Comparison videos and articles

[hoodie axel]

On 4/13/2019 at 8:02 AM, Old Cat Lady said:

Judging by the videos I've seen so far, I think this might be the greatest quad Lutz ever performed. Huge height and distance and a smooth landing.

Also great air position, and wonderful interpretive element

[Old Cat Lady]

29 minutes ago, hoodie axel said:

Also great air position, and wonderful interpretive element

 

 I also forgot to mention the absolutely perfect takeoff and nice posture. 

[hoodie axel]

Just now, Old Cat Lady said:

 

 I also forgot to mention the absolutely perfect takeoff and nice posture. 

Yeah, I basically became a fan based off that worlds competition That's actually the best jump ever for me, not just best 4Lz. It's not only got some of the best qualities ever, it's got LOTS of qualities, AND it works with that part of the program. Very rare, especially nowadays.

[hoodie axel]

11 hours ago, Old Cat Lady said:

Still think of Bobek when I think of the most beautiful spirals. I prefer the alignment of her body to Michelle's though in these photos it looks like Michelle has a better edge.  

For me, Kwan definitely had the best spiral, because of the way she didn't even bobble while raising or dropping her leg, especially impressive considering her speed and depth of edge.

[Old Cat Lady]

8 hours ago, hoodie axel said:

That's actually the best jump ever for me, not just best 4Lz.

It's in the running for me.  Undoubtedly, of all plain entry quads I think it's the best ever but I can't decide how I would rank it next to jumps with the more difficult entries. The only jumps I can think of that can compete are Yuzu's.  

 

3 hours ago, hoodie axel said:

For me, Kwan definitely had the best spiral, because of the way she didn't even bobble while raising or dropping her leg, especially impressive considering her speed and depth of edge.

 

I agree.  If I had to prioritize, I think the depth of edge, smoothness/speed of glide are the most important aspects of a spiral - to the point that I'm hard pressed to pick between Cohen's beautiful flat spiral and Slutskaya's butt ugly fast, deeply curved spiral.   I've just always loved Bobek's position and I guess there's a bit of nostalgia factor - that was the first season that I was more than just a casual viewer and Bobek's spiral was probably the single biggest "wow" element for me that year.   I wish there was some sort of required element to do a long gliding element that forces them to put the quality of their edge front and center rather than allowing the ones with weaker skills to hide behind choppy choreography.

 

btw, to everyone, if my OCD rearranging of links is annoying you I can wait to collect more of them before posting.  It's just easier to link as I come across them and I think they are most interesting when directly compared to like elements but I can see how that might make following the thread harder.  I'm also wondering if there will be issues with having so many links on one page - as usual, I'm letting myself get carried away 

[hoodie axel]

15 minutes ago, Old Cat Lady said:

Undoubtedly, of all plain entry quads I think it's the best ever but I can't decide how I would rank it next to jumps with the more difficult entries.

Well, it shows clarity of technique with the long back glide, which needs control, after all. It takes it based off the interpretation, because the music didn't need a different entry. There's a simple yet grand beauty there which goes very well with the music.

 

15 minutes ago, Old Cat Lady said:

I'm hard pressed to pick between Cohen's beautiful flat spiral and Slutskaya's butt ugly fast, deeply curved spiral.

Cohen's is probably second for me though. She had the best ever position on her arabesque.

(Kind of sad where US skating is after Kwan, Cohen, Savoie and others)

[Old Cat Lady]

This is a site of statistics.  I still have to look through it

https://www.sports.ru/tribuna/blogs/ternovblogfk/1400457.html

 

These are just compilations of Ladies 3A and quads but no stats.  

 

[Old Cat Lady]

I wasn't planning a collection of spread eagles but came across this pic. Don't know who this guy is

 

[hoodie axel]

Jonathan Cassar.

[mercedes]

13 hours ago, Old Cat Lady said:

I wasn't planning a collection of spread eagles but came across this pic. Don't know who this guy is

 

[sallycinnamon]

Another beautiful spread eagle from Jonathan:

 

cr. figure skaters online

[Old Cat Lady]

 

1 min in, there's a sbs of Yuzu and Plush spinning.  9 yo Yuzu already had better sit spins 

[Old Cat Lady]

Just came across these tweets by Chibura on spread eagles

 

 

 

http://shoma-uno.tumblr.com/tags

 

[Old Cat Lady]

It's not hard to see who most benefits from eliminating steps before jump requirement.  Though I suppose judges almost never followed that rule anyway so I guess it made no real difference in practice.  I think the only time I've ever seen judges deduct for it is in Yuzu's COC(?) performance of Etude 

 

eta: counter argument to myself. But perhaps the possibility of a deduction was enough to discourage skaters from doing jumps that are more difficult from steps. Maybe it's the difference between attempting a 4lz vs a 4t from steps.  It gives a lot more strategic flexibility.

 

eta 2: counter to my counter. But it never stopped them in the past,  so I guess not. As long as the judges didn't punish for the lack of steps, the skater never fixed it.  

[hoodie axel]

23 hours ago, Old Cat Lady said:

 

LOL, spread eagle entry into tiny wonky "quad".

 

I am entirely bored by spread eagles at this point. I have liked Boitano's and Kozuka's, Cassar's was good. That's pretty much it for me. I like Ina Bauers better. Well, as long as anyone uses them to interpret the music, instead of "HERE'S AN INA BAUER!!"