Non Controversial Olympic Wins

[FayD]

I think every win (be it Olympic or other) will be controversial for somebody for a whole list of reasons:

1. They deserved to win but they were overscored.
2. They deserved to win but the margin with second place was too big.
3. The margin with second place was too small hence not convincing
4. They didn't have the most difficult program, played it safe
5. They had the most difficult program, but aren't strong on PCs
6. They didn't win both segments so not convincing enough
7. There's a hypothetical scenario where someone else could have gone clean and won so not convincing enough
8. They didn't win with the absolute best skate of their career
9. They used tactics people don't agree with (backloading, recycling programs)
10. They won on home ice so something fishy must have happened
11. Personally preferring the other skater/team's style/program so they should have won, technicals be damned
12. They don't have enough other titles to back their win

Am I missing something?

 

[TallyT]

Am I missing something?

13. They had the unmitigated gall to beat the foretold favourite!!!!!

 

[Harriet]

I think every win (be it Olympic or other) will be controversial for somebody for a whole list of reasons

Having read through the thread, I agree. Conclusion at this point: there is no such thing as an uncontroversial Olympic win.

Am I missing something?

Only "Because I said so, so there."

 

[yume]

Yes, frontloading all your difficult jumps, and doing little in between till the last pass was knocked out and then moving on to the steps, choreography sequence, and spins, is obviously far and away a better and magical program construction than someone who approaches that in the opposite direction.


Yes, a Russian and/or an Asian "skater" being scored too damn high is obviously oppression and emotional abuse to Brown and Savoie, who remain the only skaters who can tie their boots properly till date, but aren't in any way affected by the ones who've beaten them on presentation at Nationals. I hope this oppression is rectified soon, not everyone can afford to constantly take to twitter or set up an interview on talk shows. Maybe the oppression of Nathan Chen's vastly underscored performances and the abuse of Jason Brown winning silver at 4CCs despite doing a +5 GOE 2T and the best triple axels ever put forward by humankind against people who can barely skate can be mitigated by banning all other competition.

 

[voolfee]

I disagree. I think Evgenia should have won.

Wow, people, you need to let this go a long time ago. :eeking: Alina's victory is unconditional. Zhenya's points were too high. Look at the quality of her jumps and flutz with +1.6 GOE. Alina's programs were masterpieces and perfectly executed from an artistic point of view. Zhenya's PCS were not supposed to be higher than Alina's. Alina's final advantage of over 10 points would be fair.

 

[Jeanie19]

Wow, people, you need to let this go a long time ago. :eeking: Alina's victory is unconditional. Zhenya's points were too high. Look at the quality of her jumps and flutz with +1.6 GOE. Alina's programs were masterpieces and perfectly executed from an artistic point of view. Zhenya's PCS were not supposed to be higher than Alina's. Alina's final advantage of over 10 points would be fair.

Please do not tell me what I need to do. You have your opinion, I have mine. And Zhenya's programs were masterpieces.

 

[yume]

Given his reputation in this fandom, Gleikhengauz would be happy to know that his choreo on Anna Kerenina is called masterpiece.

 

[CanadianSkaterGuy]

Well I think that might be a bit of an overstatment. She didn't have all the triples (no loop I believe). Mao was probably closer to Joannie rochette. But I m sure there will be some Mao fan or soeone who thinks it is controversial.

Sorry I should clarify that the fall once or twice comment was also considering what Mao did and the mistakes she made. While an argument could be made for the SP score being closer I still think Kim hit the performance better than Mao. I don’t know Mao fans who think 2010 was controversial and if they did they probably basing it off the triple axels and disregarding where Mao left points on the table. Her single toe and UR 3F for example immediately negated the technical benefit of her two axels.

Kim was the opposite - she had no loop and but it didn’t matter because she executed with such quality (thus more than making up for no loop or triple axels) and showed polish and flourish whereas Mao seemed very measured in her elements and her programs were a bit mechanical to me with not much personality.

 

[Blades of Passion]

Given his reputation in this fandom, Gleikhengauz would be happy to know that his choreo on Anna Kerenina is called masterpiece.

Heh, the choreography should have done more with the train sound at least! If she's throwing herself on the tracks at the end, then lets see Medved down there on the ice. The ending was very non-committal, where's the emotion and tragedy? That music in general though, it's very specific and doesn't have a powerful through-line, so it really needs to be followed very closely with movement, or else it's going to come off as rambling around the ice. Which is mostly what it was in the end, because they just repeated the same program she had been doing for 3 years in a row and threw in a few different arm gestures (and a wonky 3Loop entrance, really what was that ugly position supposed to achieve?) to make it seem like an attempt was made.

The footwork sequence music is the biggest problem though (same issue as her program the year before...), just so grating and impossible to skate to, certainly when trying to execute the laborious requirements of CoP footwork. There was another Anna Karenina program the same season that didn't use such a severe, off-putting section of the soundtrack - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WzwXMsjvTjI. I'd be all in favor of someone beating Zagitova via better artistry, maybe Mevedeva's 2017 SP + 2016 LP would be enough for me, but those 2018 programs were not it.

 

[yume]

I'd be all in favor of someone beating Zagitova via better artistry, maybe Mevedeva's 2017 SP + 2016 LP would be enough for me, but those 2018 programs were not it.

Why is that SP better than the others? I think it's her worst program actually. The step seq is unintesresting. A true "i kill the time till my jumps". The moves she does before her first spin are what i expect from a junior program. The packaging. Worse and even more juniorish than Rika's clair de lune. It was juniorish, basic and unrefined imo. "My soul is travelling" program had at least a better step sequence. The deep thing was a fail because she was trying to emote only with her face not her whole body.

W.E had brillant music cuts and some interesting moves.

 

[Skatesocs]

Neither is a remotely musical skater for it to be anything but a sad result if we based it off artistry. At least Zagitova had a fantastic +3Lo in the LP.

Karen Chen doing a better choreograhed LP would have been ideal. Even the previous season one was unmemorable from her, but I think I found it at least better. She would have had some of the best jumps, maybe the best layback, and definitely the best SP as the winner.

 

[Blades of Passion]

Why is that SP better than the others?

I find it to be her most genuine SP by far. There's a delicacy to it that doesn't feel willowy just for the sake of it, a sense of remembrance that she seems to have a connection to, and some changes of tempo and stronger beats of music that make it feel more dynamic and let her be more energetic in addition to the softer moves. It's actually her only SP I would even consider to be good (aside from Orange Colored Sky maybe, which had some nice aspects, her vibe at the Autumn Classic especially, but she abandoned it instead of growing into it).

 

[Mathman]

Why is 2006 Ladies non-controversial?

To me, Arakawa's win was non-controversial because she skated really well and the other two didn't.

If Arakawa and Slutskaya weren't overscored after the SP, maybe Cohen would have entered the LP with more confidence.

A controversy! Would Cohen have skated with more confidence, or would she have collapsed under the pressure? Or would a meteorite have fallen from the sky and hit her in the head? So many controversies in this sport ...

 

[Mathman]

Fair assessment; I agree the hardest program but one could have slaughtered her for unbalanced program pc wise.

The wording in the Program Components criteria is,

Proportion (equal weight of all parts)
Each part and section has equal weight in achieving the aesthetic pursuit of the
composition.

I guess the question would be, can half a program with no jumps have equal weight to the other half with 7 jumps? I can see where some people would say yes and others would say no.

 

[Skatesocs]

To me, Arakawa's win was non-controversial because she skated really well and the other two didn't.



A controversy! Would Cohen have skated with more confidence, or would she have collapsed under the pressure? Or would a meteorite have fallen from the sky and hit her in the head? So many controversies in this sport ...

I agree it's non controversial of course, as I said in my first post. But it's the line of reasoning we were following to call several events controversial in this thread. we can maybe play counterfactuals with some of these wins though, for fun.

 

[Blades of Passion]

I think it should have been close between Arakawa and Cohen in the end (Arakawa was overrated in the SP), but the optics of that one don't feel controversial, with Cohen's big mistakes and Arakawa still seeming like an underdog after being 3rd in the SP, even if the points should have been much further apart. I do feel a bit robbed of not seeing Arakawa do the Triple-Triple in the LP, which maybe she would have taken more seriously if she had a lot more ground to make up after the SP. The program was beautiful though, a great Olympic moment, it feels unnecessary to worry about an overscored SP in the end.

It's a scenario where an ordinal system would have messed things up, because for me Arakawa should be 5th in the SP, and there's definitely nobody in the LP that deserves to take Sasha below 2nd, so with the 6.0 system it would have been impossible to get the right result. Although it's not an issue if they just split the darn events up and give more medals out, like every other sport does. We could've had 2x Olympic SP Gold medalist Sasha Cohen, Olympic SP medalist Elene Gedevanishvilli, Olympic LP Gold medalist Mao Asada, etc.

So many more controversies to talk about if the SP and LP are their own events.

 

[Skatesocs]

The meteorite would have given Sasha Cohen superpowers and she'd have landed the first ever 4A!

 

[drivingmissdaisy]

Would Cohen have skated with more confidence, or would she have collapsed under the pressure?

There are a lot of skaters who might be affected by different SP placements. I don't think Sasha is one of them, as I can't recall her skating a single clean LP in an event where she skated a SP.

 

[plushyfan]

A controversy! Would Cohen have skated with more confidence, or would she have collapsed under the pressure? Or would a meteorite have fallen from the sky and hit her in the head? So many controversies in this sport ...

 

[treeloving]

For me, pair 2002 is so non controversial, Elena and Anton should win by a mile. It has become a controversy only because of North American media.