Xen

Twizzles are faster, as you don't check. Think about it like a traveling spin, and usually skaters have their arms pulled in to maintain balance. Where for 3-turns, arms are usually more out, since you need to check with each turn. Twizzles also have a more linear entry. Rockers and counters: both are S shape curves, but rockers are the ones that look like they are heading into a 3 turn, only instead of a 3, they look like they did a gliding S shaped curve. =) (that's actually how I differentiate them...)

BTW, I find it easier to tell from fancams than TV broadcasts, especially if the TV broadcast doesn't have the full body moving and fail to capture the full entry and exit edge of transitions (this is pretty important for counters and rockers).

For the most part, I'd agree. I am a pretty generous judge, but perhaps a tad harsher than protocols. In general, I tend to prefer staying relatively stable on SS and even TR, since short of significant change, those 2 sets shouldn't theoretically fluctuate much. But I would probably fluctuate my IN, PE and lesser degree CO scores. I almost forgot multi-directional skating. OMG, I'm horrid! But yes, that's another thing- skaters tend to have preferences on which direction they do things. Most skaters, if they are right-handed, tend to prefer skating counter-clockwise direction, part of this is just natural, and part of it is because most skating rinks you will primarily skate that direction, and will need to do extra work to practice the opposite. Pay attention if the skater has ease going in the counter-intuitive direction. Even with Yuzu, you can kind of tell which side he favors. One day, go look at his twizzles in the Chopin StSq. He's faster doing twizzles going counter clockwise, but his twizzles going clockwise are noticeably slower to me (still faster than others, but slow for him). I love Mai Mihara's twizzles btw. And I hope that Boyang brings back Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon when his SS finally hits 9.0 status. That StSq at the end would be scary-he felt a tad behind the beat and tempo now, but one day if he hits it, wow. Edit: you guys made me go watch fancams at midnight =P Okay, after watching the WC2018 fancams, I think Shoma may have gained a bit of speed this season.

Hmm. Well I actually do score fairly close to you. Though I'm definitely considered generous. And if anyone disagrees, I'm all ears. =) 9.5+: Yuzu and Patrick-both are able to gain speed out of nowhere, using deep edges to gain momentum. Patrick looks way better in fancams-you really get a much greater sense of his speed and absolute stability as he goes from element to element. His skating reminds me of water-it is just a neverending flow. Yuzu gains speed from nowhere, and is incredibly fast. But I would rather say Yuzu is like the wind-he doesn't so much flow, but "breezes by" gently from element to element. It's pretty healing watching both of them (when they are not falling of course). 9.0-9.25 range: Javi, Jason Brown (Jason brown could go higher actually, on a good day, he has really nice flow in his skating). They're both solid, and quite fast, but not quite at Yuzu/Patrick level when it comes to ease of movement. 8.75-9.0 range： Mikhail, Dimitri Aliev and Shoma (Shoma has nice edges and flow to his skating, his knees are quite good). Majority of Japanese skaters are probably in this range. Cha Junhwan is also IMO, in this range, though judges don't acknowledge it, and Dennis V is also in this range. More 2 foot skating, but quite good when they do 1-foot, pretty good edge use and decently deep edges. 8.25-8.5: Boyang, he's improved a lot, but some of his movements aren't fully extended enough to go beyond 8.5 yet. 8.0-8.25: Nathan, still higher than avg, but not quite there yet. His knees truly kill everything for me, and from fancams he always comes off as more slow, labored, and lacks this certain lightness/agility that Boyang and Shoma have.

Hmm....SS. Well-go with the standard that figure skating should look "easy". This easy is defined by aspects such as does the skater look balanced (ease of movement), does this skater have good speed and coverage of ice, does this skater seem to gain speed out of nowhere. Then you figure in stuff such as whether the skater used harder movements, such as rockers/counters/choctaws as part of their linking movements instead of normal 2 foot skating and gliding, and whether the skating still looks smooth and "easy" despite the difficulty levels thrown in. There is a reason why difficulty of TR movements and the quality of the TR movements can be somewhat correlated with SS, and why people joked about quality crossovers. The harder TR movements usually are 1-foot skating, with complex turns that require you to go counter-intuitive on your balance. You should be able to gain speed off of turns and deep edges alone due to knee and ankle action, but to do it consistently, maintain speed/gain speed, and hold your balance is hard. And now you know why I tend to get pissed when JPN skaters get worse SS scores.

Uh, no I did not. Let's stay away from that. Last I checked, Yuzu is at 74% in that poll, with Adam at 10% and Nathan at 14%, poor Dima at 2%. Wonder if Adam will overtake Nathan. In which case, no wonder Adam wasn't in the SP poll either.

Well if he were really born with skates on, I feel bad for his mother. Those must have been some real kicks in the womb, especially if he was practicing Nessie in there.

Wow, as TP I might end up going faster. o_O

He has nice jump entry, and in terms of entry goes, his jump technique is fine, nothing that makes me want to grit teeth on. Height is okay, distance covered not that great-more height than distance, depends more on rotation speed and on axels at some point he made me wonder if he was spinning almost in the same position. Landings make my ankles hurt, flow on exit is non-existant. Musicality is a bit, meh (better in SP, problem in the long). He would probably usually net a 0 from me. No clear mess-ups, but nothing extraordinary to add GOEs to. (His OG PCS scores shocked me, I initially thought the PCS for the long was 82, which might have made more sense-but then someone woke me up to the fact it was 87)

Yes, but strictly speaking we should be following bullets as they are. Otherwise, it might as well be "let's judge by our standards that we created based on our bias" rather than "let's judge how it should have turned out by ISU existing rules." Hence why I mentioned being hesitant to call PRs unless they are extremely egregious-and even then, if we follow how TPs should usually go, the benefit is to the skater, not to my eyes or biases (honestly that's all that's keeping me from giving Shin Amano a run for the money). IMO, Boyang's jumps are usually a nice +2 if he doesn't have a mess up on the landing. Yuzu is usually a +2, +3. Shoma I can see some getting +1, as he does have good flow out, even if I don't like the knee torque. Most US men though, I think Jason Brown probably has the best looking jumps now (otherwise I like Andrew Torgashev in the Juniors ranks). Overall, the east asian skaters have pretty nice jumps, and Aliev has nice looking ones (minus that PR on the lutz), and Mikhail as gorgeous jumps.

He always goes there to test his new skates right? Because Jackson is Canada based. BUT-what if he has new choreography from Jeff or Shae-Lynn?

I can do loops without needing toe-socks. Besides, I only like qual/quad-loops coming from the toe-sock wearer, who hopefully is resting instead of kuyashiing image training his jumps.

Oh nice! I'll go poke around with it! So regarding the events- which ones do we judge? I think we have agreement on COC ladies top 6, Sp and LP correct? I'm thinking also Europeans Ladies, and possibly SC 2017 (think there were complaints that Marin Honda got robbed?). Any other controversial ones I'm missing?

*far far away, hissing noises emit from a pooh plush*

I love Zu, but toe socks is something I just cannot get used to. A split between the big toe and the rest of the toes is okay, but a split between pinky is just plain weird. Plus all that extra padding that makes the front of the boot feel too tight....ugh, no no no, that is one item even Yuzu can't successfully get me to buy.

The amount of information and stuff coming out this april is amazing. Does that mean the summer drought will be more severe than normal?

I would propose that we just emergency drop you into the exhibition, where no smelling salts will be needed. As a Yuzu fan, you'll naturally feel the vibe around you has changed, and just wake up. And probably faint again in front of a giant poster of him.

Um, I think I'll stay firmly as TP. =) My over generous scores as a judge would net a lot of tomatos to the face. Thinking back about how I tracked URs for ladies...I might not be that far from Shin Amano on URs now.

Well considering we're all Doh-M's as fans of the Doh-S king, that hell is probably paradise to us. o_O

I'm curious if people will go measure that waistline again. XD

I might be in the minority, but most of Yuzu's events were not that controversial, at least not at CoC2017 level of controversial. Yes, he gets underscored relative to others, but the effect on men's usually doesn't quite have the impact as the ladies. Frankly, my ire at TPs tend to get seriously directed at women's singles events just because consistency and PCS can be such game-changers.

Don't ask...it's like the banana art, better that you don't know where, just enjoy it when it is brought in. So given Jeff's inclinations, Yuzu's SP tend to be more experimental? Though didn't Yuzu himself mention at sometime he wanted to give Chopin a try? Well....Yuzu and anything Mahler might be interesting, especially if it's a version conducted by a young genius conductor like Dudamel.

Or do several rounds to see which 4 end up coming up on top. Or not use a poll system that only has 4 options when at least 8 is needed. I can seriously see Adam Rippon and Vincent Zhou beating Nate's SP, even if Yuzu isn't included.

Not so much perfect, but definitely the most controversial of the events this season.

The people they forgot is amazing, a list that includes the likes of Vincent Zhou, Jason Brown, Adam Rippon from the US, Kolyada and Aliev of Russia were left off, and nevermind smaller fed skaters like Cha, Bychenko or Deniss V.