. It seems to go with the territory of being a gold medalist-not a Russian or American or Japanese thing.

 

[Alex D]

I think calling it a "witch hunt" and an "anti Russian campaign" is a little ridiculous. At least here on GS. There are occasional trolls, sure, but nothing awful. As for the rest of the interest - it doesn't need to ruin discussion here. Yulia Lipnitskaya is very loved here. So are allllll of the Russian pairs. Not to mention how intense the fandom is for Elena and Ruslan. Criticism of Russian skaters doesn't not equal anti-Russian. Granted, the most successful skaters are going to undergo the most scrutiny, and that's just normal. During Tara versus Michelle in the late 90s people started picking on Tara for having a flutz. People hated her. But everything turned out okay.

If I see posts with upvotes of 15+, where a user clearly attacks Evgenia as a person and an artist then one troll or "critique" is surely not the right term to describe it. I had to stop reading the Ladies FS thread, as looking at posts with so many upvotes, posts which were so rude and offensive, it just broke my heart.

I had to change my post with some examples of what I saw there, as I had a cencored word in it (not sure which, so I killed the post and started now without the examples) and maybe those posts are already deleted, but still so many upvotes??? It shows that people support these people, maybe a silent support, but I did not see anyone help or step in, it was a nightmare that thread and I honestly don´t want to look at it again.

From my point of view, people in America use certain words in their every day conversations, but for us non native speakers they are very offensive, which btw. can work both ways, which is why I always double check my wording. That being said, I often read stuff here, that offends me - but I can move on and don´t make a lot of noise. However, specific threads and topics, have become impossible to follow because of these things. I just avoid them and I wouldn´t be surprised if others do so as well.

I don´t even think that everyone is fully aware what damage words can do, but they still hurt.

One user here mentioned, how many Canadians left the forum already and while I don´t know what happened, I can get a good picture of it, if I see how users and skaters from Russia are attacked now. I even read a reply of someone who said "then leave the forum" where a user was offended by a comment from another member, who said rude things about Evgenia.

Look, I really don´t expect that everyone is always positive to everyone that's my job anyways , but I wish that users would stop being so rude and offensive. If I don´t like a program and yes, this can happen too - I just move on and talk about the programs I liked. Why is this so difficult for others, why the need to talk about a skaters weight, mouth position and co?

Feedback, especially if negative should be well explained and not a simple sentence like "this program is -----". I also notice the negativity rising about Madison & Evan, not sure if this is because they are a serious threat, but I find it wrong and this might also explain why the offensive posts towards Yulia have stopped, as she struggles and isn´t a medal contender right now.

These athletes work every day, many hours, their heart is with these programs, it means a lot for them to present them and then some guy who watched the program once and might ate a few chicken wings on the road, comes to a forum or posts the term "boring" at the skaters FB. I find that rude and disrespectful, especially since these people hide behind a virtual identity.

In the end, being nice can´t be so hard - there are ways to express critique so that nobody get´s hurt.

 

[Blades of Passion]

Anyone who doesn't like it, let them come onto the ice and challenge her.

But nobody else is even allowed to challenge her? She doesn't get called for her faults, while other skaters like Asada and Hongo constantly receive phantom tech calls and big GOE deductions for no good reason.

Rika Hongo's 3Lutz at Skate Canada being called as both "e" and underrotated, and then receiving full downgrades on two other jumps, is one of the most ridiculous things I've seen. Hongo's opening 3F+3T that received a << call and -2 GOE was more rotated and jumped bigger than than Medvedeva's 3S+3T that received no call at all and got +GOE. It is UNFAIR and WRONG.

 

[andromache]

I do appreciate your contributions but I have to disagree with you on that one. There are both russophobia and picking on Russian fans on this board. Big kudos to moderators who try to make GS an impartial environment. And many posters have to deal with that unlike, say, Yahoo. Unlike Yahoo, here the argument: "You are Putin's troll" is used as the last resort (on Yahoo it is the weapon of the first choice) but, alas, it is still used. I myself received "titles" more than once. There are people who come here just to write anti-Russian stuff. One is the most persistent. He/she is easily identifiable as he uses numbers in aliases every other time he reappears (being revealed I guess he will change next time). Last time he was Skinny80. The very first post of this user was in Skate Canada Ladies FP thread and it was about how bad the Russians are in general: they only praize their skaters and bash all non-Russian skaters, etc. This post was deleted and I hope the user was banned another time - mods are good here. But what is essential: this post received many thumb ups - I think about 10. So it is not about just one crazy person - it is about the mood among some of the "moderate opposition". Imagine the reaction if some Russian poster wrote a humiliating post about Americans or Canadians in general: what people would thumb up such a post?

And there is another "popular weapon" - whenever you point to some russophobic statements you immediately get back: "the Russians always whine".

The occasional trolls are ridiculously annoying, and I hope that no one thinks they speak for the majority of the forum. But you're right, I didn't consider the impact of seeing thumbs-up on such rude posts. I know I cringe whenever I see a cruel post with many thumbs-up because that only encourages the nasty behavior of the troll.

But I do think that when a poster wants to call someone out for their poor treatment of Russian skaters, it is better to call that person out directly, rather than to imply that anti-Russian sentiments are pervading the whole thread. There are times I have felt hurt and gotten defensive because I will be in a thread, critiquing a Russian skater (among other posters being critical) and one or two posters will be being rude and cruel. But a Russian poster comes in and says that everyone is being anti-Russian when that just isn't true. For example, while there are a few mean posts in this thread, a few more that are over-dramatic, I do not think expressing concern over pre-rotation and Evgenia's success with her jump technique (the majority of posters, IMO) makes them anti-Russian or means there is an anti-Russian witch hunt. Satoko has received more discussion regarding pre-rotation than anyone, plus Shoma Uno among the men, and I don't think anyone accuses anyone of being anti-Japanese.

If people instead considered skaters as individuals rather than as a single monolith, everything would be better. "Russian ladies blah blah blah." Not all Russian ladies are the same! Anna Pogo is more like Gracie Gold than any other current Russian ladies! Yulia's skating has more in common with Satoko than with Elena's. Liza has textbook jump technique and Evgenia does not. Supporting skaters ONLY for their nationality tends to lead to problems in discussion.

 

[rosy14]

Besides her jumps, I am weirdly looking forward to see the PCS scoring in her next GP event, which is France, where she will face Mao.

Done that already:see Worlds.

 

[Mathman]

...maybe those posts are already deleted, but still so many upvotes?

To all: Please use the report feature to call the moderators' attention to posts that violate the Golden State guidelines, posted at the top of each page.. (Click on, um, Guidelines. ) The competition threads explode up to 100 pages so fast that we cannot keep up with them on our own.

One user here mentioned, how many Canadians left the forum already and while I don´t know what happened,...

Come back, come back! It is just an ugly rumor that GS is unfriendly to Canadians. We love Patrick Chan, Virtue and Moir, Duhamel and Radford, Kaetlyn Osmond. We love Gilles & Poitier and Kevin Reynolds. Chartrand! Daleman! Weaver and Poje! :yes:

 

[TGee]

I do appreciate your contributions but I have to disagree with you on that one. There are both russophobia and picking on Russian fans on this board. Big kudos to moderators who try to make GS an impartial environment. And many posters have to deal with that unlike, say, Yahoo. Unlike Yahoo, here the argument: "You are Putin's troll" is used as the last resort (on Yahoo it is the weapon of the first choice) but, alas, it is still used. I myself received "titles" more than once. There are people who come here just to write anti-Russian stuff. One is the most persistent. He/she is easily identifiable as he uses numbers in aliases every other time he reappears (being revealed I guess he will change next time). Last time he was Skinny80. The very first post of this user was in Skate Canada Ladies FP thread and it was about how bad the Russians are in general: they only praize their skaters and bash all non-Russian skaters, etc. This post was deleted and I hope the user was banned another time - mods are good here. But what is essential: this post received many thumb ups - I think about 10. So it is not about just one crazy person - it is about the mood among some of the "moderate opposition". Imagine the reaction if some Russian poster wrote a humiliating post about Americans or Canadians in general: what people would thumb up such a post?

And there is another "popular weapon" - whenever you point to some russophobic statements you immediately get back: "the Russians always whine".

Really appreciate your coming across to comment and share your perspective on this...:agree:

I really feel the impact of those thumbs up too......

And it becomes very hard not to either react / feed the troll or walk away altogether when the troll is rewarded by so many posters...

Lastly, I'd like to note that Canadians can be hesitant to react to comments about Canadian skaters that are not neutral or substantiated because many of us expect the response "You Canadians are soooo nationalistic"....