2019-20 Russian Ladies' Figure Skating

[ruga]

Daria is a very good skater and I'd dare to say that PCS wise maybe even the best Russian junior. Her jump consistency is bit of a problem. Though I'm not expecting her to be a super consistent skater in her first year. She has one more year before she becomes a senior. And I'm still conflicted about her programs. She is very mature but maybe 'Please Don't Make Me Love You' and 'Je suis malade' are not the best way to express her artistry.

Happy for Anna. She certainly has been an underdog but due to favorable circumstances she is able to show her skating at an international stage.

 

[Vandevska]

Aaaand of course the spin off is always about precious/evil Eteri. Yall it's not an argument saying "these people think this". Provide a better argument (ermmm opinion mostly) next time. I beg of you, all of you.

 

[TripleAxelQueens3]

Dasha also has wonderful lines, and very good posture in my opinion. I feel like she looks really balletic on the ice and her arms are so expressive too. Her SS are kind of underrated, in the step sequences she uses a lot of deep edges and the transitions in her program are insane. But yeah, at Riga and Zagreb - Haein was clean, she was captivating and she deserved the win. When Dasha pulls it together, I think she will be able to reach the top of the podium.

 

[Scott512]

You shouldn't laugh at this (EDS); it's actually quite sad - some poor souls even believe that Evil Eteri was conjuring some evil voodoo magic while standing at the rinkside at the Test Skates, and that's the only reason why all of the supertalented non-TeamTut skaters failed in one way or another.

EDS? I've heard of TDS and we all know what that means and it's real. But EDS? I guess that's real too but on a slightly smaller scale.

Eteri will have to waive her magic wand in order to keep everyone in her ladies stable happy the next few years. I hope she can do it because there's only so much Eteri to go around for all these girls and ladies. It's a tough job but somebody's got to do it. And she has plenty of boys she's trying to develop too. Fortunately Eteri has a great team around her and that has to help a lot.

 

[Vandevska]

Dasha also has wonderful lines, and very good posture in my opinion. I feel like she looks really balletic on the ice and her arms are so expressive too. Her SS are kind of underrated, in the step sequences she uses a lot of deep edges and the transitions in her program are insane. But yeah, at Riga and Zagreb - Haein was clean, she was captivating and she deserved the win. When Dasha pulls it together, I think she will be able to reach the top of the podium.

She has a lovely presence. In Riga she was very good in that aspect, and perhaps in Zagreb she was more nervous due to the fact that this was a very important event as someone said before.

 

[Tolstoj]

Buahahahhaha No jokes, Sherlock!
Why stop there though?
Shelepen and Yulia also never met on jgp stages in 2012! The Eteri powah from day 1! I’m pretty sure if we’d dig deeper, we’d find out that before that Yulia and Yevgeniya never met on junior Russian cup stages!
But what happened this year though? Why send injured Maya to events that soon with stronger competitors and not give her time to recover, like it was allowed to some other skaters? Why send an injured skater on a very short notice the second time? Is she losing da powah?

LOL, I’m surprized people are thinking Rusfed is playing some elaborate mind games for some placements on junior level. Rusfed surely cares about jgp more than some other federations, who are much weaker at strategizing. But you’re bringing it too far. They probably had people with valid us visas and thought it was an easy decision to send them to US, since obtaining US visas is notably quite hard right now, as applications are getting stuck for several months. Everyone has been discussing that, when proving conspiracy theorists how Sinitsina’s rejection was not an inquiry from the White House, but now we’re ignoring that fact yet again. Panova Team had them due their trip to Raf.

You keep throwing in the Sinitsyna situation despite i had already said that i don't believe any conspiracy theory around the visa issues.

Even if she was allowed to compete, chances to win gold would have been scarse, in a competition that almost looked like it was set for Alysa Liu to win.

As for the rest my point stands, i think they absolutely have these conversations about which skater to send to gurantee more skaters at JGPF and often Eteri skaters gets that privilege because most of the time they are the best.

Because it takes a lot of time and work to learn a 3A? Because height and distance aren't all that's required? Alena has the biggest 2A but hasn't stabilized a 3A. Polina Tsurskaya had some of the biggest jumps in ladies and didn't have any 3A/quads. Pretty sure you have to be able to rotate fast enough, have the require air position, timing, etc.

I'd argue Valieva, and Khromykh 2a is even longer than Kostornaya's 2a (which to be honest sometimes it looks a little regressed)

Tsurskaya's jumps had rotation issues due to the huge delay, which was really cool as long as the jump was fully rotated, with a quad you don't have the time for the delay, so unless some major change i've never believed Polina could do quads, but maybe they tried at some point with the quad lutz.

It's just a bit curious from a team that is ALL about the fast rotation: you look at Shcherbakova or Trusova 3ltz (which isn't the best lutz in the world) and you'd think it's more difficult to turn that into a quad than Valieva-Khromykh 2a which has everything to be a triple, and we know at least Valieva can rotate fast, looking at her quad toe.

The only reasonable explanation i can give is that they want to make sure all the other triples are consistent before working on those elements, in fact between the three only Valieva has the quad in her program, plus Khromykh joined later this season due to injury.

But like i said, it might well be the case for next season.

 

[Scott512]

You keep throwing in the Sinitsyna situation despite i had already said that i don't believe any conspiracy theory around the visa issues.

Even if she was allowed to compete, chances to win gold would have been scarse, in a competition that almost looked like it was set for Alysa Liu to win.

As for the rest my point stands, i think they absolutely have these conversations about which skater to send to gurantee more skaters at JGPF and often Eteri skaters gets that privilege because most of the time they are the best.



I'd argue Valieva, and Khromykh 2a is even longer than Kostornaya's 2a (which to be honest sometimes it looks a little regressed)

Tsurskaya's jumps had rotation issues due to the huge delay, which was really cool as long as the jump was fully rotated, with a quad you don't have the time for the delay, so unless some major change i've never believed Polina could do quads, but maybe they tried at some point with the quad lutz.

It's just a bit curious from a team that is ALL about the fast rotation: you look at Shcherbakova or Trusova 3ltz (which isn't the best lutz in the world) and you'd think it's more difficult to turn that into a quad than Valieva-Khromykh 2a which has everything to be a triple, and we know at least Valieva can rotate fast, looking at her quad toe.

The only reasonable explanation i can give is that they want to make sure all the other triples are consistent before working on those elements, in fact between the three only Valieva has the quad in her program, plus Khromykh joined later this season due to injury.

But like i said, it might well be the case for next season.

Polina was a tremendous jumper and it would have been interesting to see her stay around a few more years and find out if a lady figure skaterher height 5 ft 8 in tall could actually pull off a triple axel or quad. As far as I know no girl or lady taller than 5ft 2in or 5 ft 3 in tall has ever done a quad or a triple axel. But I bet Polina could have done it. But things happened and she retired unfortunately.

 

[*~RussianBleux~*]

As far as I can tell, RusFed usually sends one stronger skater and one weaker skater to each event to balance things out, so let's see how the test skating ranks affected the assignments.

Test skates:

(1) Valieva - Clean SP, Clean FS (with quad).
(2) Sinitsyna - Clean SP, Clean FS (with backloaded combos).
(3) Kanysheva - Clean SP, Clean FS (but with shaky landings).
(4) Usacheva - Clean SP, 1 Fall in FS.
(5) Tarakanova - Clean SP, 1 Fall and Missing Jump in FS.
(6) Frolova - Clean SP, 1 Fall and 2 Missing Jumps in FS.
(7) Khromykh - Clean SP, 1 Fall and 2 Missing Jumps in FS (I put her below Frolova because of shaky landings).
(8) Vasilieva - 1 Fall in SP, WD from FS.
(9) Tarusina - Missed Test Skates (injured).

So for assignments, we have:

Courchevel: Valieva + Khromykh. 1+7.
That's one stronger skater and one weaker skater (if we assume strong/weak entirely on test skates, of course).

Lake Placid: (Sinitsyna) + Tarakanova. 2+5.
This event was more of an exception because of how hard it is to get a US visa, so they assigned those with visas to Lake Placid. You can see this from them having only Tarusina as a sub for this event - unlike all the other events, the other skaters simply weren't options for Lake Placid. No visas, after all. But technically speaking, they still did assign one skater from the top half of the list, and one skater from the bottom half of the list (if we delete Tarusina, who didn't compete on the JGP, then Tarakanova's 5th technically does fall in the bottom half, even if she's the highest skater there).

Riga: Usacheva + Khromykh. 4+7.
This one is more questionable. Technically Usacheva's 4th does fall in the top half of the skaters, but she's at the bottom of the top half. But still, it's one skater from the stronger half and one skater from the weaker half.

Chelyabinsk: Valieva + Sinitsyna + Vasilieva. 1+2+8.
If I'm remembering correctly, Sinitsyna's place was originally either Tarusina's or Frolova's. She got subbed in after Lake Placid's mishap. So that would make it 1+8+9, or 1+7+8. One skater from the top half and two from the bottom half. There's really nothing questionable about that if we're going off the results of test skates. Unless the argument is that test skates shouldn't matter and the fed should only be looking at skates from the previous season, then I don't see how anyone (the Davydov skaters) were unfairly screwed over at Chelyabinsk. (Sinitsyna was only there as a sub.)

Gdansk: Tarakanova + Vasilieva. 5+8.
This is the only questionable one. It has two skaters from the bottom half of the list. I think the fed might've just decided to sacrifice both to Alysa Liu after both got bronze medals. Or maybe it was a side effect of all the scrambling after Sinitsyna's visa issues and Kanysheva withdrawing from the JGP right around then. The layout clearly wasn't intended because Vasilieva had to compete back to back. I think Sinitsyna was supposed to be there at first? So that does point towards RusFed deciding to sacrifice Vasilieva for her bronze, because they could've had Sinitsyna or Vasilieva compete back-to-back and they chose Vasilieva. Maybe they weren't expecting her to take silver over Tarakanova here.

Zagreb: Usacheva + Frolova. 4+6.
One skater from the lower top half, one skater from the upper bottom half. I think that makes enough sense. Maybe it isn't ideal in terms of consistency, but it does make sense based on test skates.

Egna: Sinitsyna + Frolova. 2+6.
One from the top half and one from the bottom half. It makes sense. The thing that doesn't make sense according to test skates would be the original assignments (Sinitsyna + Kanysheva, 2+3), but that's explainable because they had to push Sinitsyna to the end because of the visa issues, and Kanysheva to the end because of her medical issues.

So in the end there's really no conspiracy theory that I can see. RusFed just put everything down to test skates. Panova's skaters weren't screwed over by having to go to Lake Placid, they were simply the only ones who could get visas on time. (If this wasn't the case then surely the sub list would've been longer). When Sinitsyna's visa issues popped up they scrambled to give her two new assignments with a good period of time in between. Davydov's skaters weren't treated unfairly, they were given bad assignments because they missed test skates. The conspiracy theories are fun, I guess, but at the end of the day, if you look at what happened at test skates then none of what happened was unreasonable. Unless the argument is that test skates shouldn't hold any weight and that we should only be looking at the previous season's results.

Excuse me but Tarakanova didn’t fall in her test skate nor did she miss any jumps. Her one and only error was a hand down. Usacheva and Khromykh should have been ranked decidedly behind the Davydov and Panova skaters based on the results of test skates and nationals. Again, I don’t consider missing test skates due to injury something that would render all previous consistency and achievements null and void, especially when another skater who happened to skate the free was also injured(and it showed). Vasilieva could still have been assessed prior to Chelyabinsk and clearly she was ready. She should have had the opportunity to have at least one assignment that was advantageous while a skater who underperformed at the test and in their first event should have been expected to take their share of the risk. But she didn’t because she wasn’t their priority, while other skaters with lesser results were.

And this isn’t just about pairing a stronger skater with a weaker skater in terms of the Russian ladies themselves. It is about the competition from other Federations and the likelihood that a Russian skater at these events will almost certainly be pushed into bronze, thus jeopardizing their chances to make the final (ie Alysa and Kamila with their quads and 3As). There were three suspect events this year: Lake Placid, Chelyabinsk, Gdansk, and three coaching groups involved. At Chelyabinsk literally one girl is getting bronze even if all score above 75 in the short and 150 in the free – it is unavoidable. You expect me to believe that when one coaching group manages to have their lower ranked skaters avoid ALL three of these events entirely despite they finished decidedly behind the Panova/Davydov skaters at nationals and test skates and performed poorly in their first assignments, there was no favoritism? There were no assumptions involved that the coach would just make them good when it counted even though other skaters had already shown they could get the job done without question? I’m sorry but I don’t.

You guys like to throw around words like “conspiracy theory” to admonish anyone who would dare paint any Eteri skater in a negative light (like simply suggesting they benefitted from favoritism even when that isn’t even their fault, not implying they asked for it). But this is merely a gaslighting technique. You are trying to convince me that I am crazy for considering evidence that is right in front of my face. 3 competitions split between two coaching teams when two skaters from the avoiding team were consistently performing below the skaters of the other teams at all of the events leading up to the assignments. There is nothing more that needs to be said.

The one point I will give you is that the waters did get muddy with injuries and visa issues that could not have been predicted. Tarusina and Vasilieva who presumably could not compete until Chelyabinsk or after, then Tarusina being out entirely. Kanysheva withdrawing late in the game due to injury, which is what allowed Frolova to get advantageous assignments that should have gone to Vasilieva, Sinitsyna, and Tarakanova. I am still unclear as to why Sinistyna couldn’t have competed at Riga where I believe she would have won and stopped the political train from moving in the favor of Haein for bronze at the final over Sinitsyna and Usacheva(should she go clean there). But maybe this was something from the Panova team and not from the Fed wanting to give Khromykh the chance Sinistyna deserved. We will never know. But you can still see their intent from the initial assignments. Both Panova skaters to Lake Placid (like no one even attempted to ask lower ranked skaters to obtain visas knowing full well the games that would be going on here?). Then both Davydov skaters to Chelyabinsk(super consistent skaters at that). If you are trying to convince me that before the injuries they were originally intending to give Gdansk to Kanysheva, Khromykh, or Usacheva to make it even, well I’m sorry but I just don’t buy it. The way I observed it, it was like they were almost hell bent on keeping certain skaters out of certain events even after those skaters underperformed in their first assignment and everything went crazy with injuries coming out, visa issues. It was always the plan for the Panova/Davydov skaters to take the fall. That’s just the way I feel about it.

And this isn’t even saying anything negative about Khromykh and Usacheva’s actual skating. It is about acknowledging the results of events they participated in and the mistakes they made in those events, and wondering why Vasilieva has a bronze medal with a free skate score above 130 and four clean programs. I think Daria is a beautiful skater with some issues to work through, but if you will remember Vika had these exact same problems a year ago and she was able to overcome them. Now I will advocate for her to receive the deference that she earns with her results. I am cheering for Daria to do the same, and when she does I will make sure no one speaks a word about her. And Maya, I believe her problems were almost entirely related to her injury and that on top of this it could not have been easy for her to be called up to Riga so late when she wasn’t even expecting to receive a second assignment. That she too can overcome all of this and be a really consistent skater. It is not about them at all. So you really shouldn’t feel so threatened by what I think.

 

[Happy Skates]

Excuse me but Tarakanova didn’t fall in her test skate nor did she miss any jumps. Her one and only error was a hand down. Usacheva and Khromykh should have been ranked decidedly behind the Davydov and Panova skaters based on the results of test skates and nationals. Again, I don’t consider missing test skates due to injury something that would render all previous consistency and achievements null and void, especially when another skater who happened to skate the free was also injured(and it showed). Vasilieva could still have been assessed prior to Chelyabinsk and clearly she was ready. She should have had the opportunity to have at least one assignment that was advantageous while a skater who underperformed at the test and in their first event should have been expected to take their share of the risk. But she didn’t because she wasn’t their priority, while other skaters with lesser results were.

And this isn’t just about pairing a stronger skater with a weaker skater in terms of the Russian ladies themselves. It is about the competition from other Federations and the likelihood that a Russian skater at these events will almost certainly be pushed into bronze, thus jeopardizing their chances to make the final (ie Alysa and Kamila with their quads and 3As). There were three suspect events this year: Lake Placid, Chelyabinsk, Gdansk, and three coaching groups involved. At Chelyabinsk literally one girl is getting bronze even if all score above 75 in the short and 150 in the free – it is unavoidable. You expect me to believe that when one coaching group manages to avoid ALL three of these events entirely despite that two of their skaters finished decidedly behind the Panova/Davydov skaters at nationals and test skates and performed poorly in their first assignments, there was no favoritism? There were no assumptions involved that the coach would just make them good when it counted even though other skaters had already shown they could get the job done without question? I’m sorry but I don’t.

You guys like to throw around words like “conspiracy theory” to admonish anyone who would dare paint any Eteri skater in a negative light (like simply suggesting they benefitted from favoritism even when that isn’t even their fault, not implying they asked for it). But this is merely a gaslighting technique. You are trying to convince me that I am crazy for considering evidence that is right in front of my face. 3 competitions split between two coaching teams when two skaters from the avoiding team were consistently performing below the skaters of the other teams at all of the events leading up to the assignments. There is nothing more that needs to be said.

The one point I will give you is that the waters did get muddy with injuries and visa issues that could not have been predicted. Tarusina and Vasilieva who presumably could not compete until Chelyabinsk or after, then Tarusina being out entirely. Kanysheva withdrawing late in the game due to injury, which is what allowed Frolova to get advantageous assignments that should have gone to Vasilieva, Sinitsyna, and Tarakanova. I am still unclear as to why Sinistyna couldn’t have competed at Riga where I believe she would have won and stopped the political train from moving in the favor of Haein for bronze at the final over Sinitsyna and Usacheva(should she go clean there). But maybe this was something from the Panova team and not from the Fed wanting to give Khromykh the chance Sinistyna deserved. We will never know. But you can still see their intent from the initial assignments. Both Panova skaters to Lake Placid (like no one even attempted to ask lower ranked skaters to obtain visas knowing full well the games that would be going on here?). Then both Davydov skaters to Chelyabinsk(super consistent skaters at that). If you are trying to convince me that before the injuries they were originally intending to give Gdansk to Kanysheva, Khromykh, or Usacheva to make it even, well I’m sorry but I just don’t buy it. The way I observed it, it was like they were almost hell bent on keeping certain skaters out of certain events even after those skaters underperformed in their first assignment and everything went crazy with injuries coming out, visa issues. It was always the plan for the Panova/Davydov skaters to take the fall. That’s just the way I feel about it.

Are you trying to say that they gave Maia Riga to try to help her because she's an Eteri skater? I agree that it would've been much better to have Sinitsyna at Riga and Maia at Chelyabinsk. But the federation new full well that Maia was injured and not ready. So why would they have sent her to Riga if they were truly trying to help her? They knew that she had a good chance of messing up, she was still injured. If they really had her best interest in mind they would've sent her to Chelyabinsk, where the judges were very nice to all Russian ladies. Maia actually was initially assigned to Gdansk after she "underperformed" at her first event. Which makes sense, because it looked like they gave ladies who got a bronze medal a harder second assignment. And it was initially going to be like that until Kanysheva withdrew, so they gave Maia Riga, which absolutely was not in her favor. As for why they didn't give it to Sinitsyna, I don't know, but it was definitely not to help Maia. But in hindsight, Chelyabinsk was probably better for Ksenia than Riga. Ksenia did have one fall in the fs, and if she had been assigned Riga, who knows whether she would've beat Haein Lee who was completely clean. Chelyabinsk actually had by far the weakest field other than the three Russian ladies, so Ksenia was still able to get a huge score and a second place, even with a fall. And for Viktoria, yes getting Chelyabinsk was somewhat of a sacrifice. But you can't just ignore the results from Test Skates. If a skater is injured and performing badly, results from the previous year mean nothing. Why look at Nationals results when you can look at results from Test Skates, which more accurately reflect the state the skater is in? Then, her and Tarakanova got Gdansk because they each had a bronze medal, and now had reduced chances for the final.

 

[Edwin]

Alyona Leonova: “I will skate until the fantasy ends”

There are these skaters whose name appear in the list of participants - and you already want to go into the stands. Their performances are always like a small celebration. It is impossible to take your eyes off them on ice, and in the perception of their programs the technical component becomes secondary: you involuntarily stop counting revolutions in jumps and spins and watch how points grow in the upper left window of the screen during the broadcast.

One of these athletes is Alyona Leonova. Her path in figure skating has been going on for a quarter of a century - 25 years. And I want it to last as long as possible.

This season for Alyona began at the 1st stage of the St. Petersburg Cup at the Figure Skating Academy, where she trains. We met her just after she finished her free program ...

Q: Alyona, I congratulate you on the start of the season! How was the premiere of your new programs?
A: Honestly, in training I skated both programs cleanly. I have no idea what happened yesterday and today ... I can only attribute this to an early start (the women's free program started at 10 in the morning) and to the fact this is the first of the season. Maybe it all added up ...

I was never so well prepared for the start of the season. It is very disappointing that I could not show myself. In training, I skate in a completely different way. Even my trainers can confirm. They themselves do not know what to say now: there are simply no words. It is unclear what the reason is, because I prepared myself perfectly for this start.

In fact, I'm really worried before the competitions. It would seem that I, already having such an experience, 25 years, shouldn't be afraid of anything. But the thought that this is a competition sits in my mind anyway. I always perceived them as a holiday, but when you see how many people came to watch you, you don't want to let anyone down and do everything you can.

Q: How exciting is it to introduce new programs to the public?
A: For me, skating in front of an audience is always a joy. It is pleasant to think that people will see something new, and it is joyful that later I will then read some comments about my programs, even if some of them will be negative. So for me this excitement is always very pleasant.

But at the same time, the program looks good when executed cleanly. I hope at the next start I will be able to confidently make all jumps and show a more complete program. In this tournament, I did 50 percent of what I can do in training. I'll work on the rest.

Q: Tell us a little about the new images. You started to have your programs staged early enough ...
A: Yes, we staged my short program in early April. The image came quite by accident, that's how some kind of light in my head lit up. We thought a lot about what kind of music to put to this surprise. I didn’t want something painful, something quick and impudent too, because I am still 28 years old (laughs).

I directly remember this moment ... I was standing on the ice, and suddenly this light in my head lights up. I skated up to Valentin Nikolayevich Molotov and said: “What if we take Riverdance?” I just wanted to. We started listening to music, sending each other different options. We settled on two, connected them, and it turned out quite harmoniously, it does not hurt the ear.

By the way, Jason Brown skated and lit up under the second composition that we chose. I've watched his program, I saw the audience very coolly accepting it, so it's great and will suit me.

Q: Where can you and your new programs be seen in the near future?
A: I think in Sankt Peterburg. My next start, it seems, is the Panin-Kolomenkin memorial. I don’t know anything about tournaments of the “B” series yet. Let's see what happens, because I'm not very far down in the list of substitutes for the Grand Prix, anything can happen. How last year turned out: someone withdrew, and I had a chance to go. In no case do I hope for someone else’s injuries, I just sit and wait, prepare calmly and perform where possible.

Q: During the time athletes spend in sports, their attitude towards it often changes. Many skaters admitted that they loved their sport many years after they began to perform at a high level and earned some medals and titles. Prior to this, for many of them figure skating rather was a suffering or they engaged in it by inertia. How have you changed your attitude to sports over the course of these 25 years? Or did you immediately realised this is love for life?
A: I am often asked if there was a desire to quit. There was! But I was at such an irresponsible age ... At that time, I had not even skated with Alla Yakovlevna Pyatova. It was like the typical state of a teenager: I do not want anything, nothing really turns out. But on New Year's Eve, Santa Claus gave me a bag for my skates. It seems like I immediately wanted to skate. And so I continued.

Q: Remember the moment when you realised that you like figure skating?
A: I fell in love with figure skating when I started going to major tournaments and winning something. This spurred me on to work even more. But there is still such a moment when love to perform appeared. It happened about three years ago.

Q: And before that, what prevented you from falling in love with performing?
A: Somehow this thrill didn't appear. I was very constrained, there were a lot of thoughts about rankings, about scores, about who and what they would think of me. Recently, for about three years, I started skating just for the audience, just showing my programs. And now I really like to perform. Now I want to return this feeling in order to approach the next start with a good mood and drive.

Q: There is such a thing as professional burnout. Reveal the secret, how to prevent this from happening?
A: This is the love of the audience. I often read what people write in comments on social networks. There are a lot of kind words. Someone even said that he cried with me after my skate. And when someone writes, no one skates like me, well, how can I leave? (smiles). I guess I haven’t said everything yet in figure skating.

Q: In one of your long-standing interviews, you mentioned that you skate well on anger. Does this trick still work for you?
A: There is sports anger, it always helps. But when you are angry with the whole world, it knocks you down. Very rarely now I have to resort to such techniques. In that season, for example, everything went very smoothly, gradually, step by step, and it worked out well. Today, maybe I really didn’t have enough sports anger. I woke up only in the last minute of the program.

Q: On your way to 25 years in figure skating there were probably some significant, turning points that changed the course of events. Can you remember what it was?
A: The momentous moment was getting into the group of Nikolay Morozov. I then changed absolutely everything: I began to live in Novogorsk, which I hated until then. Even at junior level, when they told me that we were going to skate in Novogorsk, I had fears, it was perceived like a prison. And I lived there for almost 5 years, without even leaving from there to Moscow. And I really loved it!

I like it when everything in life is comfortable and convenient, and there everything you need is just nearby. On a day off, you can go to Mega for a walk: movies, shopping, and everything you want. And in Novogorsk itself there is a dry hall, ice, and rehabilitation facilities. From training I went to my room, extended my legs and relaxed. You can reach the ice within a minute walking through the hotel, you don’t even need to go outside. Everything has been done so that the athlete feels comfortable and is can train well.

With these conditions, Nikolay Alexandrovich and I came to the best result in my career - Silver in the World Championships.

That period was probably a turning point for me. In general, I have a motto in life - all that's done, all for the better, so I was not afraid of change.

By the way, after the transition to Morozov, relations with Alla Yakovlevna improved. I began to communicate with her much warmer. Before that, I always perceived her with hostility. When I trained, we were always like cat and dog. I didn't obey, I wasn't silent, I would always tell my opinion. Then I matured, became calmer. I am very grateful to Alla Yakovlevna that she then remained my second coach, did not turn away from me, as many do. I haven't had a bad relationship with any coach after the transition. It is important for me to stay in good relations with people who have done so much good for me.

Me and Nikolay Alexandrovich also calmly discussed everything. He said that he could no longer remain in Moscow and was leaving for America. I told him I would go back to St. Petersburg, because I could not leave for America.

Q: A lot happened over your career: a change of coach, a move to another city, and even starting in competitions without a coach. What was the hardest?
A: Probably the most difficult period in my career was after silver at the World Championships. You know, as if they set a match on fire and immediately blew it out. There was complete devastation. For a long time I could not come to my senses, I performed terribly. The whole next season was a failure.

Then there was the Olympic season. Then I already pulled myself together. The probability that I will get to Sochi to the Olympics was 1%, but I still wanted to continue skate. Nikolay Aleksandrovich and I staged interesting programs, got to the European Championship. He supported me in every way so I would not return to that depressed state. I'm just really glad that I got out of this, it was important.

Q: During your career, you managed to work with at least three coaches: Alla Pyatova, Nikolay Morozov and Yevgeniy Rukavitsyn. Maybe I forgot someone. What did each of them give you?
A: There was also my very first coach, Marina Vladimirovna Vakhrameyeva. She put me on my skates, and this is the most important thing!

Now we have girls jumping triple Axels at 10 years of age, and I honestly say, at 8 I could not even do a single (laughs). There was never any talk of doubles. At 10, something like this began to appear. Just at 10-11 years, I got to Alla Yakovlevna.

She led me through my whole junior period and helped to reach the senior level. All the jumps that I have now were taught by her. It is clear that there were some roughnesses in the technique that were later adjusted, but she laid the foundation.

Nikolay Alexandrovich is simply a wonderful director. I am grateful to him for the support he provided me all this time. And one more moment ... He kept saying this one skater was asking for him, but he didn’t want to take anyone, because he has me and he doesn’t want to push me with anyone. I was the only girl in the group, so all attention was directed to me. It was very nice. Although, when Miki Ando arrived, we trained with her on the same ice, and it was cool to skate together with a champion.

Yevgeniy Vladimirovich sheltered me. I returned to Sankt Peterburg and did not know where to go. The only option in my head was to go to Rukavitsyn. He took me almost immediately, without thinking twice. I also had very good results with him, and the wonderful programs were staged for me by Olga Glinka and Valentin Molotov. But the greatest merit of Yevgeniy Vladimirovich is that he believed in me. So far. It is very important that they believe in you, love you and appreciate you as an athlete.

Q: This is especially valuable when you have such a long way to go.
A: Yes, especially knowing how much I have already gone through and what my character is. Now he is much better than when I first came to the Yevgeniy Vladimirovich's group. At first they kept me in black gloves (smiles).

Q: What distinguishes the training process in the group of Rukavitsyn?
A: He taught me to work for real. For me, skating in training was something from the realm of fantasy. Now, when they say “skate!” I calmly get up and do it. Six minutes of skating is good. Sliding is good. Everything is in order. Yevgeniy Vladimirovich taught us not to be afraid of this and to skate, and skate, skate doing a large number of repetitions ...

Q: From the side it seems that the choreographer, Olga Germanovna Glinka plays a special role in your group ...
A: Olga Germanovna is the sun of our group, its heart. Everyone loves her very much. She enters the ice and immediately illuminates everything around with her rays. She is insanely kind, insanely talented. Always supportive. You can contact her at any moment, and she will help as much she can. I don’t know what we would all do without her.

Olga Germanovna has brilliant performances. She will find an approach to everyone and choose exactly what she needs. She never repeats herself, doesn’t stage similar programs, doesn’t really like to take someone’s music. Sometimes it happens, I say that I liked the melody that someone played recently, and she replies: “Well, why? They’ve already skated under it, let's find something else.” She always has some options. With me, from the very beginning, it went wrong with Chaplin, so we never went through with that image. Always hit one hundred percent.

Q: How did Olga Germanovna influence you?
A: She always knows how to find the right words. I can say that sometimes she can be tough, when needed. In the future, when, perhaps, I will work as a trainer, I will also use this approach. Sometimes you need to specifically say something like that in order to spur on. Olga Germanovna does this very well.

Q: We have so smoothly moved on to the topic of choreography. You have always had very different programs: from Vivaldi's Seasons to Pirates of the Caribbean. Nevertheless, which direction is closer to you: lyrical or funny?
A: Something funny and comical - one hundred percent.

Sometimes I rush into adventures, stage something tragic. Last year, we took a great risk with the short program, but in the end everyone was so delighted with it (under the nocturne “Separation” by composer MI Glinka). My husband (Anton Shulepov) always has goose bumps from this program. He even refuses to watch it.

But something fun is still closer to me. I like to smile before starting. I can’t go out with a smile on a tragic program. There you need to suffer a little, instead of to smile. And I want to light up from the very beginning.

Q: Do you have a favourite program amongst all?
A: I think my opinion will coincide with the opinion of many that the most memorable are the Pirates of the Caribbean and Chaplin. These two images are the most beloved.

Q: Do you have a favourite dress? Sometimes it happens that skaters find their own style, and from time to time have sewn costumes to it. Your dresses are always so different from each other and always exactly fit the image.
A: It's probably the costume for the image of Harley Queen from Suicide Squad. We did everything exactly like in the film: inscriptions, even makeup and hairstyle. We took great risks, because both the judges and the audience haven't seen the film could perhaps not understand the idea.

In general, I like to skate in pants better. Last year, the Zorro jumpsuit was beautiful. I really like the new red dress for my free program. We did it in three days, also without Olga Germanovna. She left with Makar (Ignatov) for a competition, saw the dress only in disassembled form and couldn't even imagine what happened in the end.

I originally wanted a black dress, but Olga Germanovna and Valentin Nikolayevich said that it was gloomy. We decided we needed it to be red. At first, the girls from the studio of Mariya Evstigneyeva did not want to sew it, because for them this is the fifth red dress this season (laughs). But the client’s word is the law! What to do if this is so necessary for the image? As a result, the dress turned out to be very simple, elegant, but with a twist.

Q: Skaters are often asked about what else they would like to skate to, what image to embody. I’ll ask the opposite question: what music is taboo for you, you know that you'll never take it?
A: "Swan Lake". Which swan am I? I do not like boring, hackneyed programs. I want to surprise, not to repeat. For example, both I and Adelina Sotnikova had “Carmen” in the Olympic year. Adeline with this program won gold in Sochi, it's a story! Last year, Alina Zagitova won using Carmen. Why take music that has already sounded so loud on ice is a little incomprehensible to me.

Many more like to choose slow, boring compositions for exhibition performances. But this is indicative! There you can do anything you like, even skate like a sausage and climb into the stands. There are very few who really stand out in gala's and come up with something unusual.

Q: When viewing your programs, you never get the feeling that you are focused only on the elements and skate from jump to jump. It is always a mini-performance. How to achieve such a pitch?
A: In fact, your words are a discovery for me. I always have the feeling that I am letting loose only near the end of the program, when everything has already been jumped. I probably distract myself in this way. It's better to work towards pleasing the audience than thinking about the jump itself at the time of jumping.

Q: With the advent of quadruple jumps in women's figure skating, there is a risk of a sway in the direction of tech. Do you think it is possible to find a balance between high technical components and expressiveness? And how to achieve this?
A: So far, I saw this combination only with Anna Shcherbakova. Of course, Aleksandra Trusova is great and all, her jumps are wonderful, but so far she is skating from jump to jump, especially in the first half. Quad jumps require a high concentration, they are very energy consuming. Three of those ... I can imagine how much power they take. Sasha, I think, still has so much ahead of her. She still needs to gain confidence in order to show more artistic programs.

I am glad that since last season only three jumps in the second half of the free program have an increased reward. I think this is for the best: the program should look like a program, not sliding at the beginning and athletics at the end.

Balance can always be found. Liza Tuktamysheva, although she has no quads, now has two triksels in her free program. In this case, the program looks very good. It is clear that she becomes more relaxed and begins to light up towards the end, when the most complex have all been jumped. But there is no sensation that Lisa is fixated on jumping: she learned to abstract and let go of herself. I hope that she will continue to be fine.

Q: How would you like to see female figure skating in 5 years?
A: First of all, I want to avoid injuries. So that in five years we will see the girls who are now just entering senior level, with their quadruple jumps and preferably on a pedestal.

Q: Alyona, you often had experiments with images not only on ice, but also in life. You often changed something in your appearance. So, are you open to everything new and to changes?
A: Yes, I am always for everything new. I think this opens a second wind.

Q: Girls sometimes tell, for them a new hairstyle is like the beginning of a new life. Have you ever had such thoughts?
A: Probably not. When I change my hair, I start to like myself more, my mood rises, and I skate better.

Q: We are used to the fact that you are a firecracker on ice. And in life?
A: In life, I am very cheerful, sociable, open and kind.

(Alyona expressively looks at her husband, Anton Shulepov, and asks for help with an answer, since from the outside - he knows better).

Anton: Same as on ice (smiles). In fact, Alyona is different, like all people. She just has all her emotions manifested much brighter.

It's true. When I cry, it is as if someone died, when I have fun, then with all my heart. I am a very emotional person. Everything in our family is like that. Only my sister is calmer and more creative, when my brother and I grief, we grief, if we'r in joy, then to the fullest.

Q: The photographs you share on social networks give the impression that you and your husband love adventures and an active lifestyle. How do you like to spend your free minutes?
A:There is very little free time, on weekends I often do not want to do anything. It happens that little children from our group ask me for trolleys. And if you took them, then you can say there is no day off already.

When some interesting event occurs, we are sure to get out. I am really looking forward to the Joker movie. As soon as it is released, let's go to the cinema right away. I also love shopping, but there isn't always time. My husband gets tired with me when I want to walk, he doesn’t like it, but walking alone is boring for me. Of course, we find some kind of entertainment, not only sports, sports, and again sports.

Q: Do you like extreme entertainment?
A: In general, I don’t really like extreme sports. It’s scary, especially now.

Anton and I once went to Greece on holiday. It was our first vacation together. Two days before departure, I fell off my bike, broke my finger, cut my chin. The whole looked like a scene from a movie.

I started that season very cool: I came to the training camp in a cast. In the end, everything worked out well, but scars and impressions remain for life. Therefore, I am not riding a bike again.

Q: This spring there was this big and bright event in your life: your wedding. How do you feel as a wife?
A: My feelings are the same as before. Nothing has changed dramatically: we'd lived together for several years already. My husband said he began to love me even more, it's nice. And for him I always want to do something good.

Q: By the way, there was a video from your wedding in which you said that you were learning a triple Axel. It's true?
A: I tried, I can’t say that I learned it very hard. Even when I skated with Nikolai Morozov, I did it once in my life for a trip. For me it was a shock.

And then ... Just because in the offseason there is nothing special to do. Usually it turns out that when all the competitions have ended, you start to skate even better than during the season, and do those things that you never did. Therefore, we decided to jump, spin, spin, experiment, to see what I can do. It is clear that it takes a year, maybe even more, to really learn this jump. But at the same time, one must not forget other elements, skate programs, run them through, so there is no time for triksels!

Q: Are you planning to increase your difficulty somehow?
A: I think not. For now, I need to run through with what I have. Since there is an opportunity to receive+5 for an element, you must use it. With my components this should be enough.

Q: Do you have any dreams about what else you'd like to do in figure skating?
A: I live today. I really want to show my programs of this season not only in Sankt Peterburg, but also in the world. To do this, you need to go somewhere. I hope this chance comes up.

Q: What do you think, how much more will you please us on ice?
A: Until the fantasy ends. I skate for the audience, for family and friends and do it with my soul. It doesn't matter where exactly. Despite the fact that I haven't been in the top for a long time, people love me and are waiting for me, and this is nice.

Author: Yuliya Gladkikh
-----
https://www.sports.ru/tribuna/blogs/figure_skating_chatting/2588721.html

 

[Edwin]

Here is a YouTube clip with Alyona Leonova talking: https://youtu.be/HQSjzzex_o0
and one with Liza Nugumanova: https://youtu.be/S1ggu1PAz10

 

[*~RussianBleux~*]

You keep throwing in the Sinitsyna situation despite i had already said that i don't believe any conspiracy theory around the visa issues.

Even if she was allowed to compete, chances to win gold would have been scarse, in a competition that almost looked like it was set for Alysa Liu to win.

As for the rest my point stands, i think they absolutely have these conversations about which skater to send to gurantee more skaters at JGPF and often Eteri skaters gets that privilege because most of the time they are the best.



I'd argue Valieva, and Khromykh 2a is even longer than Kostornaya's 2a (which to be honest sometimes it looks a little regressed)

Tsurskaya's jumps had rotation issues due to the huge delay, which was really cool as long as the jump was fully rotated, with a quad you don't have the time for the delay, so unless some major change i've never believed Polina could do quads, but maybe they tried at some point with the quad lutz.

It's just a bit curious from a team that is ALL about the fast rotation: you look at Shcherbakova or Trusova 3ltz (which isn't the best lutz in the world) and you'd think it's more difficult to turn that into a quad than Valieva-Khromykh 2a which has everything to be a triple, and we know at least Valieva can rotate fast, looking at her quad toe.

The only reasonable explanation i can give is that they want to make sure all the other triples are consistent before working on those elements, in fact between the three only Valieva has the quad in her program, plus Khromykh joined later this season due to injury.

But like i said, it might well be the case for next season.

So one point of clarification here. You mentioned this type of thing happening last year and in previous years. But for me it isn’t comparable because in those years this priority was based on the merit of those skaters over others. At least from 2017 when I stared following closely. I completely agree that pairing a stronger skater with a weaker skater is the best way. Last year for example Trusova and Kostornaia speak for themselves going into that season. Shcherbakova didn’t have the results from her junior and novice nationals but had shown at least two different quads over the summer and I believe her test skate was successful. The three of them very clearly and definitively on top. Since Eteri had all 3 of the stronger skaters it made complete sense not to make them eat each other and jeopardize their chances for the final. The same way it makes complete sense not to make Valieva go up against Alysa before the final and jeopardize her chances to make it if she happens to be volatile at the beginning of the season when she could win in December.

The problem is when priority is given that isn’t earned. If Daria had beaten any of the Panova/Davydov skaters at nationals, which I believe she would have if she would have skated well, and then she and Maya both blew everyone else out of the water at the test skates with clean programs full of difficult transitions and backloaded combos, Or in the alternative if one or both of them was showing a quad or 3A, then I wouldn’t be complaining just because all Eteri skaters are being kept away from Alysa because in that case it would make sense. Same way I wasn’t complaining about Valieva and Kanysheva not receiving any of the questionable assignments; ;they’re her top 2 and both are in the top half of the 9 (I would have had Sinitsyna 2nd and a toss up between Tarakanova and Kanysheva for 3 and 4 after test also considering nationals; also why having both Sinitsyna and Tarakanova at Lake Placid made no sense to me).

I am not anti Eteri by any means. That’s not what this is about. I just thought it was pretty clear following the test skates that Daria and Maya were consistently performing below the Panova/Davydov skaters. And 99% of the time these are the skaters given the more volatile assignments for the precise reason of protecting the higher performing skaters so that they will be able to participate in the final at peak. This is the way every Federation does it. It is the reason you will never see for example Nathan Chen and Vincent Zhou at Skate America along with Jason Brown as the host pick(just an example, I know it couldn’t have happened this year because Vincent was 3rd at Worlds but even if he had come in 4th it wouldn’t have happened, and Brown isn’t the host pick). There is no reason to make all your top people eat each other when your 2 or 3 could win somewhere else. Except RusFed on the JGP this year, somehow.

At the end of the day, I hope the results of this weekend will be as predicted. Sinitsyna 1st, Frolova or Matsuike 2nd. Vika beating Frolova/Matsuike/Park in the tiebreaker for the final spot, and all will be right in the world.

 

[Edwin]

I think we are forgetting the fact FFKKR official in charge over finalising the assignments have more inside information than any of us about the actual competitive state and readiness of the skaters under consideration.

Vasil'yeva had and has problems with maintaining competitive shape and weight, Davydov made no secret of this (perhaps for his own reasons to spur Viktoriya on?). Viktoriya herself fought for what she is worth in her two assignments, and gave it her very best effort, which is really commendable on her part. But the 'problem' apparently remains, and her 100% readiness for the final in December cannot be guaranteed (as if that can be said for the other still pre-pubescent girls?)

Tarakanova IMO wasn't quite ready yet after having started anew in #TeamPanova only this spring. Her programs to me clearly seemed to me a work in progress, and Anastasiya's innate qualities of skater and fighter saved her.

Sinitsyna is the most complete package at the moment, ready to do battle and slay with fully developed programs using exquisite images and staging.

Frolova is pleased she is in contention and sort of free form 'favourite pressure', so essentially a dark horse with a very small chance of making the finals. She competed free from this pressure and this showed, but her 'quality' is just below the afore mentioned.

So if some of you didn't want Maya Khromykh in contention, perhaps your wish would have been granted if both Kanysheva and Tarusina would have been healthy and ready. Tsibinova who at the moment does rather well for #TeamDavydov on the national level, isn't up to par with any of the contestants on FFKKR's original entry list. I really don't know which other junior to consider, a junior able to challenge for the JPGF, which all of the FFKKR entries are capable of if distributed over the stages to their best effect.

IMO, FFKKR underestimated the top KOR girls, who have been excellent in both stability and quality this season. And KOR fed also plays the game of optimal distribution and still have a valuable card in play in the person of Park.

 

[*~RussianBleux~*]

Are you trying to say that they gave Maia Riga to try to help her because she's an Eteri skater? I agree that it would've been much better to have Sinitsyna at Riga and Maia at Chelyabinsk. But the federation new full well that Maia was injured and not ready. So why would they have sent her to Riga if they were truly trying to help her? They knew that she had a good chance of messing up, she was still injured. If they really had her best interest in mind they would've sent her to Chelyabinsk, where the judges were very nice to all Russian ladies. Maia actually was initially assigned to Gdansk after she "underperformed" at her first event. Which makes sense, because it looked like they gave ladies who got a bronze medal a harder second assignment. And it was initially going to be like that until Kanysheva withdrew, so they gave Maia Riga, which absolutely was not in her favor. As for why they didn't give it to Sinitsyna, I don't know, but it was definitely not to help Maia. But in hindsight, Chelyabinsk was probably better for Ksenia than Riga. Ksenia did have one fall in the fs, and if she had been assigned Riga, who knows whether she would've beat Haein Lee who was completely clean. Chelyabinsk actually had by far the weakest field other than the three Russian ladies, so Ksenia was still able to get a huge score and a second place, even with a fall. And for Viktoria, yes getting Chelyabinsk was somewhat of a sacrifice. But you can't just ignore the results from Test Skates. If a skater is injured and performing badly, results from the previous year mean nothing. Why look at Nationals results when you can look at results from Test Skates, which more accurately reflect the state the skater is in? Then, her and Tarakanova got Gdansk because they each had a bronze medal, and now had reduced chances for the final.

A “harder second assignment” by my definition, this year is an assignment where no matter how the Russian ladies skate someone is essentially ensured a bronze medal. Riga and Courchevel were easier assignments by virtue of the fact that the Russian ladies only had to skate well or well enough and they were going to win and come in second. Remember this is before Haein had any political advantage pushing her scores well past 130. They were all ready to hand it to Khromykh and Usacheva when clean, you can see this from the short program results. And I think RusFed knows this, reasonably clean and their girls are getting the advantage over the Japanese and Korean ladies. Thus even injured, prior to knowing what condition Haein would be in I would definitely say Riga was a more advantageous position for her than Chelyabinsk where again, no matter how generous the judges are they have to give someone a bronze medal.

And yes let’s look at test skates where Khromykh and Usacheva both fell, it was public knowledge that khromykh was injured yet someone this matters for Davydov’s skaters but not her. Even if you say Tarusina missed the whole thing entirely that’s just Tarusina, still doesn’t excuse what happened with everyone else.

People can make the argument that Usacheva/Kanysheva/khromykh were initially assigned to Gdansk or whatever weeks prior but with the way they are constantly moving the assignments around I simply don’t believe they were ever intending to leave them there like they were the other skaters before injuries and visas. It’s just not supported by anything else I’m seeing.

Khromykh in France (one of the easiest chances at silver) and Usacheva in Riga while Sinitsyna and Tarakanova had to eat each other at USA and the Davydov girls in Russia was he first red flag for me. The US visa thing was just one excuse, and it never should have been handled this way to begin with. I’m not sure how much leverage the coaches have in all of this but if I were Panova I would have been livid.

 

[*~RussianBleux~*]

I think we are forgetting the fact FFKKR official in charge over finalising the assignments have more inside information than any of us about the actual competitive state and readiness of the skaters under consideration.

Vasil'yeva had and has problems with maintaining competitive shape and weight, Davydov made no secret of this (perhaps for his own reasons to spur Viktoriya on?). Viktoriya herself fought for what she is worth in her two assignments, and gave it her very best effort, which is really commendable on her part. But the 'problem' apparently remains, and her 100% readiness for the final in December cannot be guaranteed (as if that can be said for the other still pre-pubescent girls?)

Tarakanova IMO wasn't quite ready yet after having started anew in #TeamPanova only this spring. Her programs to me clearly seemed to me a work in progress, and Anastasiya's innate qualities of skater and fighter saved her.

Sinitsyna is the most complete package at the moment, ready to do battle and slay with fully developed programs using exquisite images and staging.

Frolova is pleased she is in contention and sort of free form 'favourite pressure', so essentially a dark horse with a very small chance of making the finals. She competed free from this pressure and this showed, but her 'quality' is just below the afore mentioned.

So if some of you didn't want Maya Khromykh in contention, perhaps your wish would have been granted if both Kanysheva and Tarusina would have been healthy and ready. Tsibinova who at the moment does rather well for #TeamDavydov on the national level, isn't up to par with any of the contestants on FFKKR's original entry list. I really don't know which other junior to consider, a junior able to challenge for the JPGF, which all of the FFKKR entries are capable of if distributed over the stages to their best effect.

IMO, FFKKR underestimated the top KOR girls, who have been excellent in both stability and quality this season. And KOR fed also plays the game of optimal distribution and still have a valuable card in play in the person of Park.

I’m aware we don’t know everything that goes on behind the scenes and I know you and I have discussed this before. But I do think some of this is a bit of a reach. If Vasilieva was so out of shape etc then how is she clean at like every competition, how did she beat so many senior names at the Cup Final, how did she score an average of 130 points in her free skates on the JGP. Surely is she performing in practice the way she is performing at her events and the Fed could see this if they did an assessment.

And the ISU doesn’t care about bad programs lol. I could name so many skaters with garbage programs and the ISU just throws them all the points when they do the jumps. Like I’m pretty sure if test skates were scored Tarakanova beats Khromykh because she landed the jumps and didn’t miss jumps and this is what they should be considering. It’s not about RusFed favorite skater or program it’s a sport managed by the ISU so which skater the ISU is going to give all the points to matters.

I want all skaters in contention including Maya, I just figured the assignments would be distributed a little more fairly and equitably considering the test skates. There were 3 risk assignments and 3 coaching groups. It isn’t hard to see what could have been a little more fair.

I agree they completely underestimated the Korean ladies which is why I think they felt safe in overestimating Khromykh and Usacheva following the test, leading to the current situation where Vasilieva could and should have been comfortably in that final over Park.

Everything will be ok - I’m going to take a breather and believe it will happen. The universe will work itself out. Though I don’t love some of how we got here I would like to see Daria skate again in the final and how big the score could be when clean. It is times like this I wish we could have more than 6 skaters in the final because I am a fan of a lot of skaters.

 

[karina17]

Excuse me but Tarakanova didn’t fall in her test skate nor did she miss any jumps. Her one and only error was a hand down.

Okay, marking a hand down as a fall for simplicity was my mistake, but yes, Nastya was missing a jump. When she put her hand down (I wrote it as a fall, that was my bad), she missed the toeloop after it. She only had two combos in that free skate. In a competition her second 3F would've been marked as +REP and the BV would've gone down. That was what I meant by her missing a jump. It was ambiguous between her and Daria, but in the end I put Daria ahead because I thought one fall would be less detrimental to the score as compared to a hand down, missing jump and +REP BV reduction. But you could have them the other way round. It doesn't change that much.

Also, I didn't reply to you or anything in my post. I honestly barely even look at people's usernames because I'm on a mobile browser and the usernames are kind of out of the way. If I was replying to something you said I would've replied directly to you, but since I was adding on to the general topic of what was already being discussed by multiple people, I just made my own post with no mention of whatever you said. So I'm not sure where "You really shouldn't feel so threatened about what I think" comes from. I didn't even remember you saying anything about Daria or Maya.

 

[Edwin]

I think FFKKR reckons with 'scoring potential' more than with actual achieved scores. Chelyabinsk stage was judged 'friendly' towards the Russian competitors, much to the favour of Vasil'yeva.
A clean Usachyova outscores Vasil'yeva (and Lee), but a clean Usachyova is perhaps a smaller possibility than a clean Vasil'yeva at this moment in their development?

Perhaps FFKKR wants to 'harden' Usachyova since she is just in her 2nd international assignment? I think FFKKR is looking towards the future as a whole, where 'bigger' girls have less a chance with the advent of ultra-si elements and the personal sacrifices that the 'bigger' girls need to make to remain in shape for quads and triksels? Looking into the future is impossible of course, and no doubt FFKKR will evaluate its distribution of skaters, but the race is almost run. Wether any strings were pulled, sticks were stuck in some wheels or documents were 'forgotten' will forever remain a secret for us fans. We can only wonder, argue and anger ourselves ;-)

 

[Jontor]

Whole post

Great interview with Leonova! You can tell she is truly an artist at heart. It is always wonderful to see her.

She was 26th on the SB list last year with a personal best score of 194. Unfortunately she was only the 12th Russian senior lady, so after 11 years with GP assignments she doesn't have one this year...yet. You never know, there might be WD's. I hope that she will at least get a B event this year, and I also hope she can Q to RusNats.

I wish her the best of luck:luv17:

 

[SkateSkates]

I really hope Ksenia has 2 strong skates (hopefully clean) next week and clinched a trip to the final. If all are clean she should win against this field by quite a margin.

Also hoping that Anna can have stronger skates next weekend. She seemed very nervous in the LP, but it was her first international event so this should give her experience for how to deal with the pressure next weekend.

There has been quite a bit of discourse about the ladies assignments this season and I do not think there were any conspiracies or the RusFed was favoring one camp over another. If we look at the original assignments this so called favoritism did not exist. It was only when skaters started to shift around due to visa problems (Ksenia) and injures (Alena and Anna T) that the assignments ended up how they did.

I would also like to point out that Daria has the highest average SP score so far of the whole JGP series. Ksenia can reverse this statistic next week, but just thought it was an interesting tidbit. Daria had all the potential to win both her events - it looks like she was lacking a bit in self confidence. She doesn’t look like she believes in herself as a leader. She spent all last season in Kamila’s shadow but it’s time for Daria to realize how good she truly can be. Fingers crossed she will be able to put it all together at the final.

 

[Good Vibes Only]

I really hope Ksenia has 2 strong skates (hopefully clean) next week and clinched a trip to the final. If all are clean she should win against this field by quite a margin.

Also hoping that Anna can have stronger skates next weekend. She seemed very nervous in the LP, but it was her first international event so this should give her experience for how to deal with the pressure next weekend.

There has been quite a bit of discourse about the ladies assignments this season and I do not think there were any conspiracies or the RusFed was favoring one camp over another. If we look at the original assignments this so called favoritism did not exist. It was only when skaters started to shift around due to visa problems (Ksenia) and injures (Alena and Anna T) that the assignments ended up how they did.

I would also like to point out that Daria has the highest average SP score so far of the whole JGP series. Ksenia can reverse this statistic next week, but just thought it was an interesting tidbit. Daria had all the potential to win both her events - it looks like she was lacking a bit in self confidence. She doesn’t look like she believes in herself as a leader. She spent all last season in Kamila’s shadow but it’s time for Daria to realize how good she truly can be. Fingers crossed she will be able to put it all together at the final.

You said everything that my mind was thinking :thumbsup: