Where have all the skaters gone?

[Mathman]

I have no answers to why interest in FS has gone done so much in the past 20 years and no suggestions for getting at least some of it back.

To me, that completely sums up the situation.

People say that "they" (the USFSA, etc.) ought to do this or that. They are trying to do this and that. They are trying as hard as they can to promote their sport.

But they are like the Red Queen in Alice Through the Looking Glass -- "It takes all the running you can do just to stay in the same place. If you want to get to somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that.."

 

[el henry]

Uh you blame the IJS for the lack of popularity in the US? That doesn't make a lot of sense, the sport's as popular as ever in Russia and makes use of the same judging system. And I'm not sure I'd agree that spirals or split jumps are what people want to see, exactly. There's a reason these elements such as Spirals are already done by skaters as young as 5 or 6, they're not nearly as amazing as people seem to want to believe and they get boring very quickly. Look at what the Russian ladies are doing, they're popular and that's the sort of skating people actually want to see.

I'd say the blame lies both with the lack of availability(as I already was talking about) but also with the consistently negative / controversial commentary. I'd say that if every commentator commentated with the same positivity as Ted Barton people would find the sport more appealing as well, Lipinski and Weir aren't exactly helping.

that only makes sense in Russia, though.

if you walk down the street and find anyone in the USA who isn’t already following figure skating who can identify Sasha, Aliona or Anna, I will give you a million gazillion internet dollars. That, in my opinion, is not the type of skating that US audiences would want to see. Since Russia makes videos widely available, if it were the type of skating US audiences wanted to see, they would be watching.

Uncle Dick made Johnny Weir look like Mother Teresa in his commentary. I love me some Ted Barton, and I adore his incredible support particularly of the lower-ranked skaters, but I am afraid that would not help.

But if I knew the answer I would implement it and everyone would love figure skating,

 

[Scott512]

In my province in Canada, the 2 best skating club are private winter sports club. Membership fees are > $15,000 and $30,000 alone, non transferrable, and yearly fees on top of that are also steep. That is a lot of money. Granted the facilities are nice, there are nice restaurants there, etc.... but still. I'm just saying. It's a lot of money to spend. Plus, there are no NCAA scholarships for skating in the USA.

The running joke in my city is that the sports clubs are for the elite to mix with each other and where business deals are made.

In a worldwide pandemic that's not going to be gone anytime soon how can normal families afford those kind of rates in Canada or America?

Canada peaked at the last Olympics. Now what? It's going to be a long road back to get Canada where they were 3 or 4 years ago in figure skating.

 

[Skatesocs]

Since Russia makes videos widely available, if it were the type of skating US audiences wanted to see, they would be watching.

How many Americans know about the availability of such videos in the first place, again? I'd imagine an interest that is already present in the populace would help them discover those videos.

I would not presume the American population has such drastically different tastes compared to the Russians. There are, after all, Americans all over the FS internet fanbase who watched those videos with pleasure, though some might have taken pleasure in complaining about it along the way. The "artistic"/what-have-you skaters of the US have failed to drum up more interest in skating in the first place, SOI is almost dead. Maybe it's something else entirely.

 

[el henry]

How many Americans know about the availability of such videos in the first place, again? I'd imagine an interest that is already present in the populace would help them discover those videos.

I would not presume the American population has such drastically different tastes compared to the Russians. There are, after all, Americans all over the FS internet fanbase who watched those videos with pleasure, though some might have taken pleasure in complaining about it along the way. The "artistic"/what-have-you skaters of the US have failed to drum up more interest in skating in the first place, SOI is almost dead. Maybe it's something else entirely.

I would contend that Jason Brown’s Riverdance certainly inspired interest in skating, with no follow through at all from powers that be. I am talking about the incredible athletic skills required for skating, spins, foot work and choreo in competition, not shows. As I think I mentioned earlier, I care about all the athletic elements of the sport of figure skating, not just the one athletic element of revolutions in the air.

and Americans are certainly capable of finding videos from other countries and having those videos go viral, aren’t they? If a video requires “help”, then I would argue the universal appeal is not so universal.

As I have said each tIme, I certainly don’t claim to know the answer for the US. I wish I did.

 

[FelineFairy]

How many Americans know about the availability of such videos in the first place, again? I'd imagine an interest that is already present in the populace would help them discover those videos.

I would not presume the American population has such drastically different tastes compared to the Russians. There are, after all, Americans all over the FS internet fanbase who watched those videos with pleasure, though some might have taken pleasure in complaining about it along the way. The "artistic"/what-have-you skaters of the US have failed to drum up more interest in skating in the first place, SOI is almost dead. Maybe it's something else entirely.

I also believe it's something else. There is a huge difference between the sports that are watched in the USA and in Russia, like almost no one is watching (or has ever watched) baseball, or American football, while soccer, biathlon and ice hockey are widely watched. Figure skating in Russia is not the biggest sport at all. Among my friends maybe 1 out of ten is mildly interested, among my son's friends no one. But it is more popular than in the USA at present for several reasons: media hype is important; those of the older generations with a habit of watching FS on TV can get it from time to time on state TV for free; the younger generations have free access to streams and videos; Russian athletes have had success in at least one or two events in Worlds/Olympics/Euros for quite some time, without any prolonged periods of no successes at all. Historically, for the Russian spectators there is no clear "favourite" among the types of FS. Pairs, ice dance, men, ladies all have had their share of success throughout the years interchangeably. Thus, I believe, there are no reasons for a significant plummeting of interest.
In Russia you can also find nostalgic fans who loved some athletes of the past, who don't watch current competitions because they are different, or people disliking the recent styles. As you can see, their existence doesn't influence the popularity of the sport. I don't know if their numbers in the USA are large enough to explain the loss of interest.
But IMHO the role of the media is decisive.

 

[Skatesocs]

I also believe it's something else. There is a huge difference between the sports that are watched in the USA and in Russia, like almost no one is watching (or has ever watched) baseball, or American football, while soccer, biathlon and ice hockey are widely watched. Figure skating in Russia is not the biggest sport at all. Among my friends maybe 1 out of ten is mildly interested, among my son's friends no one. But it is more popular than in the USA at present for several reasons: media hype is important; those of the older generations with a habit of watching FS on TV can get it from time to time on state TV for free; the younger generations have free access to streams and videos; Russian athletes have had success in at least one or two events in Worlds/Olympics/Euros for quite some time, without any prolonged periods of no successes at all. Historically, for the Russian spectators there is no clear "favourite" among the types of FS. Pairs, ice dance, men, ladies all have had their share of success throughout the years interchangeably. Thus, I believe, there are no reasons for a significant plummeting of interest.
In Russia you can also find nostalgic fans who loved some athletes of the past, who don't watch current competitions because they are different, or people disliking the recent styles. As you can see, their existence doesn't influence the popularity of the sport. I don't know if their numbers in the USA are large enough to explain the loss of interest.
But IMHO the role of the media is decisive.

I think you have hit the nail on the head. I deleted a previous response when people were going on about collegiate championships, but the main thing to me is that skating is simply not embedded in the culture of American viewership, whereas it looks like it is for the Russians. I believe the TV producers probably tried a lot when gala shows were popular in the US, but they failed for whatever reason. As a result, when shifts in taste of an overall viewership occurred, skating might have simply fallen by the wayside. Add events that took place in early 2000s or late 2000s, and it might have changed the outlook of the audiences enough to make certain things seem a lot less important than before (just as an example, the Great Recession is hardly a period where people would have wanted to spend money on skating. Football is a lot more hyped in the US, as you point out, so it makes sense it would survive through a lot more). For Russia, seemingly, it is different, because it looks a lot more cultural.

I'll also say that the viewership blowing up due to controversy like the Harding scandal is nothing to be proud of, nor would I say anything happening with the Russian coaching drama currently is something that should be attracting people. Faith in humanity ever-so-slightly restored if it's driving people away, in fact. No need to replicate such bs.

Now in order to embed skating into the culture of American viewership, maybe collegiate championships are indeed the answer. Or maybe it is indeed the answer to make coaching inexpensive. IDK. Gala shows, or viral videos, or recreational skating, or skating as "art" - none of these really answer the question of how one might increase interest in competitive skating. Collegiate skating is unlikely to be the same type of format as one sees in international competitions, but it seems closer to the aim even if temporally far off even assuming any interest. To me it's more worthwhile to think about whether we should care about such a thing ("Does skating need to be more popular in the US/worldwide?"). For that I'll simply say "do something more meaningful". It's OK if a country lost interest in skating, or if skating is forever niche.

 

[MUALover]

In a worldwide pandemic that's not going to be gone anytime soon how can normal families afford those kind of rates in Canada or America?

Canada peaked at the last Olympics. Now what? It's going to be a long road back to get Canada where they were 3 or 4 years ago in figure skating.

I'm speaking from personal experience. I know families with kids who have trained for other sports (not skating but other sports like swimming and badminton) in the same facility (I mean posh winter sports clubs) and they had rich daddies who were doctors, hot shot partners in law firms and dentists. One kid got selected for a PanAm games and his family paid a lot of money for him to go to PanAm games (somewhere in South America) because since it wasn't a Worlds or Olympics, the federation didn't pay. Fortunately, their family was quite wealthy and the whole family went as a family vacation of some sort to cheer him on.

Is this even possible for an average middle class family? I think not.

 

[Scott512]

I'm speaking from personal experience. I know families with kids who have trained for other sports (not skating but other sports like swimming and badminton) in the same facility (I mean posh winter sports clubs) and they had rich daddies who were doctors, hot shot partners in law firms and dentists. One kid got selected for a PanAm games and his family paid a lot of money for him to go to PanAm games (somewhere in South America) because since it wasn't a Worlds or Olympics, the federation didn't pay. Fortunately, their family was quite wealthy and the whole family went as a family vacation of some sort to cheer him on.

Is this even possible for an average middle class family? I think not.

No it's not possible.

Figure skating in America could go all the way American men's tennis has gone. Probably not but nobody saw it American men's tennis would be dead for the last 15 years.

This is one of the reasons kids in Russia especially the girls seem so hungry at a young age like they're going to go to the ends of the world to make it. Their families for instance don't have a lot of money and if they reach success then they can give their family a better life

 

[Shayuki]

that only makes sense in Russia, though.

if you walk down the street and find anyone in the USA who isn’t already following figure skating who can identify Sasha, Aliona or Anna, I will give you a million gazillion internet dollars. That, in my opinion, is not the type of skating that US audiences would want to see. Since Russia makes videos widely available, if it were the type of skating US audiences wanted to see, they would be watching.

Uncle Dick made Johnny Weir look like Mother Teresa in his commentary. I love me some Ted Barton, and I adore his incredible support particularly of the lower-ranked skaters, but I am afraid that would not help.

But if I knew the answer I would implement it and everyone would love figure skating,

That was not really my point, though. It was about the judging system and what people want to watch, and what kind of skaters are popular with the general public.

Russia's success is going to be extremely difficult to emulate without significant structural changes. I'd start with making all figure skating content freely and easily available on TV. And yes, that's easy enough to accomplish. Just require that in the next broadcasting contract. Earn less in the short term? Too bad, that's the nature of investing in the future.

The actual development infrastructure would be more challenging to fix. Something would need to be done about costs and accessibility. But that still is just the second step, making people have interest is the first one.

 

[TallyT]

In the U.S. It's the geoblocked YouTube videos that hurt. Only showing a handful of skaters on network tv. Never showing pairs of dance on network tv.
When a video hits over a million views and it's taken down.

But that's not only true of the US skaters, is it? I mean, just a few weeks ago we were all wailing and grumbling about the incredible geoblocked-where's-the-streams-how-do-we-VPN headaches in accessing the Japanese Nationals (and don't get me started on the mental gymnastics needed to watch Japanese ice shows). And their videos are yanked even faster than the NA ones. The difference is, of course, that Japanese stars are visible - certainly domestically and some of them throughout their region - outside youtube and competitions. (Okay, Evgenia and Alina also get that in Russia but I'm not sure the younger ones do yet. V/M in Canada? If not, their agents dropped the ball there.)

And casual youtube browsers aren't going to find skaters whose names they don't even know to be curious about. It's a vicious circle, no public awareness means no interest in raising a public profile, which means no visibility, and so it goes.

if you walk down the street and find anyone in the USA who isn’t already following figure skating who can identify Sasha, Aliona or Anna, I will give you a million gazillion internet dollars. That, in my opinion, is not the type of skating that US audiences would want to see.

I'm going to be devil's advocate and suggest that had Alina, with her looks and Cinderella aura, won the OGM while being American quite a few of her then countrymen would have quickly learned to want it

 

[karne]

People say that "they" (the USFSA, etc.) ought to do this or that. They are trying to do this and that. They are trying as hard as they can to promote their sport.

I find that hard to believe after they shoved US Nationals behind a paywall and made it impossible for non-US viewers to legally watch, despite being the only major skating event in the WORLD at the time and many non-US fans chomping at the bit to see it.

 

[Amei]

I find that hard to believe after they shoved US Nationals behind a paywall and made it impossible for non-US viewers to legally watch, despite being the only major skating event in the WORLD at the time and many non-US fans chomping at the bit to see it.

Well they still have to make money to operate and the 2 biggest events for figure skating in the US: Skate America and Nationals, they decided they could not have an audience in the arena - so they lost revenue there; plus with the economic hit that has been taken I would imagine that the donations to the US figure skating organization has been reduced.

 

[Mathman]

I think you have hit the nail on the head. I deleted a previous response when people were going on about collegiate championships, but the main thing to me is that skating is simply not embedded in the culture of American viewership, whereas it looks like it is for the Russians.

Actually, though, that is not the questipn that this article asks. The article does not compare USA to Russia, except tangentially. It compares USA in 2021 tp USA in the 1990s.

Figure skating was not exactly embedded in the US sports consciousness back then, either, but it had a period of relative prosperity and popularity. Then it didn't.

Why not? I have to punt on that one. Dunno. Cultural drift, changing tastes in entertainment.

As for all the plans to have more skating on the Internet, etc., the problem is, you can't force someone to like what he or she doesn't like. You can't force people to take an interest in something that does not interest them. Btring back Michelle Kwan, bring back 6.0 judging, hire a raftload of marketting geniuses, etc., etc. -- I don't think it would make any difference at all.That was then, this is now.

 

[AshWagsFan]

Interesting article. I think the 2008 economic crisis in the USA was a contributing factor in the decline of skating popularity, as it caused many people to be unable to afford the skating costs. Thus, I think it’s been a struggle to attract people to skating since.

 

[Mathman]

Interesting article. I think the 2008 economic crisis in the USA was a contributing factor in the decline of skating popularity, as it caused many people to be unable to afford the skating costs. Thus, I think it’s been a struggle to attract people to skating since.

The cause of the 2008 financial collapse was the abundance of free and unregulated credit. You want a million dollars? Just go to the bank and get a loan. You have no prospect of ever paying it back? That's OK, the bank has already sold your debt to a super bank, which sold it to a super-duer bank.

Ordinary people started taking expensive vacations, buying yachts, joining country clubs, and in general living like rich people. (It was called R_____-nomics ) 2008 was a reality check -- cancel those skating lessons quick!

 

[Shayuki]

Well they still have to make money to operate and the 2 biggest events for figure skating in the US: Skate America and Nationals, they decided they could not have an audience in the arena - so they lost revenue there; plus with the economic hit that has been taken I would imagine that the donations to the US figure skating organization has been reduced.

You don't think that it would make them MORE money making it free to watch for everyone and gathering sponsors / using ads, than they make by paywalling them in a manner that only the most hardcore of fans will watch? Similarly, if we consider video games for a moment, many of the most profitable games in the world are free to play, similar concept. Free = good.

In fact, if it was all free and proper marketing was performed, they could probably make more in merch than they do with p2ws.

 

[TallyT]

In fact, if it was all free and proper marketing was performed, they could probably make more in merch than they do with p2ws.

Oh I doubt it. Merchandise isn't that easy to sell to a market that isn't there.

 

[Shayuki]

Oh I doubt it. Merchandise isn't that easy to sell to a market that isn't there.

The market would be there if it was free to watch and readily available. Like I said, plenty of casual viewers who'd never watch any other sports might want to watch figure skating. Perhaps it wouldn't happen overnight but that's what they should do if they want to regain any sort of control over the world stage.

 

[TallyT]

The market would be there if it was free to watch and readily available. Like I said, plenty of casual viewers who'd never watch any other sports might want to watch figure skating. Perhaps it wouldn't happen overnight but that's what they should do if they want to regain any sort of control over the world stage.

Sorry, I was mainly talking about your statement on on merchandise. You need to build the audience before they'll start buying enough souvenirs to make it worthwhile. At the minute, that would be just another money sink.