Yuna Kim

[Krislite]

Oooh, she's not using David Wilson as her choreographer this time round?! Peter Oppegard, how interesting (hey, maybe Blades' hypothetical appeal to Team Yu-na for her to skate to Miraculous Mandarin worked XD)! So she's pretty much confirmed for next season? Awesome! I really do hope that Team Yu-na is referring only to a new short though... hopefully, she'll keep her long and skate it against next season. Or at least keep it for her exhibtion (kind of like what Daisuke did with his Tango de Roxanne program :3).

So excited over Kurt Browning and Stephane Lambiel... wow I really envy the Korean fans this summer! Two legendary men's skaters on the same ice! Wowza! And yeah... looking over the off-season commitments, it's pretty obvious why she's contemplating skipping the GP; I mean, she'll be flying to and fro until July, has commercial commitments until August in Korea and won't really be able to 100% commit herself to training for a competitive season until August.

[...]

The article did not specify that Oppegard himself will choreograph Yuna's new program(s), only that she will prepare with him. I thought it was common practice for both coach and choreographer to have some input in preparing new programs?

I think the South African trip is in early July and will be short (the final vote is on July 6), so Yuna has most of July and August to train. The ice show in August also only takes about a week or so, including practices. Still, I highly doubt she'll compete in the Grand Prix since she's pretty much ruled it out.

 

[Lilith11]

The article did not specify that Oppegard himself will choreograph Yuna's new program(s), only that she will prepare with him. I thought it was common practice for both coach and choreographer to have some input in preparing new programs?

I think the South African trip is in early July and will be short (the final vote is on July 6), so Yuna has most of July and August to train. The ice show in August also only takes about a week or so, including practices. Still, I highly doubt she'll compete in the Grand Prix since she's pretty much ruled it out.

Lols, reading comprehension fail *facepalm* Still, hoping that Peter will while he works w/Yu-na, choreo at least one program for her :3 I love Wilson's works with her, but I wouldn't mind seeing her collab w/a new choreographer... perhaps Tom Dickson?

True, but doesn't she still have K&C filming and potentially other commercial obligations after the July decision in Korea? Plus, she's already lost May in terms of training, most probably June so that's already 2 months behind for her... and we all know how valuable summer training is for skaters. So like I said before, her probable decision to skip the GP makes sense to me in that light.

 

[Mathman]

Mathman, can you imagine a system perfect the first time out? If you can, my goodness man, why haven't you created it yet. If not, than why criticize attempts to fix it unless you think those attempts were incorrect.

My beef is not with the details of the CoP. It is the whole adding-up-the-points concept that goes against the grain.

 

[jatale]

I don't think the change to CoP from 6.0 has had much to do with the decline in popularity of figure skating the US. Having top-notch skaters is much more important than what the judging system is. The US has not had any top solo skaters in a while now, and that is the main culprit in loss of audience IMO. There was an amazing boom in figure skating popularity after the Tonya/Nancy disaster, but that faded away after a few years and figure skating has been declining ever since. A revival will happen again when the US figure skating team becomes top-notch again.

 

[kwanatic]

I'd like to see both Yu-Na and Mao skip the GP, but for different reasons.

Yu-Na is really busy and rather than stretching herself thin, it'd be nice to see her live her life a bit and then head back to skating for 4CC (I bet you anything she'll go next year!) and then worlds. She's won all of the in-betweens so there's no reason to go back...unless she just wants to compete. Hopefully this year she'll keep the Homage program; Giselle? Eh, take it or leave it. But she should definitely stick with the Homage program. I really want to see her perform that without the first-time-out jitters and nerves...

As for Mao, I thought she should have taken last year off. I don't think she took the necessary time off to deal with the let-down of Vancouver. She jumped right back into training and that was difficult both physically and emotionally because she was re-learning technique all the while trying to compete and failing horribly which undoubtedly affected her confidence. She got through it well enough, but then the earthquake/tsunami hit. Mao looked completely deflated at worlds this year. I really think that girl needs a break. She needs a few months off to rest and have some fun. Skip the GP and train to be ready for nationals, 4CC and worlds. I really hope she takes a break...she needs it more than anyone right now.

 

[Mathman]

I don't recall that her decision to train the 3Lz/3Lo was in preparation for facing Irina Slutskaya at the Olympics. That sounds like a bit of fluffy fan historical revisionism, in order to credit Michelle for taking the initiative to challenge herself and match Irina's jump difficulty. Again, I'm a Michelle fan, but that's not how I remember it happening. Watch the video and you'll hear Terry Gannon's comments which reference the criticisms that were surrounding Michelle's skating at that time, post Skate America, and which factored in to why she attempted the ill-fated 3Lz/3Lo.

I think Terry Gannon was talking through his hat. I don't think Michelle gave a rusty hoot (as Dick Button would say) about what the fans thought, or what the media thought, or what posters to Internet forums thought. She wanted to win the Olympic gold medal.

The only thing that could prevent that was if Irina Slutskaya out-jumped her. Michelle could not go into Salt Lake City wth a pitiful sometime-y 3T-3T and beat Slutskaya if Irina brought her best stuff. Sarah Hughes was not in the equation. (The only person more shocked than Michelle at Hughes' victory was Irina.)

There was a famous press conference shortly before Skate America in which they asked Frank Carroll how everything was going, and Frank said, "Everything is going all right."

Michelle practically broke into tears and said, "No, everything is all wrong!"

Skate America proved that Michelle was correct. Michelle parted ways with her coach and tried to upgrade to a 3Lz+3Lo (thanks for the correction. ) It didn't work out. But the ironic thing is that the way it actually came down. Sluskaya skated weakly at the Olympics and Michelle could have won with just an average error-free program.

 

[Mathman]

Stop to tell a lie, M, and please remove the 1998 Nats and 1998 Olympics from the list and consider reviewing her other performances before claiming that MK did "all 5" standard triples while berating other skaters like YuNa.

As my sainted mother used to say, tell the truth and shame the devil.

What are you so mad about? Michelle was a great skater who milked every possible drop out of the 6.0 ordinal judging system. Yu-na Kim did the same with the CoP.

Michelle had kind of an iffy, flatzy Lutz. Yu-na doesn't point her toes on her spiral. You pay your money and you take your choice.

 

[Lilith11]

As my sainted mother used to say, tell the truth and shame the devil.

What are you so mad about? Michelle was a great skater who milked every possible drop out of the 6.0 ordinal judging system. Yu-na Kim did the same with the CoP.

Michelle had kind of an iffy, flatzy Lutz. Yu-na doesn't point her toes on her spiral. You pay your money and you take your choice.

Yes, you were singing a different tune before... like say when it came to Yu-na not including a 3loop in her program? Please don't backtrack and play the "innocent" "who, me?" card.

 

[Layfan]

The point of my post(s) was not to knock Yuna but the CoP as well as ISU politics.

I thought Yuna showed better all around skating than Miki at the WC despite it being her first event of the season and would have placed her first.

mathman's point about not liking Miki but liking the CoP is quite astute..

Miki under Morozov is very much a CoP skater. So is Yuna but she offers more IMO.

I like both girls but think Yuna is clearly the superior skater.

It is how I feel about Racahel and Mirai. Even if Rachael manages to score more points than Mirai there is little doubt in my mind which girl is easily the superior all around skater.

CoP was supposed to emphasize and promote better all around skating.

Instead what we see is an exaggerated manipulation of the system that is not about better all around skating but is primarily about who can score the most points by whatever means.

It has just about killed the sport in USA and that is why we don't see much of it on TV anymore.

I know you weren't trying to knock Yuna.

My point was more that Yuna vs. Miki is a bit of a strange example to use against CoP Yuna has been hugely successful under CoP. More than Miki. More than any other skater. Of course, I think Yuna would have been hugely successfully under 6.0 too. Sometimes, great skating is just great skating.

Rachael vs. Mirai is perhaps a better example. But really, Mirai generally does better and gets more points than Rachael when she doesn't mess up. If you look at the way she was scored at the Olympics and the 2011 4CC, she was pretty far ahead of Rachael. I'm using those competitions as examples because both girls were solid at both.

Still, you could get into the nitty gritty. I totally understand why Rachael beat Mirai at this year's nationals and I think it was fair. But it did come down to whose series of minor mistakes cost the post points. And you can't help but wonder if under 6.0, the judges would have made the same decision.

 

[Serious Business]

Oh god yes I hope Yuna works with Peter Oppegard. Not that David Wilson isn't pure magic, but Oppegard, from what I've seen, is a brilliant choreographer who is woefully underused. I would love to see the most talented ladies skater in the world show off his artistic vision.

As to Mathman's criticism of the COP, I completely get what you're saying, Math dude. The way the COP is set up actually doesn't allow for that much creativity in program construction: everything is worth a set amount of points, doing them a certain way is worth a set amount of points, so of course eventually everybody winds up doing much the same thing per that season's COP. However, I do believe that's slowly being fixed. One of the most prominent examples of that is the new Choreographic Footwork and Choreographic Spiral sequences implemented in the 2010-2011 season. Those elements have no levels, and while there are some GOE guidelines, they still allow for a lot of flexibility. And we already see some brilliant uses of the freedom they provide, such as Mao ending her FS with a slow but beautiful and perfectly timed spiral. A simple spiral like that would've been impossible in previous seasons, as it would cost her massive points from not having a high enough level.

And this is just the start. I hope the COP will implement more elements free of levels, and just give everybody the same fixed base value and let the GOE differentiate them. In fact, I'd like to see them allow wildcard elements in the FS (while taking away some of the balanced program elements to make room). The COP has plenty of room for change. So while I agree that the COP as it is doesn't allow enough artistic freedom, I disagree with the idea that it is fundamentally broken.

 

[Mathman]

Yes, you were singing a different tune before... like say when it came to Yu-na not including a 3loop in her program? Please don't backtrack and play the "innocent" "who, me?" card.

Can you mention which post in particular you are referring to?

The new rule that restricts the number of double Axels hurts Yu-na (much more than other skaters) because she has a 3Lz+3T and a 2A+3T but she doesn't have a triple loop.

Since she doesn't have a triple loop she had to give up her 2A+3T this season.

If she had a triple loop she could dominate under CoP by 20 points like she did last year. Without a triple loop, others have a chance to close the gap.

I really enjoyed programs like Michelle's Aranjuez which seemed to me like a clinic presenting each type of jump. I thought that was cool. So shoot me. But maybe I am remembering the past through rose-colored glasses.

Not every observation is an attack.

 

[Lilith11]

Can you mention which post in particular you are referring to?

The new rule that restricts the number of double Axels hurts Yu-na (much more than other skaters) because she has a 3Lz+3T and a 2A+3T but she doesn't have a triple loop.

Since she doesn't have a triple loop she had to give up her 2A+3T this season.

If she had a triple loop she could dominate under CoP by 20 points like she did last year. Without a triple loop, others have a chance to close the gap.

I really enjoyed programs like Michelle's Aranjuez which seemed to me like a clinic presenting each type of jump. I thought that was cool. So shoot me. But maybe I am remembering the past through rose-colored glasses.

Not every observation is an attack.

How about this: "... But you're right about the new rules punishing only a skater who does a triple-triple and does not have all her jumps. (How can a coach send his skater into senior competition without teaching her all the jumps, spins, steps, turns, etc., anyway?). Saving the "ganging up on Yu-na Kim" theory for another time, perhaps we can think of the rules as warning the skaters, you'd better learn all your jumps first before you start in with the advanced tricks like triple-triples."

 

[Mathman]

How about this: "... But you're right about the new rules punishing only a skater who does a triple-triple and does not have all her jumps. (How can a coach send his skater into senior competition without teaching her all the jumps, spins, steps, turns, etc., anyway?). Saving the "ganging up on Yu-na Kim" theory for another time, perhaps we can think of the rules as warning the skaters, you'd better learn all your jumps first before you start in with the advanced tricks like triple-triples."

OK, you got me about the sentence in parentheses. (Prettykeys got me. too, but I didn't want to give her the satisfaction of admitting it. )

Sorry about that. I got carried away trying to make my point over-forcefully.

But the part about the "warning" ... maybe warning is the wrong word, but I do think that the point of the new rule is to make it harder for skaters to reap the full rewards of the triple-triple when they don't have a complete repertoire of lesser elements to full in the holes.

Certainly the new rule has this effect, whatever the intention was.

 

[Krislite]

My beef is not with the details of the CoP. It is the whole adding-up-the-points concept that goes against the grain.

What's wrong with the additivity of elements and components? Even 6.0 to an extent relied a dubious foundation by adding up the technical marks and presentation marks to derive the ordinals. Since the marks are simply indices and are preserved under any monotonic transformation, it makes no sense to add them the way they did. It would have been more accurate to have an ordinal for the technical marks and then a separate ordinal for the presentation marks and then add the two (weighted) ordinals to derive the general ordinals for each program.

 

[prettykeys]

If there's any doubt, go watch the clips for yourself at the times I took the screenshots.

No, all I have are not just pictures. The links to the YouTube videos AND the moments where I took the screenshots are plainly in the screenshots. Take a look.

^^^to fairly's comment
I have to agree. I'm not saying Michelle didn't occasionally flutz (because she did) BUT she also executed lutzes. No, her outside edge wasn't as pure as say Shizuka's, Miki's, or Yu-Na's, but she did execute lutzes. The picture doesn't show where her blade is when she takes off; it's capturing where it is before she takes off. Oftentimes, the edge rolls (to the outside or slightly inside) so, I agree, the pic doesn't tell the whole story.

The picture is better just before takeoff in that it captures moments just before she PICKS her toe into the ice. Once the toe is in the ice, it is MORE DIFFICULT to establish whether a skater doing a proper Lutz has already launched herself into the air (wherein a proper outer edge on the gliding blade becomes less evident) or if she is still on the ice. Furthermore, anyone who watches the video will see that Michelle starts her Lutz entry with a deeper outer edge than just prior to picking her toe in, which is when she not only switches to the inside edge, for some reason she leans her whole body to the inside (which I already pointed out.) This should not happen on good Lutz technique, I've read--the outer edge should become deeper right before takeoff. Further, while I'm no expert in human biomechanics or the physics/technique of Lutz jumps, I am aware that a healthy human knee does not normally bend from side to side and Michelle Kwan did not have extreme bowing of her left leg. Her whole body is leaning deeply inward; how is she supposedly skating on the outer edge of her left blade (or the flat) just before executing a jump that is characterized by counter-rotation? Blows the mind, doesn't it?

I've noticed that good Lutz jumps are also executed with the body perpendicular to the ice, that is, the skaters are straight, not leaning inward, before takeoff. This makes sense. The curve of the glide is one way, the rotation of the jump the other way.

Watch the video. MK's edge gets even more questionable when her toepick actually hits the ice. I was being conservative.

As my sainted mother used to say, tell the truth and shame the devil.

Tell a lie, make Jesus cry.

Michelle had kind of an iffy, flatzy Lutz.

Michelle Kwan had a flatz in 2003, when she did Aranjuez, which I've always said is my favourite ladies' LP. That's the only LP I regularly watch from her, so obviously I believed the story about the flatz, too. Serious Business made me take another look and it is clear that Michelle Kwan is flutzing in 1998. MK executed 4 different triples plus a jump that started off like it was supposed to be a Lutz but took off from the inside edge.

Don't step to Frank. He knew about her edge issues with the lutz, it's why she changed her approach from the traditional (and beautiful, imo) long backwards glide, to a much shorter one, with the change of edge to the outside comes a lot sooner. This hasn't gone unremarked on at all; it's in Christine's Brennan book, which is about as pro-Michelle and anti-Tara as you could get, even Dick Button made mention of her flutz issues at times, and plenty of European commenters straight-out called her jumps "flutzes". As in, "triple flutz, double loop combination!"

Oh, wait a second. Do I have a skater agreeing with my observations? (doubleflutz skates, yes?) So Frank knew about the edge on the Lutz (and again, you will see that my comment is more tongue-in-cheek than anything, basically firing the criticism of YuNa and her coaches back to Team Kwan.) Christine Brennan knew. Dick Button and Euro commentators also knew. Hallelujah.

Edited to say: You might not want to site Oksana as an example of a lutz. Or any jump, really. You have to land on one foot for it to count.

Actually, I thought Oksana was a great example to use. Even she had a pure Lutz.

 

[mskater93]

Actually, I thought Oksana was a great example to use. Even she had a pure Lutz.

doubleflutz was referring to the fact that Oksana was known to 2-foot her landings (and therefore did not SUCCESSFULLY complete the element)

 

[kwanatic]

I wonder if Yu-Na will stick with the programs she had this year or pick something else?

I definitely think she should keep her LP...I think, especially since she's using it as her exhibition for her shows, she should drop Giselle (good but not a great program) and come up with another SP. Heck if she wanted to, she could recycle one of her older SPs (Tango and Danse are my favs)...

 

[prettykeys]

doubleflutz was referring to the fact that Oksana was known to 2-foot her landings (and therefore did not SUCCESSFULLY complete the element)

I know what doubleflutz was referring to, but http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3uZycSYnufI&t=0m33s - that's a nice Lutz.

I liked using Oksana as an example: an oft-derided 16-year old skater at her first Olympics is doing a pretty Lutz but The Kween with "mastery of the full vocabulary of figure skating" never did a Lutz like that.

 

[OS]

I wonder if Yu-Na will stick with the programs she had this year or pick something else?

I definitely think she should keep her LP...I think, especially since she's using it as her exhibition for her shows, she should drop Giselle (good but not a great program) and come up with another SP. Heck if she wanted to, she could recycle one of her older SPs (Tango and Danse are my favs)...

I have mixed feeling about her LP, as fantastic and gorgeous as it is, I think it would work best as a exhibition where she doesn't have all these COP limitations and she can have complete freedom to express from within. It is one of those rare 'heart on a plate' type of program, and putting it through the COP shredder is just *shudder* inducing. If there's any program that need to be bring back from the past, I'd love it to be the Lark Ascending.

-------------

As for Yuna news,

This is the official video released by ATS for her Fevers exhibtion
http://youtu.be/2PrUzGTuN50

and here's her latest official MV released yesterday for PyeongChang 2018 bid, a duet with the great Lena Park.
http://youtu.be/5ye6AOZ83kI

 

[Kwanford Wife]

I know what doubleflutz was referring to, but http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3uZycSYnufI&t=0m33s
The Kween with "mastery of the full vocabulary of figure skating"

Gosh, Prettykeys - you always make me so happy when you bow at the feet of THE KWEEN That's all I ask: that she is worshipped and adored...

(Ok, I'm sorry. I won't interrupt again...)