Songster01

For context and nuance, I would recommend following Judge Three on Twitter. JT is a fs abuse survivor in another case that is ongoing. What JT has been put through by the US fed and Safe Sport is sickening: https://twitter.com/JudgeThree

Let us not forget Bridget Namiotka who bravely came forward under her own name publicly and had no public support from USFS, facing down the negativity of her colleagues and too many fs fans. USFS already knew of Ashley's experiences then and still they kept their mouth shut. Disgusting.

Considering the difficulty of the jumps and the number of these jumps (3), I would be really surprised if he landed all of them in competition next season. Of the three, 4Lz feels like it should appear next season, barring injury. 4F and 4A may still be works in progress, so I would not be shocked if only one or neither appeared this coming competitive season. So I took this as a determination to be around for at least 2 seasons, if his health allows it. I can see him wanting the blaze of glory of the 4A for sure, and maybe landing all types of quads as an "extended" goal that would not say anything certain about his will to do the next Olys, considering the very great risks to his health to do that many dangerous jumps. I do agree that I doubt he'd do Olys unless he knew he had a very good chance of winning. Of course all of this could change at any time if he gets more than a very minor injury.

I'm planning to go to ACI regardless because it's very close to me, is cheaper than later-season competitions (though who knows with SC this year), and because the chance is good that Yuzu and other TCC skaters will be there (perhaps also Kevin A and Julian Yee will return as well). Moreover, I found the atmosphere fun, like a convention, and the seats you can get are great (though ofc I'd love it if they took off the hockey glass this year). I suspect the only reason Y would not go is if he got injured again at some point (let's hope not!). Although I suppose he might choose another Challenger in Europe? But ACI is convenient and not associated with another rival already, like the USC and Lombardia. OTOH, if you want programs to be more polished, then maybe a later event is best? But I hear you. The prices for Worlds are awful and everyone I know is unenthused, which is sad because we were hoping for a nice meet-up. I guess everyone has to decide what they want to do, based on their own preferences, budget, and logistics. If Y appears at ACI, I may consider not doing Worlds at all, though I really wanted to go. But then, who knows how I will feel by then, as the scoring trend does not seem as friendly to complete and artistic skaters as we hoped. One friend told me she was trying to keep motivated by just watching performances and trying to shut out scoring and placements. But that can be hard to do. I am hoping watching FaOI will help because there is no scoring, just ppl trying to entertain and enthrall.

I have to agree that we can't make a strong statement about how well Stephen did under the Lee and Brian combo (we can't forget they were his co-coaches before) vs. Lee as sole head coach. Lee is (or was if rumor is true) Stephen's only sole coach since sometime after his second JGP event. He had two successful outings at 2 very important events (JGPF and CNats) and struggled at a third (JWorlds). Definitely not enough time to make a definitive statement either way, but also tbh encouraging. Add this to Lee being a co-coach from some years, you can see that it is no cut and dried situation. I had been hoping this wasn't a huge split and that perhaps once things settled in a season or so SG's parents might go back to a collab at least, but I doubt that the parents who took their much younger child from Russia to Canada would be afraid of a move to the US. They may have liked Nathan's season and got the same message the singles skaters seemed to be getting from judges esp in the late season: landing certain jumps at least decently will give you a PCS and GOE bonus. Doesn't matter if your SS and performance skills are that close to the real leaders in that area or not (see Lilbet and Vincent). Raf admitted as much to the Russian media that he knew he could get the judges' approval even with Nathan dropping choreography and lesser SS/TR proficiency. So he wants his students to medal more than he wants them to become complete skaters (as we see from his skaters). Not that he's against it ofc; he seems to think N at least can get there eventually. As for great coaches in the GTA, Lee seems to have the last few years favored working with mostly juniors. It may be he found over time he worked best with younger skaters. This does not make him a better or worse coach than one who works with seniors mostly, as both are important stages in a skater's career! Having a mediocre or worse junior or lower-level coach may cost a skater years to catch up (see Javi's career and imagine where he might have been had he gone to Brian and Tracy years before). I had been getting the vibe that he was happy to handle primarily juniors (though definitely I could be wrong, this is nothing but a hunch by someone who doesn't know these ppl or work at the rinks alongside them). Perhaps and more importantly in this case, the only coach recently who had turned out very top senior men who were very successful at their goals, other than Brian and Tracy, is Raf. Patrick Chan moved around alot and struggled after his break, and Russian men and Boyang struggled alot this year. Even Shoma struggled much more this season. If SG's parent's were worried about inconsistency, then perhaps the past couple seasons Raf has had with N has made them think he could help their son, though ofc he's still in early puberty days and alot could happen. I may disagree with Raf and wouldn't want to send esp a female skater to him ever, but at least like Brian he isn't going to push S to the detriment of his future career quad-wise. I do agree that unless they get better ppl SG's SS, posture, performance skills may stagnate or worse. Last, I'm def no fan of TSL for multiple reasons, but they do still seem to have Doug Haw as an insider to feed them information. He seems to be their pair of ears and eyes at TCC. At least for things like coaching changes re: TCC they have been right on for the past year, even for less newsworthy ones like Joseph Phan audition and moving to Brian last summer. Regardless in this case I hope the rumor is wrong. But honestly I'd be more surprised if they were, considering it is TCC-related coaching news.

I see the Olympic Channel is trying to stir up 4A excitement by telling us a 4A from Keegan is "Possible", but honestly imo either the quote is old, or Keegan means "possible" as in "anything's possible! Yuzu could land a sept, I could bring out the 4A, aliens could invade the planet". Of course, he could have been cagey in what he told Bev Smith in the early season, but he strikes me as a straightforward person. And what he said is supported by his actions from August onward continued flirtation with the 4Lz in practice and competition. I suppose he could have given up on the 4Lz after SCI, but then he'd have only 3 weeks to reacquaint himself with the 4A in harness, work on getting it out of harness, and then land it enough he feels he could trying in a program in practice and then competition. But then the other aspects of his program might suffer when he's about to compete at an event where has a real chance of qualifying for the GPF? I doubt Keegan would want to jeopardize that on the off chance he might land a 4A.

Very doubtful. If you look upthread for my posts on Keegan you’ll see by late summer he had shelved it to concentrate on the 4Lz. He hoped that later on that jump would allow him to turn back to the 4Lz and hopefully work on getting it out of the harness. It would be extremely foolish to suddenly take a jump that dangerous at that stage of development and suddenly yolo it. In all his interviews since late summer all focus has been on the 4Lz and he clearly was still focusing on it at SCI so I doubt he gave up and suddenly brought out the 4A, moved it out of harness and started landing it consistently in 3 weeks. Not utterly impossible, but very unlikely especially considering he has a definite chance to make the podium and the GPF.

Yep, that's the Ice Talk podcast I mentioned in my reply to you earlier. I listened again just in case but there are no references to the 4A anywhere, not in the interview with Keegan, nor in any of the other segments. Again Keegan discusses the 4Lz and his struggles landing it this season. Perhaps someone misheard "Lutz" as "Axel", but it's also clear from context he is talking about the 4Lz since that was in his planned content at GTSA (which I saw myself live). He landed one in practice, but not in competition (called <), though it was attempted. At Nebelhorn no 4Lzs were landed, though it's not completely clear whether his triples were planned or not (consensus is planned though). That the Ice Talk interview didn't touch on the 4A suggests it wasn't enough on the radar of the international press atm to ask; it was clear anyway that the 4Lz was his foremost interest for at least part of this season (or all, though we'll have to see ofc), given the earlier interview with Canadian journalist Bev Smith: https://bevsmithwrites.com/keegan-messing-what-now/ A quote (more details at the link): "And then there’s that quad Axel, the new frontier. And Messing is walking into the ether of it. Messing says he and coach Ralph Burghart are “joking around with it.”" “It’s scary but it’s cool,” he said. “I haven’t tried it out of the belt yet, but we’re really hoping that we can work it out of the belt this year.” So unless he's already given up on the 4Lz (seems early to do so!) he's probably still focusing primarily on it and leaving the process of the moving the 4A out of the harness to later this season or in the off-season.

Hey there! Do you happen to have a source for this? I'd love to see the date and full context. Is it something that came out since his interview on Ice Talk last week, during which he talked about stabilizing the 4Lz but the 4A was not discussed at all iirc. Beforehand he chatted about it in text interviews noting that he was putting it on the back burner for at least part of the season but hoped to be able to return to it later on once/if the 4Lz is more stable (see upthread to my earlier post). If he does get back to it (or if he has already), his next step was to get it out of the harness and be able to land it w/o the harness. However, that was end of summer and he may have changed his mind (though stabilizing the 4Lz is a better option from strategic viewpoint)? Just trying to be cautious here before people get too excited/scared for the skaters' safety.

I don't think this was posted here yet; I did skim through earlier pages, but may have missed it: Alexey Mishin: “Dmitriev is closest to the quadruple axel of all the athletes I have seen” https://www.sports.ru/figure-skating/1067323885.html (source: post #283 on this page: https://goldenskate.com/forum/showthread.php?72086-2018-19-Russian-Men-s-figure-skating/page15 If the translation is accurate, then clever wording from Mishin, given that it's probably unlikely Mishin has been visiting TCC this summer/early fall (correct me though if I'm wrong, but I've not seen any sign of him visiting). I assume "I have seen" means either seen anywhere (live or on a video), or in person (live). So if he hasn't seen Yuzuru, then he isn't part of that group of athletes evaluated by Mishin. Coupled with D saying he wants to get back in shape for 4A (if a recent quote), then he might be able to try again later in the season, unless that combo is really his new main focus and the 4A is a nice but secondary goal. I don't know D well enough to say how serious the 4A comments are .

Yes, what I got from the interview is that Keegan and his coach wanted to focus more on stabilizing the 4Lz as they ramped up for the GP . Better risk/reward ratio to do so. It sounds like K wants to get back to trying it in harness, maybe later this season and then be able to transition to doing it out of harness. That would be the next big step, though obviously he would have to get used to it in harness again. Unless he's holding back on his 4A status for strategic reasons, it doesn't sound like it would be landed this season unless the 4Lz cooperates and fairly soon. At the GTSA Summer Skate (seen in person) he fell on his 4Lz and < and at Nebelhorn he chose to do the 3Lz (or it popped? haven't watched so just looking at the protocols). So for the GP series he would want to choose one new quad to concentrate on and he's still working on the 4Lz. We can check bck after the GPF to see how the 4Lz is going for him. If it's still a work in progress, then it seems even likelier a 4A attempt would not happen until next season, unless again he is still focused more on stabilizing the 4Lz. Then again, K loves danger and thrill, and he may surprise us. If he does "go for it" it won't be out of character. I just hope all of the 4A chasers keep as safe as possible and not push themselves to do it in competition too early. Even if K and Yuzuru are in the later stages of their careers, no one wants to see those careers end early because of a 4A-induced injury. As for Stephen, who is 13 btw, I am cheering for his growth and development as a complete skater like his idol. He has plenty to work on already, and Brian and Lee permitting even harness work on the 4A by a junior man would be a terrible decision. Why would they risk SG's potential on it? Even the 4Lz is a big risk, though if he can learn to to it well, if he needs to give it up during extended growth spurts then at least he'd have the feel of it 4Lz in the bank. And with multiple men doing it already, it's more useful.