Thoughts on U.S. skating talent

Cindy1983 · May 21, 2018

Right now, I think, all we can say I that the US has good talent that they can exploit. We need to let them develop and see what happens.

I think consistency is a myth. People say internal competitions help this. What they actually do, I think, is that it gives the top developing talent 'ready for prime time'. They get their mistakes out BEFORE they go before international judges. Unfortunately, I think the judges now expect this from skaters. This is sad. For one thing, not all skaters can do that and judges may ascribe a reputation to a skater based on early performances. Early competitions should, above all, give young talent experience in front of judges which is different than a practice environment. Some mistakes can be due to inexperience and skaters wouldn't be labeled for life. For another, it doesn't allow for growth stories. It's nice to see athletes grow to become competitors (e.g. Ashley Wagner). Most of the Russian girls are cookie cutter and formulaic, but are ready for prime time.

This being said, I wonder if Zagitava article Worlds was a sign of a chink in the Eteri armour, time will tell. People gush over them, but nothing is perfect.

I think that the US needs coaching turnover.

Spirals for Miles · May 22, 2018

Yes, I think the US needs to revamp their coaching. But not for your reasons. I think that right now, we've got a couple of coaches who have adapted to the new system and produced skaters that have done well under it. These are the coaches that need to be lifted higher rather than the ones that did well before, under 6.0, or just have a big name. Vincent Restencourt, Laura Lipetsky, Denise Meyers, etc., each are more of a lesser-known coach but each has good students that are doing well with the new system, like Ting Cui, Alysa Liu, Bradie Tennell, etc. (yes I know that Ting has left Vincent but she flourished most under him)

For starters, I disagree that the Russian girls are cookie cutter and formulaic, as you say. Each so clearly has their own personality that it's an obvious attempt to discredit them by saying this. Would you really say that Anna Pogorilaya has the same style as Evgenia Medvedeva has the same style as Elizaveta Tuktamysehva has the same style of Elena Radionova has the same style as Alina Zagitova? I for sure wouldn't. What each of these girls have in common, though, is that they really have to work to make the team. This internal competition that you were dismissing ensures that only the top talents are selected to go to the biggest stages. I think that's fair. It also encourages skaters to be ready to compete no matter what and helps them to develop better competition nerves. I think that's also fair. It's not that they're getting their mistakes out earlier but that they're less likely to make mistakes, because they know that mistakes are what kicks someone off of the team. Clearly, if there are skaters without mistakes at top domestic competitions, they're going to be the ones going over the ones who do make mistakes, and I think that that's also fair. Giving a reputation to someone is what's not fair to me and what makes it harder to transfer to the senior scene. If judges keep on propping up, say, Carolina Kostner, through PCS, and they do: she gets higher PCS with errors than without, then that is what's not fair to me. Sure, Carolina has longevity and has become a competitor in your sense of the word, but that doesn't mean that she's an example of a "growth story" that the Russians apparently don't have, because it's a lot easier to "grow into becoming a competitor" when you don't have to constantly worry about improving your technical base just to make the Worlds team. I know this argument's been rehashed thousands of times, but I just wanted to put it out there.

Also, to me, Zagitova at worlds wasn't a "chink in the Eteri armour" but rather just a skater who happened to have a bad day after being exhausted throughout the season and sick before worlds. Were others exhausted throughout the course of the season? Yes, I'm not saying that only Alina suffered, but she's allowed to have a bad day and that's what happened. You're right! no one is perfect, certainly not Alina or any skater. Eteri isn't teaching them to be perfect all the time, she's teaching them how to consistently go out and show their skills. If other countries or skaters don't get that skill, well, that's on them, and I certainly wouldn't want to hold them back just because other people can't all do it. What happened with Alina shows how hard it is to perform the layouts of an Eteri skater and that to me means that when she's on, she should be commended more for being able to do such a difficult layout that no other senior, not even Medvedeva, could do. This is sport, not a time to idolize people. If we want to see the same skaters for a decade, we can watch ice shows. But if they're struggling, that's on them. And sport isn't about "growth stories". It's about being THE BEST.

If the US has good talent, then we should expose them to competition early on. It will do them favors by exposing them to their international rivals and giving them experience with judges. We also need more internal domestic competitions to encourage them to show their best throughout the season and not only at Nationals. It will only hurt them if we try to protect them from what's coming by keeping them away from competition, and that's a surefire way to end up with a skater who doesn't know how to compete and ends up regressing one hitting the big stages. Alysa Liu is doing the right thing in competing up because it not only gives her more experience but also exposes her to who will be her rivals once she's an international junior trying to compete for a spot on the Junior Worlds team. Learning the elements early on will also help them in their consistency and teach them early on what they'll need to do later on. Someone brought up funding as an issue, and I think that the USFS also needs to work to fund promising skaters more. I realize that this is practically the same way as everything else in our country, but should we really hold a top talent back just because they can't afford to continue? I think not.

So, yes, the US needs a coaching turnover and a mindset change in my opinion. Just not the way that you think we do.

drivingmissdaisy · May 22, 2018

It's a mixed bag. Nathan and Vincent have the technical skills to challenge anyone in the world. As for the women, it is going to be tough to match what Eteri's skaters are doing. I'm still not convinced that her methods help skaters have technique that will survive puberty. Evgenia's has, but she is very fortunate to have as slim a build as she does. Let's see how Alina looks in two years; if she's still skating well, then maybe Eteri can help her skaters have long careers. If her school just churns out 15 and 16 year old champions, then I'm not sure if we will be able to match that when our skaters are looking to have longer careers.

karne · May 22, 2018

It's also attitudinal. There are STILL US journalists and commentators who refer to IJS as "the new scoring system" even though there are now skaters competing internationally who weren't even BORN when we started using the IJS. As long as that kind of thinking is in play, it's hard to progress the sport.

I mean, it was blatantly obvious five years ago that a man was going to need more than one quad internationally. Like, super obvious. And for very brief time it did look like the USFS understood - they had a National champion who was the only US man who could do more than one in the FS, they told all the men at Champs Camp that they would need a quad to be considered for the US Olympic team...and then they promptly did an about-face and decided that "artistry is more important!". Even though it was super, ridiculously obvious that it was now about the quads, they just shoved their fingers in their ears and went "lalalalala. we can't hear you!" and then acted all surprised when they started having difficulty producing international results. And then suddenly a kid comes along and they decide quads are important again.

And regardless of where your biases lie that did happen, the USFS did completely decide that quads weren't important when it was obvious they were.

drivingmissdaisy · May 23, 2018

karne said:
And regardless of where your biases lie that did happen, the USFS did completely decide that quads weren't important when it was obvious they were.

They're important, but the risk of doing multiple quads can result not only in memorable performances, but also total meltdowns. Vincent won a SP small medal at Worlds but finished 19th in the LP. Nathan Chen won the LP at the Olympics after finishing 17th in the SP. Adam and Jason haven't won small medals, but they also haven't finished outside the top 10 in either segment at Worlds or Olympics in the last quad. Their steady performances in big events helped the US earn World/Olympic spots and even Team medals. If someone had the quads and the consistency, I think he would always be favored. But I think the results in the last few years have sort of validated the idea that the team sent to big events needs a mix of individual medal contenders and skaters who can earn top 10 placements with consistency and artistry.

Nimyue · May 23, 2018

Spirals for Miles said:
If the US has good talent, then we should expose them to competition early on. It will do them favors by exposing them to their international rivals and giving them experience with judges. We also need more internal domestic competitions to encourage them to show their best throughout the season and not only at Nationals. It will only hurt them if we try to protect them from what's coming by keeping them away from competition, and that's a surefire way to end up with a skater who doesn't know how to compete and ends up regressing one hitting the big stages. Alysa Liu is doing hte right thing in competing up because it not only gives her more experience but also exposes her to who will be her rivals once she's an international junior trying to compete for a spot on the Junior Worlds team. Learning the elements early on will also help them in their consistency and teach them early on what they'll need to do later on.

So, yes, the US needs a coaching turnover and a mindset change in my opinion. Just not the way that you think we do.

It's a lot easier to do this when your country is paying these kids to skate and compete. It's a lot more difficult if parents are footing the bill. As a parent of a skater, even if she ends up having amazing talent, she'll never get to a high level, because I can't afford it. The pool of available talent is much bigger when more funding is available.

Cindy1983 · May 23, 2018

Nimyue said:
It's a lot easier to do this when your country is paying these kids to skate and compete. It's a lot more difficult if parents are footing the bill. As a parent of a skater, even if she ends up having amazing talent, she'll never get to a high level, because I can't afford it. The pool of available talent is much bigger when more funding is available.

That's where the offering of scholarships and other help comes in. The USFS has to step up.

NaVi · May 23, 2018

Nimyue said:
It's a lot easier to do this when your country is paying these kids to skate and compete. It's a lot more difficult if parents are footing the bill. As a parent of a skater, even if she ends up having amazing talent, she'll never get to a high level, because I can't afford it. The pool of available talent is much bigger when more funding is available.

These Russian kids don't get paid to compete... if they make the national team or local team then their coaches/clubs get something like a block grant. If they're on track to skate on the Junior Grand Prix then they probably are not paying anything... but it's a long way to get on that track.

andromache · May 23, 2018

Cindy1983 said:
That's where the offering of scholarships and other help comes in. The USFS has to step up.

Easier said than done. USFS simply doesn't have the resources to fund the elite-level training of a large enough group of kids to see results - otherwise, I assume they would already be doing so.

Is it possible that non-profits like Figure Skating in Harlem could offer funding/training at an elite level to especially promising youngsters? I don't know enough about what they do or what their emphasis is, but the focus seems to be on the overall benefit for individual girls (health, education, etc.). Which is awesome! That said, perhaps it is not unreasonable that they could assist particularly gifted young girls who have promise at the elite level? This might be a completely dumb idea on my part though.

Anyway, because skating is so expensive, only a certain class of individuals can afford it. This means that the US talent pools are going to be much smaller (not to mention far less concentrated in individual geographic areas) so there will be less success overall than in countries with higher and more concentrated talent pools.

Cindy1983 · May 23, 2018

I'm just sick of the negativity I see on this board. You'd think there was no talent at all when that's not true. Sports cycle and it takes time. Back to the nagativity issue. Negativity and hate online can get you down as well. Bradie's shown a thick skin in this area. This makes me think she'll be fine. Maybe she has the perspective that comes with overcoming a serious injury. I think some of it was her new commer or unknown status. This makes it hard for newcommers to break through. I also want to address the scoring and reputatation stuff. The IJS has taken the US some time to adapt to. I think they have. They began adapting, from what I read, after Sochi. The fruit of that will take time, but it will come. Bradie is the beginning of that adaption. That's where coaching turnover comes in. The US tends to prop up coaches that worked in the past which gives no incentive to adapt. I do think they should base less of the scoring on reputation because it is hard for established skaters to break out of it and for unknowns / new faces to break through. Is it really THAT threatening to have an unknown do well and maybe challenge for a medal (or even win)? Yes I do think they shouldn't use PCS to prop up skaters, but it is a symptom of the scoring based on reputation thing. What's hard is the subjective piece of the sport because that can come down to taste.

Ic3Rabbit · May 23, 2018

andromache said:
Easier said than done. USFS simply doesn't have the resources to fund the elite-level training of a large enough group of kids to see results - otherwise, I assume they would already be doing so.

Is it possible that non-profits like Figure Skating in Harlem could offer funding/training at an elite level to especially promising youngsters? I don't know enough about what they do or what their emphasis is, but the focus seems to be on the overall benefit for individual girls (health, education, etc.). Which is awesome! That said, perhaps it is not unreasonable that they could assist particularly gifted young girls who have promise at the elite level? This might be a completely dumb idea on my part though.

Anyway, because skating is so expensive, only a certain class of individuals can afford it. This means that the US talent pools are going to be much smaller (not to mention far less concentrated in individual geographic areas) so there will be less success overall than in countries with higher and more concentrated talent pools.

From experience I'm going to disagree with your points of only a certain class can afford and also concentration of talent in individual geographic areas. This just isn't the case.

jf12 · May 23, 2018

There are a lot of kids who have a lot of talent and drive but not a lot of money who get helped out with ice time by their skating club, or get coaching for free or heavily discounted by coaches who really believe in them.

dippy · May 23, 2018

Spirals for Miles said:
Yes, I think the US needs to revamp their coaching. But not for your reasons. I think that right now, we've got a couple of coaches who have adapted to the new system and produced skaters that have done well under it. These are the coaches that need to be lifted higher rather than the ones that did well before, under 6.0, or just have a big name. Vincent Restencourt, Laura Lipetsky, Denise Meyers, etc., each are more of a lesser-known coach but each has good students that are doing well with the new system, like Ting Cui, Alysa Liu, Bradie Tennell, etc. (yes I know that Ting has left Vincent but she flourished most under him)

For starters, I disagree that the Russian girls are cookie cutter and formulaic, as you say. Each so clearly has their own personality that it's an obvious attempt to discredit them by saying this. Would you really say that Anna Pogorilaya has the same style as Evgenia Medvedeva has the same style as Elizaveta Tuktamysehva has the same style of Elena Radionova has the same style as Alina Zagitova? I for sure wouldn't. What each of these girls have in common, though, is that they really have to work to make the team. This internal competition that you were dismissing ensures that only the top talents are selected to go to the biggest stages. I think that's fair. It also encourages skaters to be ready to compete no matter what and helps them to develop better competition nerves. I think that's also fair. It's not that they're getting their mistakes out earlier but that they're less likely to make mistakes, because they know that mistakes are what kicks someone off of the team. Clearly, if there are skaters without mistakes at top domestic competitions, they're going to be the ones going over the ones who do make mistakes, and I think that that's also fair. Giving a reputation to someone is what's not fair to me and what makes it harder to transfer to the senior scene. If judges keep on propping up, say, Carolina Kostner, through PCS, and they do: she gets higher PCS with errors than without, then that is what's not fair to me. Sure, Carolina has longevity and has become a competitor in your sense of the word, but that doesn't mean that she's an example of a "growth story" that the Russians apparently don't have, because it's a lot easier to "grow into becoming a competitor" when you don't have to constantly worry about improving your technical base just to make the Worlds team. I know this argument's been rehashed thousands of times, but I just wanted to put it out there.

Also, to me, Zagitova at worlds wasn't a "chink in the Eteri armour" but rather just a skater who happened to have a bad day after being exhausted throughout the season and sick before worlds. Were others exhausted throughout the course of the season? Yes, I'm not saying that only Alina suffered, but she's allowed to have a bad day and that's what happened. You're right! no one is perfect, certainly not Alina or any skater. Eteri isn't teaching them to be perfect all the time, she's teaching them how to conistently go out and show their skills. If other countries or skaters don't get that skill, well, that's on them, and I certainly wouldn't want to hold them back just because other people can't all do it. What happened with Alina shows how hard it is to perform the layouts of an Eteri skater and that to me means that when she's on, she should be commended more for being able to do such a difficult layout that no other senior, not even Medvedeva, could do. This is sport, not a time to idolize people. If we want to see the same skaters for a decade, we can watch ice shows. But if they're struggling, that's on them. And sport isn't about "growth stories". It's about being THE BEST.

If the US has good talent, then we should expose them to competition early on. It will do them favors by exposing them to their international rivals and giving them experience with judges. We also need more internal domestic competitions to encourage them to show their best throughout the season and not only at Nationals. It will only hurt them if we try to protect them from what's coming by keeping them away from competition, and that's a surefire way to end up with a skater who doesn't know how to compete and ends up regressing one hitting the big stages. Alysa Liu is doing the right thing in competing up because it not only gives her more experience but also exposes her to who will be her rivals once she's an international junior trying to compete for a spot on the Junior Worlds team. Learning the elements early on will also help them in their consistency and teach them early on what they'll need to do later on. Someone brought up funding as an issue, and I think that the USFS also needs to work to fund promising skaters more. I realize that this is practically the same way as everything else in our country, but should we really hold a top talent back just because they can't afford to continue? I think not.

So, yes, the US needs a coaching turnover and a mindset change in my opinion. Just not the way that you think we do.

Wow can someone send this to educate Christine Brennan please? What an amazing post!

schizoanalyst · May 23, 2018

Ic3Rabbit said:
From experience I'm going to disagree with your points of only a certain class can afford and also concentration of talent in individual geographic areas. This just isn't the case.

USFS used to do surveys of member household income (I don't think they do anymore) and iirc reported nearly 70% have over $75,000 (they didn't report a lower bound) with nearly a quarter more than $150,000+ - and that was more than a decade ago. I'm sure the sport is even more biased toward high income families now.

Even at beginner levels, you can easily run $10K a year. Half of all American households report not being able to afford an unexpected $400 expense. I just think it's implausible to think we are getting almost anyone that isn't from a household of the median household income or above (recall that the typical nurse makes more than the median household - so what we call middle class is a bit distorted in America). Sure you could pull the weird outlier where some single mom works 12-hour shifts/7 days a week and has 10 people living in a 2 bedroom apartment (there was a profile of Agnes Zawadzki where that was the story more or less) - but almost no family is going to commit to that.

Also, the USFS is mostly a white and asian sport. There are very few black or latinx skaters.

chopinskate · May 23, 2018

schizoanalyst said:
Also, the USFS is mostly a white and asian sport. There are very few black or latinx skaters.

Interesting. You attribute this to income inequality? Or some inherent bias?

I can't PM you about this, your inbox is full.

schizoanalyst · May 23, 2018

chopinskate said:
Interesting. You attribute this to income inequality? Or some inherent bias?

I can't PM you about this, your inbox is full.

Both. It’s just statistical true that black and hispanic households have, on average, significantly less wealth (a great injustice imo, but I’ll avoid politics) so that plays a role.

I think there are a lot of cultural assumptions. I think for a long time the sport wasn’t viewed as being receptive to non-White Americans (undoubtedly true) and nobody really tried to cultivate any interest in that community so it never really clicked strongly historically. I think that history never being built up just perpetuates itself - the fan base is already dying in America, no reason to think it’s going to grow in specific communities where it historically hasn’t been popular anyway. The methodology on this is a bit dubious - but USFSA reports only 6% of US figure skating fans are Hispanic or African-American (http://www.usfsa.org/content/FactSheet.pdf) so it’s still not clicked culturally - and I think that’s the legacy of the sport only being realistically open to white people and that’s just been for decades carried over - even though the sport would likely welcome black or hispanic fans and competitors now.

I also think representation matters. I think the influx of Asian-American skaters was, in part, influenced by the extraordinary success of Kristi Yamaguchi and Michelle Kwan. If Debi Thomas won the Olympics and became a big household name at the level of Kristi or Michelle, I think we could’ve seen more black kids try a pair of skates.

(and my inbox is clear lol)

el henry · May 23, 2018

chopinskate said:
Interesting. You attribute this to income inequality? Or some inherent bias?

I can't PM you about this, your inbox is full.

I don’t want to speak for schizoanalyst, but I see them as too entirely different statements:

Studies have shown X ...and skaters are Y. *Not* studies have shown X, therefore skaters are Y. I saw nothing in the post about bias.

chopinskate · May 23, 2018

el henry said:
I don’t want to speak for schizoanalyst, but I see them as too entirely different statements:

Studies have shown X ...and skaters are Y. *Not* studies have shown X, therefore skaters are Y. I saw nothing in the post about bias.

Sure, but I was asking if there was bias in it, as well.

Ic3Rabbit · May 23, 2018

schizoanalyst said:
USFS used to do surveys of member household income (I don't think they do anymore) and iirc reported nearly 70% have over $75,000 (they didn't report a lower bound) with nearly a quarter more than $150,000+ - and that was more than a decade ago. I'm sure the sport is even more biased toward high income families now.

Even at beginner levels, you can easily run $10K a year. Half of all American households report not being able to afford an unexpected $400 expense. I just think it's implausible to think we are getting almost anyone that isn't from a household of the median household income or above (recall that the typical nurse makes more than the median household - so what we call middle class is a bit distorted in America). Sure you could pull the weird outlier where some single mom works 12-hour shifts/7 days a week and has 10 people living in a 2 bedroom apartment (there was a profile of Agnes Zawadzki where that was the story more or less) - but almost no family is going to commit to that.

Also, the USFS is mostly a white and asian sport. There are very few black or latinx skaters.

I'm still going to disagree with you. I remember those surveys and they weren't reporting the way they should have been.
There are many of us elite and right below that are NOT from anywhere near that kind of income with our family. Many of us come from families that have had to sacrifice so much to get us where we are or were.

Go read about people like Jeremy Abbott, Adam Rippon, and so many other skaters that their parents (just as mine did) have to take out several mortgages on homes and work multiple jobs to keep their skater going.

I also wouldn't go assuming that there is just a majority of whites or asians in USFS. Just because a skater seems to be a certain race, doesn't mean they are necessarily.
I know of Native American skaters who you would not know that it was their race by looking at them.

ETA: As far as money: A really good example right now is Dinh Tran.

Arriba627 · May 24, 2018

Ic3Rabbit said:
ETA: As far as money: A really good example right now is Dinh Tran.

Wow - what a story! Thx for posting.

Thoughts on U.S. skating talent

Cindy1983

Spirals for Miles

Anna Shcherbakova is my World Champion

drivingmissdaisy

karne

in Emergency Backup Mode

drivingmissdaisy

Nimyue

Cindy1983

NaVi

andromache

Cindy1983

Ic3Rabbit

Former Elite, now Pro. ⛸️

jf12

dippy

schizoanalyst

chopinskate

schizoanalyst

el henry

Go have some cake. And come back with jollity.

chopinskate

Ic3Rabbit

Former Elite, now Pro. ⛸️

Arriba627

TWO-TIME WORLD CHAMPION 🔥

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