Sombreuil

Doesn’t she realise that all her ....finest.....costume moments are there on the internet for the casual listener - right up to the most fanatical fanyu - to google search and see - in all their .....glory?

I got the right ladies in the wrong order- I think I got the men but I was thinking of several possibilities and might not have actually used that one - can’t remember pairs and dance.

This is why I like Satoko - she knows and acknowledges that her jumps are lacking and she does her level best to put them right, instead of pretending there’s no problem and hoping that the judges won’t notice - cough - TZ

TBH if you listen to them commentating on Shoma or Nathan - or sometimes Boyang and Mikhail when they aren’t falling all over the place- you begin to wonder what they’re watching, with a few exceptions. No it wasn’t perfect or his best performance but it’s the kind of uncritical gushing praise the top few tend to get unless they’re really splatting all over the place. Patrick and Javier used to get it too - will be interesting to see what they say about Javier at Europeans after a year off the radar. It took them ages to see Patrick as he really was skating after his comeback rather than how he had skated before. Yuzuru didn’t actually fall on this occasion so they can overlook the wobbles and the crunchy landings and gush - plus they’re blinded by those 2 OGMs. If they can ignore stiff legged landings, if heavy knee torque is regarded as an acceptable landing technique, if tons of crossovers and minimal transitions and choreography can be praised then why not a flawed Hanyu performance? Because the season before last all some of them could talk about was the fact he wasn’t skating clean, had he lost his edge, looking vulnerable etc etc, whilst praising easier, quad heavy /choreography light programmes with dubious technique to the skies - right up until FS WC 2017, when they could see what he was aiming for because he nailed it. Basically they talk absolute rubbish but they always have done - it’s nothing new. @wpisces I know exactly what you mean - I took most of the season to warm up to H & L and I’m getting the same feeling about Origin. With Phantom the skating was lovely and the mistakes were injury/ illness driven - he could cope with the difficulty and wasn’t upgrading because he was in no condition to try, so it was gorgeous with falls and sometimes less difficult spins. With LGC and H&L he was pushing the difficulty levels so there was a lot of frustration and grimly concentrated performances - it never quite came out perfectly for LGC,( though he did get the performance aspect of that one by GP,) and only once for H&L, luckily at the right place. Hopefully it will come right for Origin too.

At least once last season the blindfold and the jabbing finger won me ice dance or pairs but I don’t think it ever managed both in one competition!

I don’t know whether ISU has rules about it or not but it certainly isn’t the only time the ice has been less than optimal. GPF 2016 in Marseilles it was very soft - WC 2016 in Boston too iirc. Given that these are rinks being made/ used solely for figure skating there’s no reason for ice not to be absolutely right. At the Olympics the rink was being used alternately by speed skating and fs so there was more of an excuse for problems - though I think there it was the speed skaters who found it too hard? Can’t remember properly - soft for ss, harder for fs, hard for ih? Or the other was round something like that anyway....

I wonder whether this is what Jin Boyang needed - a bit of international competition mileage on his new programmes before the GP began.

There is also the ice issue - the photo of that big hole and comments about ice quality during the ladies SP. Maybe his sweet gesture showing the lady patching the ice where there was a hole was partly his legendary courtesy and partly self preservation!

The better lighting in Finland showed up the detail in the Origin costume beautifully- you could see the purple and the feather detail. I liked the extra blue on Otonal and the blue gloves. Pleeease Yuzuru drop a hint to Jun about his gloves. I dont know whether it was the show lighting in the summer or whether he changed it but the Sakura costume seemed to have more pink in it, some pearl details among the sparkles that I didn’t notice before and a little green detailing among the pink. Lovely.

I’m beginning to feel a bit ‘que sera, sera’ about 4A. It will happen when it happens, and I’m happy to be in the losing team on Helsinki being the place because I (and I don’t think I was the only one) was getting carried away with the ease ( relatively speaking) with which he managed last years programmes - which were repeats thankfully in the circs. Now I remember early versions of others and how long it takes to get them right and it’s unreasonable to expect 2 brand new programmes ( 3 if you count the ex) in a new scoring system and a new quad - the new quad because we all know that 4A is a different beast, all in the same season. Jokes about aliens apart, he might well still do it but let’s just try and be patient and less frantic about it. The media are being frantic enough for several fandoms.

I always think of that interview about wanting to skate to different music - we’ve heard the comment that he loves to skate from practically everyone closely involved with his career and when he does shows he seems to be enjoying himself, but there isn’t that edge you see in competition which is where I think he gets true satisfaction. As for the judges - I’m beginning to think that fuels him further - if they showered him with points he probably wouldn’t be so fired up. I also think that music he wants to use might surprise people - Phantom, my much maligned Phantom was his choice after all - so was R&J 2. I think his taste in music for his programmes is quite catholic and less about his personal musical tastes than what would be good/dramatic/ impressive to skate to.

Aaaah no - I didn’t put in a third lady - redone now - sorry.

Speculation about the progress of the laser technology - it’s being trialled at the world gymnastics championships in Doha but not actually used to judge the competition- will be interesting to see how the computers judgement stacks up against the actual competition decisions. They’re planning to use it at Stuttgart 2019 to evaluate blocked scores and inquiries and if that’s successful, in Tokyo 2020. have a nice video with Kenzo Shirai

Meh as far as I recall I get the winners but not the others, at least not in the right places. I really have trouble remembering pairs and dance apart from the obvious picks - especially dance. If my form holds for this round I won’t complain....

Rather than giving coaches the right to demand a review of the video by judges, giving ‘human error’ another chance to mess it up and big feds an opportunity to apply undue pressure , I think the system that FIG are trialling is the way to go. A computer can’t judge artistic merit, but it can measure the athletes movements, and it can tell whether a jump has mathematically been rotated or not. This is a copy - couldn’t get it to link to the actual article. Yes such equipment will be expensive, but it’s for big competitions - I can’t see FIG using it at every gymnastics competition, any more than goal line tech or the Hawkeye in tennis is used at small events, but for the big ones why not.? Gymnastics is not a wealthy sport either. The International Gymnastics Federation and Fujitsu to Collaborate on Building a Judging Support System for Artistic Gymnastics Competitions The International Gymnastics Federation,Fujitsu Limited Lausanne, Switzerland, and Tokyo, Japan, October 07, 2017 (Japan issue date: October 8, 2017) - The International Gymnastics Federation (FIG), which regulates Gymnastics disciplines internationally, and Fujitsu Limited today announced that they have agreed to collaborate on implementing a judging support system for Artistic Gymnastics competitions. In collaboration, FIG and Fujitsu will carry out data capture and field trials in order to achieve fair and accurate, real-time judging support for Artistic Gymnastics that can be launched in 2020. From 2016, Fujitsu Limited, Fujitsu Laboratories Ltd., and the Japan Gymnastics Association have been conducting joint research on judging support technology for Artistic Gymnastics competitions. Now, based on this technology, FIG, which oversees regional and national gymnastics organizations, establishes gymnastics rules, and hosts international competitions, and Fujitsu have agreed to work together to launch a judging support system in order to achieve consistently fair and accurate, real-time judging support. Under the agreement, Fujitsu, for the first time at a World Championship, captured competition data at the 47th Artistic Gymnastics World Championships in Montreal, Canada, from October 2nd to 8th. The data will be used to further develop the judging support system. Future Plans With the aim of making the system available for practical use in 2020, the partners will acquire data of athletes competing in international competitions and continue development of the system, which will be put to test use at the 48th Artistic Gymnastics World Championships, taking place in Doha, Qatar. Overview of Judging Support System for Artistic Gymnastics Competitions In addition to the scores given by the judges at the competitions, this system will support them to come to a more accurate judgment by capturing the gymnasts' movements with a 3D laser sensor and analyzing them as numerical data.

It’s also a pair of programmes that are retrospective - so the iconic moves are part of the theme. Who knows what he'll do if he’s skating next season.....

In the aftermath of the fuss about Vincent Zhou and his carrots (and his coach) at SA it will be interesting to see how Jason’s second pancake looks at SC, as a skater who is facing up to his jump deficiencies and has moved to a coaching team that he hopes will be able to help him remedy them instead of pretending they don’t exist.

Aaah - just did mine twice for SC - forgot to put my name on the first one @Joey if you wouldn’t mind deleting it. I won’t be quite as happy about getting singles wrong if it happens this time, unless it’s just a placement rejig. I’m hoping that Wakaba is going to be able to skate, but not expecting her to be in winning form with an injury. I’m assuming that her team would have someone sitting on her back in Tokyo if it was bad, given that this is year one of the next quad and a stress fracture would torpedo the whole season. I hope I’m not wrong about that. Apart from J/C employed the pin and blindfold again for pairs and dance.

This is where he should go https://imgur.com/gallery/Q7GrSiJ or maybe he should end his grand tour there

@Joey redid both so could you take out my first go - thank you - all these withdrawals making work for you

I think I’ll wait and see whether anyone else keels over before I redo anything. I hope we aren’t going to have a rerun of last years GP .........

I would be overwhelmed with gratitude if they could rework those jumps to even approach her spins etc. She’s climbing a higher mountain than Medvedeva, and trying to do it within a few weeks which seems to me to be unlikely to succeed. Whatever happens, she’s incredibly enjoyable to watch, and I really hope she proves me wrong.

The hands are always ...... exquisite ...... the costumes, especially those selected by the sponsors less reliably so....

Aaaaah yes - those picks ....🤔

I think most of us veer between what we really expect and wishful thinking for our favourites