Kostner's plan for the Lutz in 2018?

David21 said:

You are wrong to say that the PCS should take a hit because of "lack of tech". The difficulty of the jumping content and the PCS are not related. Read the ISU ruebook.

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Not everything is spelled out in the rule book explicitly. Landing a jump that has a certain snap and or adds an impact on a program can influence the judges positively when it comes time to award components. At the same time lower quality elements or even simpler elements that are easier to perform can deflate a program's impact in a judges perception and we can see the opposite. Especially when we factor the competition. Just for a moment imagine the potential impact on your scores if you find yourself following a much stronger skater and who just absolutely slayed the crowd with masterful difficulty far above your own and unfortunately now you are up. Nowhere in the guidelines will it explain this but the contrast of the stronger skater before you might become even more stark in comparison to some judges and your scores could be lower than they would have given you if you had instead gone first. Skate order may seem nefarious and may even be used as such at times but it is a natural phenomenon that isn't always just bad judging.

Of course it's Carolina we're discussing so she is an example of someone who can wow us without all of the technical goods and instead focus on a mastery of the basics and interpretation. The thing is....I think it's worth acknowledging that some people will wonder if she is doing less difficulty in with technical layout then to what degree is it potentially easier to focus on the interpreting and even performance. How much easier is it to deliver without having to focus on landing 3-3's or even a Lutz? These things can and should be discussed and people are free as are the judges to weigh in on this. Nothing unfair about that is there?

You won't find this spelled out in the rules but I think you'd be wrong to believe that these factors aren't at play. Even if only .25 or .50 here or there in components. Feel free to disagree but I don't think it's realistic to say that TES doesn't have impact on PCS. It should. This includes the difficulty and execution. It's very hard to fall and not have a transition affected in some way. Not always of course because some people fall and pop up super quick but I'd say more often than not a fall will affect your transition and it should be reflected in your scores.

Sam-Skwantch said:

Of course it's Carolina we're discussing so she is an example of someone who can wow us without all of the technical goods and instead focus on a mastery of the basics and interpretation. The thing is....I think it's worth acknowledging that some people will wonder if she is doing less difficulty in with technical layout then to what degree is it potentially easier to focus on the interpreting and even performance. How much easier is it to deliver without having to focus on landing 3-3's or even a Lutz? These things can and should be discussed and people are free as are the judges to weigh in on this. Nothing unfair about that is there?

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Carolina is already punished in the TES in her lower base value for not doing a triple lutz or no real 3-3 combo. If she did a triple lutz instead of the triple flip, it would change nothing to her program regarding the PCS and it shouldn't.
Jason Brown doesn't have quad and he was still getting the highest PCS at NHK in the men's event because he was the best in that aspect (IMO even a bit too high but that's because of his errros and not his jump diffculty). No sane sane person is argueing that he should be getting lower PCS because unlike Voronov or Bychenko he didn't try a quad.

Sam-Skwantch said:

You won't find this spelled out in the rules but I think you'd be wrong to believe that these factors aren't at play. Even if only .25 or .50 here or there in components. Feel free to disagree but I don't think it's realistic to say that TES doesn't have impact on PCS. It should. This includes the difficulty and execution. It's very hard to fall and not have a transition affected in some way. Not always of course because some people fall and pop up super quick but I'd say more often than not a fall will affect your transition and it should be reflected in your scores.

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I didn't say that the TES are completely independant of the PCS. I said the jump difficulty shouldn't influence the PCS. You don't get an extra "wow"-PCS-mark in Ladies Figure Skating for doing a technically great clean triple axel in the beginning of a program because rarely anyone does it. That goes against everything that is spelled out in the rule book concerning PCS. And I'm not saying in reality, a great technical jump difficulty might never influence the judge's opinions, however that is wrong judging and, like I said, is not backup by the actual rules.

David21 said:

Carolina is already punished in the TES in her lower base value for not doing a triple lutz or no real 3-3 combo. If she did a triple lutz instead of the triple flip, it would change nothing to her program regarding the PCS and it shouldn't

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Maybe not but I do think that there is a case to be made that performing an easier layout may lend itself to the perception of being "easier" to perform the rest of the program. How could it not be? I guess to what degree.....YMMV :think:

I'm getting sidetracked here though....I don't have issues with Caro's PCS when she is clean. Personally I'm ok with her getting the highest marks but not when she is messy. In NHK I thought she was scored too high based on her performance.

Sam-Skwantch said:

Maybe not but I do think that there is a case to be made that performing an easier layout may lend itself to the perception of being "easier" to perform the rest of the program. How could it not be? I guess to what degree.....YMMV :think:

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Well, like I said, I disagree and without wanting too sound too arrogant, I tend to think that the rule book is backing me up on this.

Sam-Skwantch said:

I'm getting sidetracked here though....I don't have issues with Caro's PCS when she is clean. Personally I'm ok with her getting the highest marks but not when she is messy. In NHK I thought she was scored too high based on her performance.

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I think Kostner deserved lower PCS but still the highest of anyone in this field since Medvedeva didn't skate well, either, and since the 2nd Russian skater is not in the same league presentation-wise yet.

David21 said:

Carolina is already punished in the TES in her lower base value for not doing a triple lutz or no real 3-3 combo. If she did a triple lutz instead of the triple flip, it would change nothing to her program regarding the PCS and it shouldn't.
Jason Brown doesn't have quad and he was still getting the highest PCS at NHK in the men's event because he was the best in that aspect (IMO even a bit too high but that's because of his errros and not his jump diffculty). No sane sane person is argueing that he should be getting lower PCS because unlike Voronov or Bychenko he didn't try a quad.



I didn't say that the TES are completely independant of the PCS. I said the jump difficulty shouldn't influence the PCS. You don't get an extra "wow"-PCS-mark in Ladies Figure Skating for doing a technically great clean triple axel in the beginning of a program because rarely anyone does it. That goes against everything that is spelled out in the rule book concerning PCS. And I'm not saying in reality, a great technical jump difficulty might never influence the judge's opinions, however that is wrong judging and, like I said, is not backup by the actual rules.

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Well, technical difficulty is not just sheer number of rotations, btw. Other elements, transitions, difficult and original spin positions count in.
For example, since you mentioned Jason. See his split jump, see his spiral, see his spins, see all the transitions and details in his program, because its packed with them. While those things do not compute directly to TES, they are difficult, and quite obviously difficult. Its where his PCs come from.
Yes, Jason does not do quads, but Yulia Lipnitskaya said, while commenting at NHK, that his spiral is better than hers. May be a slight exaggeration, but surely that is difficult and exceptional, and one can see how this difficulty translates into PCs. It is not some abstract "he is art on ice", you can actually point those things out and it makes sense.

Now, in my opinion, this is not the case of Caro's programs. She does nothing technically exceptional: no harder jumps, her jumps are extremely telegraphed and she spends a long time just gliding through the rink into the jump, no WOW spins or anything else that stands out from technical point of view.

moriel said:

Now, in my opinion, this is not the case of Caro's programs. She does nothing technically exceptional: no harder jumps, her jumps are extremely telegraphed and she spends a long time just gliding through the rink into the jump, no WOW rotations or anything else that stands out from technical point of view.

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Like I said harder jumps have nothing to do with PCS. What stands out about Kostner are her skating skills, her interpretation, maturity and her feeling of the music. IMO she doesn't even need plenty of difficult transitions because the rest of her skating (skating skills and presentation) is good enough to deserve the highest PCS.

David21 said:

Well, like I said, I disagree and without wanting too sound too arrogant, I tend to think that the rule book is backing me up on this.

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Out of genuine curiosity could you please site the specific rules and a link to the ISU Guidelines where this is addressed?

Sam-Skwantch said:

Out of genuine curiosity could you please site the specific rules and a link to the ISU Guidelines where this is addressed?

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It's simple. There are descriptions of all 5 different component scores and as far as I know, nowhere there are words like jumping difficulty mentioned there.

These people act as if the other girls are doing something amazing only happened recently. Whatever jumps they are doing are already done in the 80s.
It is not like a bunch of young girls are doing multiple different quads like Vincent and Nathan, something not seen before. Get a grip. They aren't pushing the TES boundary.

David21 said:

It's simple. There are descriptions of all 5 different component scores and as far as I know, nowhere there are words like jumping difficulty mentioned there.

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Nor have I seen where difficulty is prohibited from influencing a performance or more specifically those marks.

http://www.isu.org/judging-system-synch

Presentation Score
In addition to the Technical Score, the Judges will award points on a scale from 0.25 to 10.00 with increments of 0.25 for the Presentation Score to grade the overall presentation of the performance.

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To me the program layout including the difficulty could factor in and impact the overall presentation and to some degree each component? Maybe a little for some or maybe not at all. I think some judges notice this stuff though just as my skating order analogy alluded to earlier. You won't see that in the guidelines either but that's just how live perception and impressions work.

Also it doesn't say "completely separate from" but rather "in addition to" the technical score.

David21 said:

At Worlds one year later, she got higher marks for tech in both the SP and LP so you are wrong.

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But I don't try to prove any point, I can't be right or wrong. I just mentioned that person used wrong scores to prove his point. Question was not about Carolina's marks throughout her whole career.

I pointed this out in the NHK Ladies LP thread but I guess it fits here too

It's funny the same people arguing Carolina should get high PCS marks based on her superior basic skating skills were the same people whining and complaining about Evgeni Plushenko receiving the same treatment in 2010 (you can count 2014 if you want to but it was loudest in '10). The same people said his high PCS marks were undeserved because he had no transitions, all he did was skate around and jump.

Well Evgeni had the best skating skills in the biz (the speed, power, force and command were untouchable) as well as the most difficult jumps/combos (and he hit them all!) and above average/decent spins and footwork (they were stronger at his peak but still something to applaud). Carolina on the other hand has the jump difficulty of a skater from 30 years ago (and even then she's rarely perfect) and only average spins and footwork. All she has is her skating skills.

So even though skating was suppose to have evolved and become more difficult and complex why is it okay for Carolina to simply skate from end to end of the rink doing nothing but looking pretty but wasn't for Evgeni? Suddenly the same people who a few years back said, "you must have transitions! its an unbalanced program if you don't! you can't just skate around and jump/spin, its killing the sport!" are now saying, "best skating skills of the group deserve the highest PCS marks! transitions be damned!" People advocating the complete opposite they did a few years back. Why the sudden flip flop?

NAOTMAA said:

Carolina on the other hand has... average ...footwork.

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IIRC, Evgeni didn't receive very high PCS in 2010, including scores in the 5s for transitions (which is the very reason he lost). He deserved higher IMO.

Carolina has average footwork? Who has above average footwork then?

bobbob said:

IIRC, Evgeni didn't receive very high PCS in 2010, including scores in the 5s for transitions (which is the very reason he lost). He deserved higher IMO.

Carolina has average footwork? Who has above average footwork then?

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I don't think any lady has above average footwork these days. Some are a little better then others yes but nobody really stands out. I blame the rules for that that require so much

The point is outside of her skating skills and natural gracefulness Carolina doesn't do much else. Her transitions (she doesn't have any!) aren't highlights. Her jumps aren't highlights. Her spins aren't highlights. And footwork isn't a highlight either. Skating skills alone should justify high PCS? Didn't people go crazy at the beginning of the decade when Patrick Chan was winning left and right because of skating skills alone?

Truth is she chooses her music wisely (good for her wish more skaters did). Music that fits naturally with her effortless glide. But there isn't much actual interpretation because its just skating from one side of the rink to the other. Turn off the sound and almost looks like a practice session in costume. All her programs looks alike no matter what the music is

As for Evgeni in 2010 I was mainly talking about the talk surrounding him. Many fans were moaning every time his name was mentioned and if I recall correctly there was pretty much a smear campaign against him as well in the press and certain officials before Vancouver and he came into the Olympics under a cloud and it did him harm

Wow. You said 'outside of her skating skills and natural gracefulness Carolina doesn't do much else". I watched her programs very closely and felt her accuracy of blade movement and fluidity of movement was mind bogglingly good. I was a dancer (ballet, tap, modern) for 40 plus years. I see a hard earned mastery of line and movement like I have never seen before in skating. And it's combined with that crazy magical flight of the blade that only comes with mastery then display of all that can be because of mastery. I thought she was an all encompassing part of the music, completely inside the music as is if another instrument. She wasn't doing what she was told she was living the character. It worried me as how can someone be such a true artist and have the mind of the undeterred athlete to land the jumps. Then she missed elements. All I hope for is that everyone is healthy so we can watch an Olympics, all parts of the sport, of great performances. These skaters are all incredible. Can we remember that? Why the need to pick at them like in the Hitchcock film of killer birds?

People's heads are going to explode when Kostner skates at Worlds.

And Carol Lane will be all, "well it is Italy..."

Bugs said:

Wow. You said 'outside of her skating skills and natural gracefulness Carolina doesn't do much else". I watched her programs very closely and felt her accuracy of blade movement and fluidity of movement was mind bogglingly good. I was a dancer (ballet, tap, modern) for 40 plus years. I see a hard earned mastery of line and movement like I have never seen before in skating. And it's combined with that crazy magical flight of the blade that only comes with mastery then display of all that can be because of mastery. I thought she was an all encompassing part of the music, completely inside the music as is if another instrument. She wasn't doing what she was told she was living the character. It worried me as how can someone be such a true artist and have the mind of the undeterred athlete to land the jumps. Then she missed elements. All I hope for is that everyone is healthy so we can watch an Olympics, all parts of the sport, of great performances. These skaters are all incredible. Can we remember that? Why the need to pick at them like in the Hitchcock film of killer birds?

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Thank you for this post, beautifully said and so true! It takes years to achieve this level and quality of movement. Every position, every movement is on point and serves a purpose. I think we are lucky to witness a skater like her.

Sam-Skwantch said:

Nor have I seen where difficulty is prohibited from influencing a performance or more specifically those marks.

http://www.isu.org/judging-system-synch


To me the program layout including the difficulty could factor in and impact the overall presentation and to some degree each component? Maybe a little for some or maybe not at all. I think some judges notice this stuff though just as my skating order analogy alluded to earlier. You won't see that in the guidelines either but that's just how live perception and impressions work.

Also it doesn't say "completely separate from" but rather "in addition to" the technical score.

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"In addition" means that the judges give out the GOEs, and then later after the performance, they score the "overall presentation". "Overall" probably meaning also some technical things like transitions. Layout including difficulty factor means that the judges evaluate the arrangemant and order of the elements. E.g. it's more difficult to space out the jumps in 4 minutes than doing them all at the beginning when you're still fresh. Those things have nothing to do with the jump difficulty which is reflected in the base mark.
We can go through to each of the of the component scores and see what they mean if you are still not convinced. The only component where I see that jump difficulty *might* *and *maybe* could play a role is in transitions because it *could* be argued that doing difficult steps into e.g. triple axel would be harder than the doing difficult entries into e.g. doube flip. Since the rule book says that the judges have to evaluate the difficulty of transitions, that could be used as an excuse to adjust that component score according to the jump difficulty. But IMO that would still not be right since the difficult entries and exits into and out of jumps already play part in the technical score since they influence the GOEs so it would be unfair for the skater with easier jumps to get punished twice.

NAOTMAA said:

I pointed this out in the NHK Ladies LP thread but I guess it fits here too

It's funny the same people arguing Carolina should get high PCS marks based on her superior basic skating skills were the same people whining and complaining about Evgeni Plushenko receiving the same treatment in 2010 (you can count 2014 if you want to but it was loudest in '10). The same people said his high PCS marks were undeserved because he had no transitions, all he did was skate around and jump.

Well Evgeni had the best skating skills in the biz (the speed, power, force and command were untouchable) as well as the most difficult jumps/combos (and he hit them all!) and above average/decent spins and footwork (they were stronger at his peak but still something to applaud). Carolina on the other hand has the jump difficulty of a skater from 30 years ago (and even then she's rarely perfect) and only average spins and footwork. All she has is her skating skills.

So even though skating was suppose to have evolved and become more difficult and complex why is it okay for Carolina to simply skate from end to end of the rink doing nothing but looking pretty but wasn't for Evgeni? Suddenly the same people who a few years back said, "you must have transitions! its an unbalanced program if you don't! you can't just skate around and jump/spin, its killing the sport!" are now saying, "best skating skills of the group deserve the highest PCS marks! transitions be damned!" People advocating the complete opposite they did a few years back. Why the sudden flip flop?

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I love Evgeni, especially his pre-2007 programs. I think near the 2010 games his team got really lazy and didn't give him any complex choreography/transitions. It did seem he was relying on the jumps alone to "win it", especially if you compare his 2010 programs to his programs in 2006 and earlier. Njinski was an absolute masterpiece (there's a reason it received all 6's across the board), as was Tosca - it was filled with transitions and musicality. Meanwhile his 2010 program fell short of that, and it would be inaccurate to claim otherwise.

NAOTMAA said:

The same people said his high PCS marks were undeserved because he had no transitions, all he did was skate around and jump.

Well Evgeni had the best skating skills in the biz (the speed, power, force and command were untouchable) as well as the most difficult jumps/combos (and he hit them all!) and above average/decent spins and footwork (they were stronger at his peak but still something to applaud). Carolina on the other hand has the jump difficulty of a skater from 30 years ago (and even then she's rarely perfect) and only average spins and footwork. All she has is her skating skills.

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LOL. Evgeni has the best skating skills. Put down the pipe, and watch Patrick Chan, Daisuke, Stephane Lambiel, and even Lysacek have much better skating skills than Evgeni in 2010. Evgeni is more in the lower half of the top 10 in all areas of PCS.

Carolina has average footwork? LOL again. This person has absolutely no idea what is going on if you make 2 outrageous statements like this.