Skate Canada 2010: From One Mess To Another

We all knew Trophée Eric Bompard wold more or less end up the way it did, right? Now that the Grand Prix events are finally and mercifully over, and all that's left is the Final in 10 days, I thought I would take the opportunity to look back on the competitions that I initially ignored out of concern for myself. First up: Skate Canada.

I will happily cover both the best and the worst, but in this case only the men's event is worth mentioning. Any event that Alissa Czisny can win (and that Fumie Suguri insists on entering) is possibly beyond 'worst' status, and both the pairs and ice dance events look too boring to even think about.

Of course I have to start with Patrick Chan. Two obvious things I did not realize about him: 1) He is still only 19 and 2) He is a two-time World silver medalist. One not-so-obvious thing I had to look up about him: 1) He is fully Chinese.

This program is remarkable for its ability to earn unearned points. How a skater can miss two of three required jumping passes and still score high enough for third place (even at a Grand Prix event) is beyond me. Even these commentators, who talk way too much, are initially at a loss for words after the missed triple Axel. I'll admit that he has good speed in his stroking and in his spins, but the magical Canadian bonus is just too much.

So actually, his placement is not beyond me. It's very easy: just keep on adding PCS points until the desired score and rank are reached. Of course the commentator says, "Three falls, and I'm not worried." Why should he be?

But my biggest problem? I'm so jaded that I can't even get angry about this.

Disguising an overused piece of music by changing the instruments and the tempo isn't fooling anyone except maybe the Canadians. The unbearably biased commentators proudly crowed that Patrick "answered another question" by landing a quad toe loop, which was admittedly very good, but moments later had to face the fact that their chosen boy was down on the ice yet again after a failed triple Axel. The ability of the commentators to continue to finding positive--and occasionally flatly wrong--things to say might be even more remarkable than the score this mess of a performance receives. Only one clean jumping pass in the entire program, and he skates away with a smile and a gold medal. "Still some rough edges"? That's putting it mildly, buddy.

Patrick Chan rivals Yuna Kim when it comes to blind adoration.

I am no fan of Nobunari Oda, seriously, but his knees are like butter. He doesn't have the excitement that Patrick Chan has, especially in Canada, but his jumps are to die for. Nobunari's costumes and music occasionally make me want to die, but that's another story.

The Russian commentators are so mercifully quiet...

I actually kind of like this costume, I think. I also like this music much better than his short program choice, but I'm afraid it's not exciting enough to help him disguise his sheer lack of artistry and musicality. He also has a strange free leg position on the entrance to his triple Axels, which I noticed just moments before he fell on one. There's not much else to say except that Nobunari deserved more, but it's just the way skating goes. At least now everybody knows that one fall is far more costly than four falls and five stepouts. The complete lack of emotion on his face as a mask for his utter confusion, disappointment, and annoyance is amazing.

By the way, if you watch the Gala, Nobunari is introduced as "He's a new dad, and the rising son of Japan!" Wow, no.

Do I approve of Adam Rippon's laughably fake attempts to portray Romeo? No, of course not. But his skating is so gorgeous I could almost overlook that. Once he got through the triple Axel I knew the rest would be smooth sailing, and it was.

His double-armed Lutz in the short program was a little less than pretty, but Adam's first Lutz in his free skate was pure beauty. I draw the line at that ugly one-armed three-jump combination, though. Just no. His knees aren't quite as soft as Nobunari's, but his increasingly evident gayness allows him to feel the music so much more. I'm not even going to bother comparing their placements, since it's obvious that their respective strengths are different, and in the end the only determinant in their markings was how to enable Patrick to win.

All in all, this was a fairly forgettable competition, minus the eye-roll outrage that was Patrick Chan. I guess I'm glad I watched it, a month late.

Thank You, ISU... Finally

The ISU has finally come to its long-overdue senses and announced plans to change the way underrotated jumps are scored. According to the article on Yahoo! JAPAN these discussions have been in the works for a while, but unsurprisingly they held everything off until (2 days after) the Olympics.

While the automatic -3 GOE rule seems to have been lifted this season (I can't seem to find the actual rules anywhere, but this article mentions that a negative GOE is no longer mandated), this new set of rules is supposed to encourage more technical innovation. Instead of automatically scoring an underrotated triple jump as a double, the new set of rules would take a base value somewhere in between the double and triple.

Although this seems to be a step in the right direction, it still remains to be seen whether they will decide to use a more robust method to determine whether something is underrotated. The current use of one camera makes underrotation calls extremely ambiguous, and there will probably be continued controversy over what was underrotated and what was not. It will be interesting to see what happens to skating next...

回転不足で「中間点」導入へ＝高難度ジャンプ挑戦を促進−国際スケート連盟〔五輪〕

（時事通信） 2/28 2:33 コメント数：117件

　【バンクーバー時事】フィギュアスケートで回転不足とされたジャ ンプの基礎点について、国際スケート連盟（ISU）が来季から「中間点」に相当するルールを導入する見通しであることが26日、分かった。五輪終了を受 け、6月のISU総会での改正に向けた詰めの議論が行われる。
　現行ルールでは回転不足のジャンプは1回転少ないジャンプと見なされて大幅な減点になるが、その減点幅を縮小し、難度の高いジャンプへの挑戦を促すのが狙い。ISU技術委員会関係者によると、以前から話し合いが続けられていた。
　例えば、バンクーバー五輪女子銀メダリストの浅田真央（中京大）が得意とするトリプルアクセル（3回転半ジャンプ＝基礎点8．2点）は、回転不足と判定 されると2回転半の基礎点（3．5点）しか付かない。新ルールが導入されれば、二つの基礎点の間の点数が得られることになる。
　近年は高難度のジャンプに対するルール緩和が行われてきた。昨季はトリプルアクセルと4回転の基礎点が引き上げられ、今季からは回転不足のジャンプに対してジャッジが評価点（GOE）を必ずしも減点する必要がなくなった。
　それでも、今回の五輪では、女子でトリプルアクセルを計3度跳んだ浅田が金妍児（韓国）に大差で敗れ、男子では4回転を跳ばなかったエバン・ライサチェク（米国）が優勝した。

Vancouver 2010: Ladies

For the sake of my longevity and emotional well-being I did not watch the ladies' event. However I have seen certain programs online, read reviews, and looked at the protocols, and my opinion remains unchanged:

• The judging system is crap. There is no way a given jump should receive +1 from one judge and -2 from another. It doesn't matter whether judges value different things--there should be a protocol that lists that qualities make a good jump, and within that the judges should be free to weigh the merit, for example, a jump's height vs. its outflow. However no judge should be able to decide that a jump was -2 GOE because it was low even if it was clean and flowy, while another decides that it was +1 because it was clean and flowy. Just no. Any given element should have a spread of 2 points, MAYBE 3.
  
• I do not disagree with the final placements. That being said, I firmly believe that Yu-na Kim was overscored. She is not the only one (see: ice dance), but sometime during these Olympics the judges decided that it was less about scoring what they saw as it was giving as many points as possible to the executed elements so that these Games could be remembered as one where all world records fell. This is not a game of "Who can give more points?" Oh, wait. This is essentially the same point as above: the judging system is crap. WAKE UP, ISU.
• Someone please get Mao Asada out of Tatiana Tarasova's grip. Tarasova is a brilliant coach who has worked wonders with many skaters, and her relationship with Mao seems very sweet, but I just don't think that she is leading Mao on the right trajectory. I feel like her skating's characteristic airiness has been completely suppressed, and with it her consistency and cute costuming have disappeared. It's painful to watch. JSF, I'm counting on you.
  

2010 US Nationals: Pairs (2)

The judging details for Pairs is fully up! I usually don't care so much about the details of GOE and downgrades and whatnot in comparison to the actual results themselves, but this time especially I was curious about what placed Rena Inoue & John Baldwin in 3rd, partly considering that it seemed like they disagreed with the results (although, to be fair, not the decision not to nominate them to the Olympic team). Anyway, the point is, the protocols are up and I (along with 90% of the figure skating world, if not more, I feel) am again so confused as to what exactly makes this new judging system so "improved":

Obviously I'm not nearly the first person to say this, but really. Take, for example, the 2T. I don't clearly remember this program so I suppose someone popped this, seeing as it wasn't judged as a 3T<, but the point is that J3 must have hit another pair's replay when he gave a +1 GOE. Since, you know, everyone else thought that it was a -2 GOE. Which results in an overall GOE of -0.60 even though 7 of the 8 judges gave it a -2. Or, for instance, the 3LzTw1... even I could see the crash. A 0 GOE? Really? What amuses me even more is the 3LoTh... are these judges actually watching the same program and paying attention to it besides? But hey, whatever, it's all anonymous, right? These are good too, although I'm glad to see that they apparently amended the rules surrounding downgrades. But, for instance, the CCoSp4--+1 to -2 GOE? Even ranges of 0 to +2 GOE are questionable (or rather J2 seems to have been determined to keep them 3rd)... come on now, ISU. Haha right.

I don't mean any of the above as a knock on anybody's scores, efforts, or abilities. I have no idea what the elements should have received under the envisioned COP, but really now. Judges do have to be trained, right? I can't just jump into the judges' panel tomorrow and start handing out numbers?

Oh well. I love figure skating anyway. At least, I think so, most of the time...