PCS Factoring - Men vs. Women

CanadianSkaterGuy · Mar 11, 2019

So, I'm not sure if this has already been addressed in another thread... but now that the men's program length has been aligned with the ladies program length - 4 minutes, and the SP is the same length, why the heck is the program components factoring still the same?! -- ladies 0.8/1.6 and men 1.0/2.0? The excuse used to be that the men's program is 30 seconds longer (which was bs to begin with).

Is it because the ISU doesn't want women outscoring men in competitions, now that skaters like Trusova/Scherbakova/Kihira are bringing on the heat technically? For example, Trusova/Scherbakova would have beat the junior men at Worlds if factoring was on par with each other.

When do you think this will this be fixed? Or is there some other reason the factoring still differs?

SkateSkates · Mar 11, 2019

CanadianSkaterGuy said:
So, I'm not sure if this has already been addressed in another thread... but now that the men's program length has been aligned with the ladies program length - 4 minutes, and the SP is the same length, why the heck is the program components factoring still the same?! -- ladies 0.8/1.6 and men 1.0/2.0? The excuse used to be that the men's program is 30 seconds longer (which was bs to begin with).

Is it because the ISU doesn't want women outscoring men in competitions, now that skaters like Trusova/Scherbakova/Kihira are bringing on the heat technically? For example, Trusova/Scherbakova would have beat the junior men at Worlds if factoring was on par with each other.

When do you think this will this be fixed? Or is there some other reason the factoring still differs?

I hope they change it. Doesn’t make sense to have different factoring given the technical developments and would actually benefit skaters who are stronger on the PCS side of things.

Shanshani · Mar 11, 2019

Isn't PCS factored the way it is because the ISU wants TES and PCS to each make up about half of the total score? In which case, the factoring for both men and women will need to increase at some point to reflect the tech growth of recent years. Why would it be about preventing women from outscoring men? TES is already comparable between the two disciplines now that they do the same number of jumping passes, and it's trivially easy to refactor the PCS if you really want to do a total score comparison. Besides, as good as Sasha/Rika/Anna are, they are unlikely to out-TES their counterparts in men Nathan/Yuzu/Shoma on any kind of consistent basis any time soon, so what would be the point of this conspiracy?

Edwin · Mar 11, 2019

Creating gender equality in scoring is always a good goal.

But I believe female athletes in gymnastics and figure skating (the only sports where children are pushed to their physical limits) only have a very small time frame where they are almost physically equal to males the same age, i.e. for very well trained girls with the right disposition 13 to 14, perhaps even very early 15 years of age. After their menarche, girl's bodies and musculature changes and young adolescent males gain their physical advantage over same age young women.

Wether you want to compensate for those biological differences in order to give the same program content the same theoretical scoring potential is a matter of ethics mostly and perhaps some politics too, as there is still female under representation in the governing bodies of sports.

Mathman · Mar 11, 2019

Shanshani said:
Isn't PCS factored the way it is because the ISU wants TES and PCS to each make up about half of the total score?

I agree with this whole post. Yes, I am pretty sure that this was the original idea for the factoring. Girls were frailer than boys, they didn't have the stamina to skate for four and a half minutes, they couldn't do the harder jumps that brought in the big points, etc. So of course the ladies will be able to score only 80% of what the men do in TES, and PCS should be adjusted accordingly.

Times change. We don't think that way any more.

In which case, the factoring for both men and women will need to increase at some point to reflect the tech growth of recent years.

Actually, it is not really important (except perhaps to achieve a pleasing symetry) for the TES to match the PCS in absolute numbers. If two competotrs both get 100 points in TES, and it comes down to PCS, it doesn't really matter if one out-points the other by 100 to 90in pCS or by 50 to 40.

Why would it be about preventing women from outscoring men?

:yes: In fact, most of the male figure skaters that I know would have nothing but support and congratulations to ladies who could match them jump for jump. If we really need to massage the male ego, then we should definitely let the ladies PCS factoring go up. That way if you "LOST TO A GIRL :eeking: at least you could say, well, obviously, she skated real pretty and crushed me on the PCSs.

Colonel Green · Mar 11, 2019

It’s not merely about program length, though with the reduced length/number of elements the technical scores are closer than they used to be. Men’s TES on average is still higher due to the much greater prevalence of big-ticket elements, so the PCS factoring reflects that.

The comparatively small number of ladies doing quads or triple Axels don’t change that most are not, even at the very elite level, so scoring is designed to serve the median, not the extremes.

Also, increasing ladies’ PCS right now would arguably disadvantage skaters like Trusova against their competition because it would allow quadless skaters like Kostornaia to make up more points against them on the components side.

ruga · Mar 11, 2019

I feel like the PCS factors should be the same in junior competitions (0.4 and 0.8), since boys peak later than girls and their technical abilities are similar then. In seniors they should remain like they are now - there are men who score more than 50/100, and yet no one changes the factor, probably because most men get less than that. It is same with the ladies. Also the 0.5/1.0 factoring would raise the importance of PCS - many skaters could get 80 points for components while getting 60 for technical elements for example. It would create a paradox - many skaters would work more on components and less on the elements because it would be easier to grab the points with the second mark, and the technical marks will become smaller on average.

Overall I don't think that a few skaters (Kihira, Shcherbakova, Trusova) should change the PCS scoring in ladies since the factoring is not changed for men even though men's technical marks sometimes overcome the max PCS.

Shanshani · Mar 11, 2019

Mathman said:
Actually, it is not really important (except perhaps to achieve a pleasing symetry) for the TES to match the PCS in absolute numbers. If two competotrs both get 100 points in TES, and it comes down to PCS, it doesn't really matter if one out-points the other by 100 to 90in pCS or by 50 to 40.

Oh, I agree. It's the margins between skaters that matter, not the absolute values. Though higher factoring would magnify the margins somewhat. But that's the reason I've consistently heard for PCS being factored the way it is--and, well, no one every accused the ISU of having a sophisticated grasp of mathematics!

Mathman said:
:yes: In fact, most of the male figure skaters that I know would have nothing but support and congratulations to ladies who could match them jump for jump. If we really need to massage the male ego, then we should definitely let the ladies PCS factoring go up. That way if you "LOST TO A GIRL :eeking: at least you could say, well, obviously, she skated real pretty and crushed me on the PCSs.

Yeah, I've never heard a male skater express any negative feelings for getting lower TES than a girl. And to be honest, when fans bring up how Rika or whomever beat these-many-men, it often sounds more like a putdown of the men rather than a raising up of Rika. Rika is a top athlete, arguably the best senior ladies skater in the world right now--why *shouldn't* she beat a lot of the men? And why should the men feel bad for it? Hopefully we're beyond mocking people for "losing to a girl" at this point, especially when that girl is one of the best, if not the best, in her discipline.

Colonel Green · Mar 11, 2019

ruga said:
I feel like the PCS factors should be the same in junior competitions (0.4 and 0.8), since boys peak later than girls and their technical abilities are similar then.

I could maybe see that for the junior men’s SP, where the only real TES difference is the 3A, since quads are banned, but I don’t think that’s true in the FS. If you compare this past Junior Worlds, in addition to the 3A everybody in the top 12 or so men tried at least one quad, except Camden. And in that sense the same relative factoring should be employed for both programs in order to preserve the balance between the two programs in scoring.

el henry · Mar 11, 2019

I don’t think male skaters or female skaters give a rat’s patootie about scores vis à vis each other. They care about winning. They care about personal bests. They care about skating their absolute best no matter how it’s scored:yes:

As a woman of a certain age, I find the “oh, you got beat by a girl” to be sexist tripe. Nothing to do with the male ego, and everything to do with mine

But until we have everyone all competing together, makes no difference, score as you will :biggrin:

just make the relative scoring between men and between women fair. Now *there’s* an achievement:agree:

SkateSkates · Mar 11, 2019

In addition it would make it easier for the general public to understand the scoring system if PCS for women was factored 1.0 and 2.0 instead of the seemingly arbitrary 0.8 and 1.6.

Mathman · Mar 11, 2019

Colonel Green said:
Also, increasing ladies’ PCS right now would arguably disadvantage skaters like Trusova against their competition because it would allow quadless skaters like Kostornaia to make up more points against them on the components side.

Only by a minuscule amount. As Shanshani points out in post #8, it is only the margins between skaters that count, not the raw numbers.

For instance, at Junior Worlds the scores in the free skate were

Trusova TES 86.96, PCS 64.44. total 151.40 (not including fall deduction).
Shcherbakova 80.79, PCS 66. 29, Total 147. 08.

Trusova wins by 4.32 points.

With men's factoring (add 25% to the PCS), the PCS go up to 80.55 for Trusova and 82.86 for Shcherbakova. This is a net gain for the "artist" of only 0.46 points. Trusova still wins, this time by 167.51 to 163. 65.

Trusova wins by 3.86 points instead of 4.32.

CanadianSkaterGuy · Mar 11, 2019

Mathman said:
Only by a minuscule amount. As Sanshani points out in post #8, it is only the margins between skaters that count, not the raw numbers.

For instance, at Junior Worlds the scores in the free skate were

Trusova TES 86.96, PCS 64.44. total 151.40 (not including fall deduction).
Shcherbakova 80.79, PCS 66. 29, Total 147. 08.

Trusova wins by 4.32 points.

With men's factoring (add 25% to the PCS), the PCS go up to 80.55 for Trusova and 82.86 for Shcherbakova. This is a net gain for the "artist" of only 0.46 points. Trusova still wins, this time by 167.51 to 163. 65.

Trusova wins by 3.86 points instead of 4.32.

Yeah this was kind of my thought - that even if it was meant to standardize PCS to somehow equate to TES, raising the PCS factoring for ladies wouldn't create huge disparities in results. This thread is a bit contrary to my past attitudes because I always think that increasing PCS factoring benefits the top skaters and allows them more leeway to make mistakes, and making "technical" skaters have to fight harder. Of course, the new GOE rules do benefit them though. This question was mainly asked because women should be factored the same as men, IMO. Say there's 5 points PCS difference, that extra 0.4 will only equate to 2 points greater disparity between those two competitors if PCS factoring were raised to 2.0 instead of 1.6.

Baron Vladimir · Mar 11, 2019

CanadianSkaterGuy said:
So, I'm not sure if this has already been addressed in another thread... but now that the men's program length has been aligned with the ladies program length - 4 minutes, and the SP is the same length, why the heck is the program components factoring still the same?! -- ladies 0.8/1.6 and men 1.0/2.0? The excuse used to be that the men's program is 30 seconds longer (which was bs to begin with).

Is it because the ISU doesn't want women outscoring men in competitions, now that skaters like Trusova/Scherbakova/Kihira are bringing on the heat technically? For example, Trusova/Scherbakova would have beat the junior men at Worlds if factoring was on par with each other.

When do you think this will this be fixed? Or is there some other reason the factoring still differs?

Because their tech scores were generally higher, PCS were factored with higher number to reflect that. But with one required element less in FP after the change of rules i think ISU should make PCS factoring of men's free program (as also in pairs) with lower number to better reflect initial idea of 'elements score' and 'program as a whole's score' being equally represented in the final score. In Ice Dance TES mark is generally higher than PCS after introducing of Choreo elements too. Maybe idea of TES and PCS being equal is not important anymore, but it is not OK in my opinion that men can benefit more of PCS in their free skate comparing to the ladies. Cause conclusion of that may be how PCS is more important for mens free programs which is not what ISU is trying to say I guess.

yume · Mar 11, 2019

Maybe because most of ladies are doing 7 triples programs with no 3A. So tech is caped to 80 in LP for almost everyone. And max PCS is 80. This is the so precious balance. If ladies get the same factoring than men we will have things like TES:65 and PCS:95 for some skaters. Which is too much and it will give judges way more room for cheating. In men it's more TES that makes the game.You have skaters like Hanyu, Chen who can put 125-130 TES on table while PCS max is 100. Physical ability has more weight than judges' bias (even is they can still cheat a bit on TES).
Maybe next quad. When 3As and quads will be more common and 100+ TES will be breakable by many ladies.

neusw · Mar 11, 2019

You can’t change factoring just based on the top tech scores that men and women can achieve. For every lady who can hit 90+ tes, there’s 5 ladies competing at worlds who can’t hit 60 tes on a good day. The same for men. The top men might hit 120+ tes, but most might only make it to 90 on a good day. The ratio between top men/women and average men/women is still about 1/0.8. You can’t compare the top 3-4 women to average mens’ scores to justify changing the factoring ratio for the entire discipline.

gkelly · Mar 11, 2019

Shanshani said:
Oh, I agree. It's the margins between skaters that matter, not the absolute values. Though higher factoring would magnify the margins somewhat.

Yes.

Which is why when fans occasionally suggest that there should be only one or two program components instead of five, I always ask what the factors should be. If you keep the increments available to the individual judges at 0.25 but multiply the total by a three- or five-times larger factor, then the difference between the two closest but nonidentical scores will be much larger -- it would limit the flexibility judges would have in distinguishing between skaters who are close but not identical in overall component skills.

If jumps continue to earn the majority of the technical scores, and men on average are able to include jump content that the majority of female competitors are not able to attempt or rotate, then making the PCS factors equal for both disciplines would mean that women would earn a larger percentage of their total scores from PCS than men do.

The implication might be that women's skating should be scored more on subjective qualities -- in the worst interpretation, on the "looking pretty" qualities.

I think there is a valid argument that the women's discipline should place more value on skills other than rotating in the air. But I personally would make that argument more in favor of other technical skills -- rewards for non-jump technical elements, for jumping difficulty other than the number of rotations in the air, and for the Skating Skills and Transitions components.

Although for that matter I might make the same argument for the men's discipline as well.

Baron Vladimir · Mar 11, 2019

gkelly said:
If jumps continue to earn the majority of the technical scores, and men on average are able to include jump content that the majority of female competitors are not able to attempt or rotate, then making the PCS factors equal for both disciplines would mean that women would earn a larger percentage of their total scores from PCS than men do.

I wouldn't make PCS factoring in those two disciplines equal. But the fact is that after the removing of one jumps pass from men's free programs PCS have more weight than before when that jump pass existed. By removing one required element from free program, they decrease the weight of TES in the total score and as a product of that increase weight of PCS in men's free program score. But they did nothing with ladies free programs - they didn't increase weight of PCS in Ladies (cause they didn't reduce their TES potential by reducing required elements/jump passes by one).

gkelly · Mar 11, 2019

Elements have been removed from programs before without changing the PCS factors.

The fourth spin was removed from senior freeskates and the second step sequence/spiral sequence from junior men's and ladies' freeskates ca. 2007.

And the second step sequence/spiral sequence from all men's/ladies' short programs ca. 2011.

Also pair/side-by-side spins and step/choreo sequence between SP and FS.

The effect of removing elements might be to make the PCS worth more, but at the same time the top level of technical content was increasing. And there have been tweaks both up and down to various elements in the Scale of Values, and most recently to the GOE values.

So I don't see a clear intention to increase (or decrease) the numerical value of the PCS, let alone with any gendered intention. The earlier element removals, as I understand, were intended to give more time for in-between skating/transitions and performance quality, which would allow for more non-element content to score in the PCS, while the PCS factors remained the same. Shortening the men's and pairs' freeskates while only removing one element has had the opposite effect.

Rissa · Mar 11, 2019

Colonel Green said:
Also, increasing ladies’ PCS right now would arguably disadvantage skaters like Trusova against their competition because it would allow quadless skaters like Kostornaia to make up more points against them on the components side.

As much as I admire her, Trusova's PCS are already inflated due to her quads. Higher factoring would only make her overscored more. There's no scenario she'd be disadvantaged on the PCS, against Kostornaia or anybody else.

PCS Factoring - Men vs. Women

CanadianSkaterGuy

SkateSkates

Shanshani

Edwin

СделаноВХрустальном!

Mathman

Colonel Green

ruga

Shanshani

Colonel Green

el henry

Go have some cake. And come back with jollity.

SkateSkates

Mathman

CanadianSkaterGuy

Baron Vladimir

yume

🍉

neusw

gkelly

Baron Vladimir

gkelly

Rissa

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