The Zayak and Quad Limitation Rule

Elaine Zayak, the 1982 World champion and 1981 U.S. national champion, was the first woman to consistently land many triple jumps in her programs. At the 1982 World Championships, she landed six triple jumps to win the title, although four of them were triple toe loops. While she also had triple Salchows and loops in her repertoire, they were less consistent.

Zayak's skating contributed to the creation of what became informally known as the Zayak Rule, enacted at the 1982 ISU Congress, which states that a skater may not perform the same kind of double or triple jump more than twice. For a jump to be given full credit on both occasions, one of the two jumps must be incorporated into a combination or sequence.


Note of interest: Zayak lost three toes on her left foot (her takeoff foot) in a lawn mower accident at the age of 2. On the advice of her doctors, she began figure skating as physical therapy. Her left boot was stabilized with a wood mold to compensate for the irregularity in the shape of her left foot.

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For the 2018-19 season, the following was implemented regarding quadruple jumps in the Free Skate (see page 18 of the Technical Panel Handbook):

Jumping elements are solo jumps, jump combinations and jump sequences.

A well balanced Free Skating program must contain: 7 jumping elements for Senior& Junior, Men & Ladies one of which must be (or must include) an Axel type jump.

Solo jumps can contain any number of revolutions.Any double jump (including double Axel) cannot be included more than twice in total in a Single’s Free Program (as a Solo Jump or a part of Combination / Sequence).

Of all triple and quadruple jumps only two (2) can be executed twice. Of the two repetitions only one (1) can be a quadruple jump.If at least one of these executions is in a jump combination or a jump sequence, both executions are evaluated in a regular way.

If both executions are as solo jumps, the second of these solo jumps will be marked with the sign “+REP” and will receive 70% of its original Base Value.

Triple and quadruple jumps with the same name will be considered as two different jumps.No triple or quadruple jump can be attempted more than twice.

Understanding the Zayak rule

Hello.
From what I've read, it is allowed to repeat a jump if it's done in combination. So why does Yuzu (or Javi) use the 3T in only one of his combinations? Why does he execute "only" a 3A+2T combination after doing a 4T+3T combo? He's been landing a 3A+3T combo in the past very consistently, but once he added the 4T+3T combo last season, he stopped doing the 3A+3T. Is it allowed to do 4T+3T and 3A+3T in one program? Or 4S+3T and 3A+3T for Javi?

I'd also like to know whether it's obligatory to do/try an Axel in each program.

Thanks.

A skater can repeat only two different jumps. Hanyu does 4T, 4T+3T, 3A+2T and 3A+1Lo+3S. He has repeated the 4T and the 3A. If he changed the 2T in the Axel combination to 3T, he would violate the Zayak rules by repeating a third jump.

Yes, an Axel jump is required in each program.

Also note that a double or triple axel is required in the short program. A single axel gets no value.

Also, if a skater doesn't complete an axel jump, then their last jumping pass is invalidated (happened to Murakami ).

Just for completeness, let's not forget the difference between the Zayak rule (the same double/triple/quad can only be performed twice, one of them in combination except the doubles) and the other rule that says no more than two different triples/quads may be repeated. They sound similar but are actually independent from each other. Maybe we need a special nickname for the latter, too.

I see!
Thank you very much!

EdgeCall said:

Just for completeness, let's not forget the difference between the Zayak rule (the same double/triple/quad can only be performed twice, one of them in combination except the doubles) and the other rule that says no more than two different triples/quads may be repeated. They sound similar but are actually independent from each other. Maybe we need a special nickname for the latter, too.

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Maybe the Kulik Rule? He's the only one offhand that I can remember who did two 3a, 3t, and 3f in the same program.

LiamForeman said:

Maybe the Kulik Rule? He's the only one offhand that I can remember who did two 3a, 3t, and 3f in the same program.

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I remember this, and it also looked planned because he did it in a few different events.

LiamForeman said:

Maybe the Kulik Rule? He's the only one offhand that I can remember who did two 3a, 3t, and 3f in the same program.

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When Kiira Korpi did two 3t, 3s and 3l's in her Europeans 2012 LP, it was planned. It didn't come up earlier in the season because that was the first time she completed them all in one skate. She didn't do flips or lutzes that season because of injury.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hdm4ZLQUaxA

Eight triples of only four different kinds: two 3Lz, two 3T, two 3F, two 3S

Looks like he may have been planning 3Lo as well but it didn't happen.

He did get all the repeats in combination or sequence one of the times, but I can only assume he and his coach didn't understand the "only two different triples may be repeated" part of the rule. This doesn't look especially ad libbed.

Quad Repetition Limit Passed by ISU

Honestly, the only thing that's "funny" about this is how so many people complained the rule would only favor Nathan, but now it ended up basically only disadvantiging him among the top men.

This rule probably won't change much in regards to the men's general layouts, it's way better then the original proposal, but I still wished they would have stayed with the original rule. Let skaters repeat whatever they prefer, the "Free Skate" is restricted enough.

GAH NO.

This is my least favorite proposal and it is SUCH BS. WHYYYYY are we treating quads differently from triples and unfairly limiting them?

This will severely disadvantage skaters who only have one or two quads; they will be focused on learning different quads instead of stabilizing the quads they do have, and the splatfests will not decrease at all (in addition to unfairly limiting the TES of skaters who only learn one or two quads).

Nathan can do pretty much all the quads anyway so I don't think this will hurt him as much as people think.

(At least this is better than the original proposal where no quads could be repeated. But still.)

This maximum one quad repetition rule sounds very temporary to me.

What about Trusova? This could benefit her in comparison to Shcherbakova: they've both practiced 4Lz (although Shcherbakova's was much better) and I'm not sure if Anna is re-training her 4T yet (if at all) If not, Anna would have to pick between 2 quads (one in combination) and 1 repeated triple or repeating both 3F and 3Lz, whereas Trusova would theoretically have 4S, 4T, and 4Lz and could probably work on getting the 3A.

Truosva's best layout under new rules:
4Lz
4T
4S
3A
---
3Lz-3Lo
3Lz-1Lo-3F
3F-3T

Shcherbakova's best layout under new rules:
4Lz-2T
4Lz (can replace combo here if necessary)
4T
2A-1Lo-3S
----
3Lz-3Lo
3Lz (can replace combo here if necessary)
3F (can replace combo here if necessary)

I know she can do 3Lz-3Lo but without a 3A it doesn't benefit her if she can only repeat one triple and obviously that would be the lutz.

andromache said:

GAH NO.

This is my least favorite proposal and it is SUCH BS. WHYYYYY are we treating quads differently from triples and unfairly limiting them?

This will severely disadvantage skaters who only have one or two quads; they will be focused on learning different quads instead of stabilizing the quads they do have, and the splatfests will not decrease at all (in addition to unfairly limiting the TES of skaters who only learn one or two quads).

Nathan can do pretty much all the quads anyway so I don't think this will hurt him as much as people think.

(At least this is better than the original proposal where no quads could be repeated. But still.)

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Skaters who only have one type of quad aren't affected at all. They can still repeat that one and would repeat a triple second - nothing changed in that regard. Skaters who have 2 types of quads could previously do 4 quad LPs, and will now be limited to 3 at most. This just doesn't get as many complaints because I think most men went with a 3 quad + 2 3A layout when they had 2 types of quads anyway.

Nathan will be affected because he repeated 2 different quads for his 6 quad LPs - that won't be possible anymore. Yuzu, Shoma, Boyang for example don't need to change their layouts at all with this.

andromache said:

GAH NO.

This is my least favorite proposal and it is SUCH BS. WHYYYYY are we treating quads differently from triples and unfairly limiting them?

This will severely disadvantage skaters who only have one or two quads; they will be focused on learning different quads instead of stabilizing the quads they do have, and the splatfests will not decrease at all (in addition to unfairly limiting the TES of skaters who only learn one or two quads).

Nathan can do pretty much all the quads anyway so I don't think this will hurt him as much as people think.

(At least this is better than the original proposal where no quads could be repeated. But still.)

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Actually, this version of the rule arguably benefits skaters with only one quad, as they can still repeat the quad, but their rivals with more quad jumps have greater limitations imposed.

This strikes me as a rule that won’t last very long. Only two repetitions allowed between quads and triples, and assuming that two 3Ts are needed to facilitate combinations, effectively means you won’t see men’s skaters repeating any other triple jump.

I've been so focused on how this will effect the men's competition I have completely forgotten about our lovely quad jumping ladies! It will benefit Trusova for now but I feel like Shcherbakova will definitely attempt different quads.

I'm glad the didn't do the original rule. It was draconian and severely punished skaters with only one type of quads. I need to study layouts more but I'm weary about this rule. It cuts down a lot on other skater's potential to do new layouts. I fear we won't see much advancements and layouts will more or less stay the same.

Colonel Green said:

Actually, this version of the rule arguably benefits skaters with only one quad, as they can still repeat the quad, but their rivals with more quad jumps have greater limitations imposed.

This strikes me as a rule that won’t last very long. Only two repetitions allowed between quads and triples, and assuming that two 3Ts are needed to facilitate combinations, effectively means you won’t see men’s skaters repeating any other triple jump.

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Basically with combos it means you have to learn to do a combo with -3Lo, -1l-3s or -1L-3F.

Actually, we might see more of these combos cause of this rule.