shanshani

I may have bought a new phone so I could film jumps at 240 FPS during practice and consequently do more accurate height estimates...not quite ice scope but it should be decent for non-wonky jumps. That makes me kind of want to go to SCI instead of ACI, since I’d be able to get Rika and Sasha too.

WAIT OMG HAN YAN IS BAACKK YES also yeah TBD at NHK is probably Dai. I hope he's been training hard and has more stamina for the long now. Also, though Dai doesn't pose any significant threat to Yuzu, it'll be interesting to see them compete against each other...when was the last time that happened?

I impulse bought (also bad) SCI tickets haha. I can only go to one of ACI/SCI though. At least I'm invulnerable to Yuzu choosing not to do ACI/my job refusing to let me take vacation on certain days. But if both are fine, which to go to. Hm. If only NHK tickets weren't so hard to get

Skate Canada ladies is stacked. Rika versus Evgenia versus Sasha

later as in a few hours behind when we expected it or later as in not this month?

Huh, really? Wow. I kind of think Rusfed might put pressure on someone behind the scenes in order to get Alena two spots, in that case... Who else from team Russia is guaranteed spots besides the skaters you listed?

Couldn't Rusfed give their host pick for CoR to her?

If he has halfway decent financial manager he'll be fine. He's almost certainly made a lot more money by 24 than your average person would in a lifetime, even accounting for the skating expenses. He also doesn't strike me as someone with extravagant spending habits--the only thing he might have to cut back on are earbud purchases

oof, there are no year round rinks around you? I want summer to be over soon too. because of my summer work schedule, I can only skate during crowded sessions now. It makes everything a billion times scarier and makes practice a lot less efficient. But at least I can still practice

Yeah, is it not called that when you step RBO to LFO? *googles* huh apparently there's some discrepancy in terminology and “mohawk” and “choctaw” officially only applies if the feet cross? Didn't know that, I thought it was just a description of which edges were involved in the step. Uh oh, I don't know if my forward inside open mohawks really fit that description. Looks like I have to practice those more too

My coach finally taught me the waltz jump! He seemed impressed with my fearlessness attempting real jumps for the first time. Then he made me do it from a back outside mohawk entrance, which definitely made it harder Now if I could only translate that fearlessness to inside 3 turns.

If we take those words very literally, it does sound like a rules change. But Lakernik gave an interview recently where he said the first place skater at worlds gets to pick, and then the 2nd place, and so on? Plus they're still "seeded" which should mean they're still being kept apart from each other?

Sometimes the kinds of surveys these programs come up with really amuse me. What an oddball question

Unfortunately my skin has not improved since I started skating I do have much stronger leg muscles now though

Oh no, Yuzu and I would get along horribly, because I also hate losing arguments and will argue until my face is blue.

yeah, I have a feeling Shoma's technique means that he's not really gonna be able stay on the competitive scene too much longer past Yuzu. I do wonder if the fact that Nate jumps smaller is protective--it makes sense, the less high you go the less force you hit the ground with. Another reason why skaters have no incentive to jump big

regretting not trying harder to get FaOI tickets now

Does Nate get injured so much? I feel like we hear about Shoma and Yuzu getting injured a lot, and I get the sense Boyang isn't doing too hot either. Maybe it's because Nate's still so young--I feel like the quads are really starting to wear on most of our quadsters. Can't say people didn't predict this, though.

wait, left ankle? well at least it wasn't his right

what. is it possible to donate ankle/foot ligaments? because Yuzu can have mine if this is what's going to happen edit: well I guess that explains the fact that his 3A has been a bit off lately. good luck Yuzu, good luck everyone. please no more catastrophic injuries--at least this one seems relatively minor

Sure, but I actually think lower ranked skaters are often genuinely underscored (ie. should have gotten higher based on the bullets they hit).

I would say the judging is actually in many ways consistently worse for lower ranked skaters--they're often given piddly GOE for jumps that would have gotten at least +3 if they were executed by a top skater, routinely under scored on PCS, and generally not given the benefit of the doubt on anything in a way that artificially creates massive gaps between them and the top skaters.

Interesting. Thanks! I don't really like the idea of element difficulty not mattering at all in the artistic program. I think the distribution of points should change to emphasize execution over difficulty, but tbh quads are more visually impressive and breathtaking than triples, all else being equal. Like if I were designing the point system for the artistic program, Yuzu's quads would score more than Jason's triples, but Jason's triples would score more than Nathan's quads. On the flip side, I hope the technical program wouldn't deemphasize artistry too much, because honestly watching hours of jumpfests just seems kind of boring. Plus skating skills are technical as much as they are artistic. I do like having fewer jumps/spins in the artistic program, as the number of elements required seriously impacts the choreo, especially in the FS. Letting skaters breath a little will give us more interesting programs. I agree with the sentiment that it doesn't matter very much how much the ISU changes the rules though, if the judges themselves aren't well trained. I'll take a wait-and-see on this one though--there *is* a problem with scoring right now overvaluing the purely technical aspects of figure skating and undervaluing the artistic, so I can't say there's no problem to be solved. Plus, it's pretty unlikely to affect Yuzu either way, since I can't imagine the odds of him continuing on past Beijing are that high.

Is this like, splitting FS into two disciplines/competitions or is it more like renaming the SP and FS and differentiating the scoring guidelines/requirements more? Because the latter iirc was kind of the original idea of the SP versus the FS (except the SP is supposed to be the more technical program and the FS more artistic, lol). If it's the latter, depending on the implementation I could kind of go for it, if it actually makes artistry worth something and punishes the 'push tech/neglect artistry and skating skills' strategy. If they're splitting up the competition entirely though, that's a big NO from me.

Maybe it would work, maybe it wouldn't, but Yuzu's personality is different from Yuna's, Yuzu vs Shoma is a different situation than Yuna vs Mao (that rival iirc had a degree of tension that way, way outstrips Yuzu versus Shoma), so I don't really see why it would necessarily have to result in some big dramatic fallout. And again, I doubt that Brian wouldn't at least discuss it with Yuzu, and if Yuzu is really opposed I think he could sink the idea. I agree Javi was probably a bigger factor in Javi & Yuzu working out, but clearly Yuzu isn't like, incapable of training with a rival or inexperienced with managing the dynamics that come with that. Plus, Shoma is his countryman and will hopefully be around to represent Japanese figure skating after Yuzu r-words, so Yuzu has reasons to want Shoma to be successful. On top of all that, the fact that they appear to have a kind of big brother-little brother type dynamic going on can only help defuse any problems that might arise. Anyway, TCC might be too busy anyway, and they do have their own stuff to deal with with Lee Barkel's departure. I just don't think that if Shoma goes to TCC it's going to be some kind of big problem for Yuzu.