How good was Worlds this year??

Worlds this year were AMAZING!!!

The audience was fantastic, the skating overall was exciting to watch, there was plenty of drama. And despite some unusual scoring here or there, the end results were fair and good overall.

What more could you ask for as a viewer?

As a spectator, one wants to be entertained by sports.
So Yes! A very good World Championships. The audience was responsive and warm and it looked like a full arena from the videos?
One slight question about the ice quality. The singles discipline, which is what I concentrate on, seemed to have more falls than last year in Saitama. It could just be my imagination.

The globalization of figure skating is great to see.
It was well received in Spain, we will have the GPF there again. China has been successful as far as audiences and local talent is growing fast. The ladies are still mostly Russian, American and Japanese, but in the men we had the most wonderful diversity in the top 10. -One of the reasons why Men is my favorite category this year.

Not sure about good. But this had one of the most diverse set of winners in recent memory. 4 different gold medaling countries with Spain making history. Usually post-Oly Worlds are a snooze but not this year IMO.

whatif said:

Not sure about good. But this had one of the most diverse set of winners in recent memory. 4 different gold medaling countries with Spain making history. Usually post-Oly Worlds are a snooze but not this year IMO.

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So Spain has 3 spots in mens. So there is Javier and then....Javier and then who?? Time for someone to step up.

GF2445 said:

So Spain has 3 spots in mens. So there is Javier and then....Javier and then who?? Time for someone to step up.

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Well, Spain got 2 spots last year but could still only fill up one of them. Javier Raya unfortunately couldn't meet the minimum TES requirements He was joking about it whilst commentating on Liza's SP saying that she was able to achieve higher TES than him

GF2445 said:

So Spain has 3 spots in mens. So there is Javier and then....Javier and then who?? Time for someone to step up.

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I think they should allow a lottery scheme for "unfilled spots". We have Spain, KAZ, and UZB next year with potentially wasted spaces. I suggest it's the packed countries with intense internal competitions like Russia/Japan and/or some exotic entries.

This was was my first ever visited FS competition and it was great!

GF2445 said:

The audience was fantastic

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Thank you. )))

whatif said:

I think they should allow a lottery scheme for "unfilled spots". We have Spain, KAZ, and UZB next year with potentially wasted spaces. I suggest it's the packed countries with intense internal competitions like Russia/Japan and/or some exotic entries.

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I don't think that Worlds has an allocated number of spots that are allowed in each segment anyway though. It really depends on how many people can meet the minimum TES. Also there is the question of how such 'unfilled spots' would be allocated.

Overall, I was happy with it. Diverse results on most of the podiums. Men and Ice Dance were pretty open fields, which led to plenty of speculation/excitement.

Unfortunately, Ladies and Pairs were not so open.

Ladies had potential to be a nailbiter -- but once the 3A was landed, the World title had practically already been decided. Once the top American ladies bombed the short, the only question going into the free was which Japanese lady would make the podium.

It's a real shame I didn't get that rush of adrenaline in waiting for the final results, as I had in past competitions...

Better than last year fo sho.

I thought it was a championship of uneven quality.

Pairs is my favourite discipline and it was one of the best competitions in recent years. A lot of the teams brought their A game, my only disappointment was K/S not been at the top of their form.
Ice Dance, while not my favourite, (I can't tell the levels) was entertaining and had a great end with the French claiming the gold
Ladies, apart from Liza and her 3A in the short it didn't live up to expectation for me, too many errors.
For Men, it was great to see Javi win gold and the battle among the Top 3 was great but a lot of the other guys didn't deliver. Exceptions would be Ge and Nguyen.

The crowd support was very good. I have never seen as many cuddly toys/flowers thrown on the ice, the flower girls and boys were working really hard all week. Are the skaters given everything thrown on the ice? Hanyu will need a separate plane to get all his presents home.

Depends on how you look at it.

As a sport competition: watching without knowing the results, either live or in skate order, it was amazing. A lot of drama, a lot of movement in the standings, and quite a few surprises (order of podium in ice dance, Miyahara making the podium and beating Radionova, a Spanish man winning Worlds, ect.)

In terms of quality of performances--whether we'll watch back these skates as 'works of art'--it was a little disappointing. Not total splatfest, but lots of mistakes. Pairs is the exception, of course, with the top 4 all throwing it down.

GF2445 said:

So Spain has 3 spots in mens. So there is Javier and then....Javier and then who?? Time for someone to step up.

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Well, great for Javi and for Spain. But, unless there are more skaters from Spain who are actually good enough now to compete at a top level, this is one area where I think the sport needs to be restructured. There should be a stronger Senior B tour for skaters with lower level abilities, and for skaters who have good talent but are cut off from making the World team because of the depth of talent in their country. (This would offer the opportunity for more skaters to compete internationally, to improve and to actually win medals too). As it currently stands, even with having 3 spots for Spain, both additional skaters will likely not possess the skills to qualify for the fp.

It looks like there is only Fernandez anyway since there wasn't even a second entry for Spain this year.

It was an interesting Worlds with lots to dissect. I'm still catching up with some of the performances I didn't get to see mostly of lower placed skaters, and I didn't see the SD for all the ice dancers. Best moments for me: Javi's reaction to winning (he's such a sweet fellow); seeing Robin Cousins in the kiss 'n cry with So Youn Park; Liza's easy peasy 3-axel; U.S. ladies comeback in the fp; Satoko's performances; Jason Brown's solid performances; moments of brilliance from D10 (too bad none of the top three men were able to skate two clean programs -- that continues to be an issue with all the OTT tech content/ heavily quad requirement); most of all, I enjoyed top pairs and ice dance with performances and victories by Duhamel/Radford and Papadakis/Cizeron the highlights!

OMG, they need to do away with those annoying reaction shots of skaters sitting on the sofa while other competitors are receiving their scores. It was just so much ridiculous overkill. Enough already! Often, it didn't make any sense at all. Who decided to do this I wonder? I hope this does not continue in the future. We don't need those separate boxes showing one set of skaters watching others' scores. They need to use those kinds of split screens during performances when they cut to a close-up on a skater's face or on their feet, there should be a split screen of their entire body. That would be a much better use of split screens. And please stop with the overhead, skycam shots!

I am not sure where to put this. These were pictures taken from the after party that has been posted on Baidu.

http://s789.photobucket.com/user/os168_photo/slideshow/WC2015 Banquet

It seems the organiser prepared the full red carpet star treatment walkin to the party where several guests have been overheard to remark 'This is crazy'. (good crazy I hope they deserve to be treated like superstars)

I hope the skaters enjoyed their experience in Shanghai, they sure look glamorous and stylish in these pictures. I love Anna's style, glad she appear to be smiling and relaxed now.

os168 said:

I am not sure where to put this. These were pictures taken from the after party that has been posted on Baidu.

http://s789.photobucket.com/user/os168_photo/slideshow/WC2015 Banquet

It seems the organiser prepared the full red carpet star treatment walkin to the party where several guests have been overheard to remark 'This is crazy'. (good crazy I hope they deserve to be treated like superstars)

I hope the skaters enjoyed their experience in Shanghai, they sure look glamorous and stylish in these pictures. I love Anna's style, glad she appear to be smiling and relaxed now.

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Thanks for providing the link. That's something nice for the skaters, like an Oscars after party. The best pics were the close-ups of Zijun Li with Hanyu, Zijun with Javi & Hanyu, and Zijun with a mugging D10.

os168 said:

I am not sure where to put this. These were pictures taken from the after party that has been posted on Baidu.

http://s789.photobucket.com/user/os168_photo/slideshow/WC2015 Banquet

It seems the organiser prepared the full red carpet star treatment walkin to the party where several guests have been overheard to remark 'This is crazy'. (good crazy I hope they deserve to be treated like superstars)

I hope the skaters enjoyed their experience in Shanghai, they sure look glamorous and stylish in these pictures. I love Anna's style, glad she appear to be smiling and relaxed now.

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I can't see it There is only information: "This album is Private."

Poice said:

I can't see it There is only information: "This album is Private."

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Oops I updated the settings. It should work now.

os168 said:

Oops I updated the settings. It should work now.

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it works for me now. thanks, os!

lol the gala is like an annual prom with almost the same people

os168 said:

Oops I updated the settings. It should work now.

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Thank you!!

By the way, I suspect Russia or Japan will still get 3 spots. Spain appears to only have Javi that qualifies the TES, and Misha remarked he is the only skater for UBZ, so there's 3 spare spots right there.