Skate Canada 2023 Mens FS - Rat's All, Folks!

[tony]

And yet some people want to get rid of the "q."

Yeah, because what are the odds that a skater lands EXACTLY at 90 degrees short? Exactly 90 degrees, no more no less. Because that’s what the rule book says it has to be. What a total joke. It’s used by generous panels as a way to manipulate a base value not going down, on top of lowered GOE.

And I’m still arguing 10+ years later that edge and warning calls need to go away because it’s selectively applied even when CLEAR evidence is repeatedly given of lifetime offenders. Call the jump by the takeoff edge. Done. Watch how many skaters start cleaning up their jumps and/or taking certain jumps out that they otherwise got full credit for.

 

[mtnskater]

Those medals are a million times better than Skate America’s. Pretty classy.

I need the Canadian female skater arm workout! Seriously. Deanna’s arms are fab.

 

[Vagabond]

I think some of those people would like the a more severe penalty if the jump is not fully rotated, but I'll let some people speak for themselves.

I did use a wink emoticon. I would be fine either way, whether a 270º jump is treated as fully rotated or as underrotated. But there's no good reason why 269º, 270º, and 271º degree jumps are treated in three, rather than two, ways. YMMV.

 

[skatingguy]

Selevko, Mihhail
Coach: Irina Kononova
Music: Game of Thrones (soundtrack)

4T
4S
3Lo
2A+3T
Fly Ch Combo Spin 4
Choreo Sequence
1A
3Fq+1Eu+2S - didn't check the rotation on the Salchow
2Lz+2T - two-foot landing on the double toeloop
Ch Camel Spin 3
Step Sequence 3
Ch Combo Spin 3V

Bit of a mixed skate for Selevko. An improvement from the short program, but still lots of errors creeping into the jumps in the 2nd half.

140.60 = 1st Place
210.78 = 1st Place

 

[skatingguy]

Gorodnisky, Mark
Coach: Andrei Berezintsev, Inga Zusev
Music: Shape of Lies, True Love's Last Kiss

3A
3A+2A+SEQ
3Lz
3F+3T
Fly Ch Combo Spin 4
Ch Sit Spin 3
2A+1Eu+3S
3F
3Lo
Ch Combo Spin 3
Choreo Sequence
Step Sequence 4

Really solid skate for Mark. Nice jump technique across the board makes him an easy skater to watch, and enjoy. The program needs some work, and more complexity, and performance throughout.

154.66 = 1st Place
225.35 = 1st Place

 

[skatingguy]

Kapeikis, Liam
Coach: Keegan Murphy, Louise Kapeikis,Eileen Murphy
Music: The Boxer by Jerry Douglas

4S - fall
3A
3A+1Eu+3S - very tight landing
3Lz+2T
Fly Ch Combo Spin 4
3F+2A+SEQ
3F - back on the heel - big step out
3Lo
Step Sequence 3
Ch Combo Spin 4
Choreo Sequence
Fly Sit Spin 4

Liam wasn't quite over his skates at times in this performance. Really lovely skating skills, and a nice feel for the music.

148.56 = 2nd Place
220.15 = 2nd Place

 

[skatingguy]

Rakic, Aleksa
Coach: Joanne McLeod
Music: No One Like You by Red Electric

4T
3S
3Aq - hands down, collapsed at the waste
3Lo+3Lo - the Tara Lipinski
Choreo Sequence
Fly Camel Spin 3
3A<+REP - hard fall
1Lz
3F - fall
Step Sequence 3
Ch Combo Spin 3
Fly Ch Combo Spin 3

Rough skate. The Axels were not his friend, and the fall on the second triple Axel clearly rattled him.

116.82 = 4th Place
189.38 = 4th Place

 

[skatingguy]

Rizzo, Matteo
Coach: Ondrej Hotarek, Valter Rizzo
Music: Fix You by Coldplay

4T
4Lo
3F+1Eu+3S
3Lz+2T
Ch Combo Spin 4
3A+2A+SEQ
3Lz
Choreo Sequence
3A - stumbled out
Step Sequence 3
Ch Camel Spin 3
Fly Sit Spin 4

Pretty good skate overall. A couple of issues late in the program with levels, but we'll see what reviews do. Data entry issues on the jumps during the skate.

171.02 = 1st Place
246.01 = 1st Place

 

[skatingguy]

Chiu, Wesley
Coach: Keegan Murphy, Eileen Murphy
Music: Kill Bill

3F+3T
4T+3T - step out
4Sq - fall
3Lo
Fly Sit Spin 3
3A - stumbled out
3Lz+1Eu+3Sq - no flow/speed
3Lz
Choreo Sequence
Fly Ch Combo Spin 4
Step Sequence 3
Ch Combo Spin 3

Messy skate. Couldn't find the balance on the blade tonight. The program got lost in the midst of the errors.

144.60 = 4th Place
221.54 = 3rd Place

 

[skatingguy]

Orzel, Conrad
Coach: Ravi Walia
Music: Imagine Dragons Medley

4S
4T+3Tq
3T
2A
Fly Camel Spin 2
Step Sequence 3
3Lz+2T
2F+2A+2A*+SEQ - messy landings, and too many double Axels
3Lo< - and again
Choreo Sequence
Ch Sit Spin 3
Ch Combo Spin 3

Doing a triple toeloop instead of a second quadruple toeloop really had him thinking through the rest of the program, and caused problems with jump repetitions.

135.44 = 6th Place
213.12 = 5th Place

 

[skatingguy]

Shaidorov, Mihhail
Coach: Alexei Urmanov
Music: Carmina Burana by Carl Orff

4Lzq
3A
4T+3T
Choreo Sequence
3F!
Fly Ch Combo Spin 4
3Lz+1Eu+3Sq
3Aq+2A+SEQ
3Lz
Fly Ch Sit Spin 3
Step Sequence 3
Ch Combo Spin 2

Got the job done on the jumps. He's committed to the program, but it lacks some complexity, and detail, and his skating lacks polish, and stretch.

162.47 = 2nd Place
241.65 = 2nd Place

 

[skatingguy]

I did use a wink emoticon. I would be fine either way, whether a 270º jump is treated as fully rotated or as underrotated. But there's no good reason why 269º, 270º, and 271º degree jumps are treated in three, rather than two, ways. YMMV.

I saw, but I couldn't help but poke @tony a bit.

 

[skatingguy]

Miura, Kao
Coach: Noriko Sato, Nobuko Fukui, KojiOkajima
Music: Attack On Titan

3A+1Eu+3S
4T
4S
Fly Camel Spin 4
3A - big fall, and slide
Step Sequence 4
4T+3T
3Lo+2A+SEQ
3F
Ch Sit Spin 3
Choreo Sequence
Ch Combo Spin 4

Pretty good skate aside from the fall on the Axel. Really attacked this choreography, and used the music, and kept the speed up to match the music throughout the program.

177.09 = 1st Place
257.89 = 1st Place

 

[skatingguy]

Tomono, Kazuki
Coach: Taijin Hiraike, Yukiko Sugita,Misha Ge
Music: Halston by Stephan Moccio

4T+2T - 3-turn between the jumps
4T - weight back, step out
4Sq - tight landing, a little off-axis
3Lo
Fly Camel Spin 4
3A<+1Eu+3S
3F+2A+SEQ
3A
Step Sequence 3
Ch Sit Spin 4
Choreo Sequence
Ch Combo Spin 4

Very muted skate from Tomono compared to the energy we usually see in his programs. It didn't help him land the jumps any better here, the program did get better as it went along.

163.49 = 3rd Place
245.12 = 3rd Place

 

[skatingguy]

Cha, Junhwan
Coach: Hyun Jung Chi
Music: The Batman Theme

4S< - hard fall, slide to the boards
4Tq - another rough fall
3F - was supposed to be quadruple Salchow
Fly Camel Spin 4
3Lz+1Lo
Step Sequence 4
3Aq - big step out
3Aq+REP - fall
3Lz
Ch Combo Spin 4
Choreo Sequence
Fly Ch Combo Spin 4

That's a disaster. Grand Prix Final = gone. Even Ted called this a disaster, that's how bad it was.

130.43 = 10th Place
216.61 = 8th Place

 

[skatingguy]

Yamamoto, Sota
Coach: Machiko Yamada, Yuko Hongo,Yukiko Murakami
Music: Exogenesis Symphony Part 3 by Muse

4S
4T+3T
4T
3A< - fall
Fly Camel Spin 4
3A+REP - big step out
Choreo Sequence
3F+1Eu+3S
3Lz!
Ch Sit Spin 4
Step Sequence 3
Ch Combo Spin 4

Axel problems, but otherwise a good skate. Opening jumping passes were really smooth. After he made the mistake on the second Axel he switched the combo and did the euler combo instead of the double Axel sequence, and that was very helpful to winning the gold medal.

Based on the look on his face at the beginning of the program I thought they were playing the wrong music.

168.86 = 3rd Place
258.42 = 1st Place

 

[skatingguy]

delete

 

[skateboy]

Chiming in here to congratulate Sota on his win! He's one of my favorites. Edges like buttah.

 

[Private Citizen]

Yeah, because what are the odds that a skater lands EXACTLY at 90 degrees short? Exactly 90 degrees, no more no less. Because that’s what the rule book says it has to be. What a total joke. It’s used by generous panels as a way to manipulate a base value not going down, on top of lowered GOE.

And I’m still arguing 10+ years later that edge and warning calls need to go away because it’s selectively applied even when CLEAR evidence is repeatedly given of lifetime offenders. Call the jump by the takeoff edge. Done. Watch how many skaters start cleaning up their jumps and/or taking certain jumps out that they otherwise got full credit for.

I agree that q needs to go away; < and << are more than enough. Q is a cop-out and a way to hold up skaters.

On your other points, I think we need to look at technology to stop the biased calling. I don't think humans will do any better than they do today, and your proposed changes may make things worse v. better. I don't think the tech panel is going to magically see, e.g., Sakamoto's flutz, anymore than it does today. If anything, their blindness might get worse when forced into a binary decision between no call and "e" (or a third flip with zero points). Sometimes Sakamoto gets a ! from the more conscientious panels that want to pretend like they're doing their job, and sometimes nothing at all. Take away that option, and I think she'd be getting no call and +4 GOE, not "3Lze" with negative GOE or 3F* with 0 points.

It would also be a PR nightmare for a competition to get decided by a borderline call that resulted in 0 points. Sakamoto is clear, heavy flutzer, so that one could be justified. But imagine a popular skater like Hendrickx or Levito goes from first to fourth place over what is today a borderline ! call that results in loss of a point or so, but in the future would be a call that results in 0 points. Continuing to hyper-focus here, v. on the various other technique issues, seems wrong to me.

I'd be more on board with either calling the lutz and flip the same jump or requiring the lutz to show clear and unambiguous counter-rotation (or face a 50% reduction in BV).

 

[SkateFanBerlin]

Kao - I don't understand his shirt... is the black a holster or lederhosen? This will probably take the lead, but I was bored.

Had same reaction - lederhosen, definately

 

[SkateFanBerlin]

Well, Sota probably did enough to hold onto gold, but I'm gonna be salty about it because effing Exogenesis.

I agree. I think Exogenesis has bad ju ju. Nobody wins with it. Exception, here, with Yamamoto

 

[SkateFanBerlin]

I`m jumped out. All I see now in singles. The other bits seem like icing decorations on a cake.

 

[Dobre]

Oh, darn, it wasn't Wesley's night. I had such high hopes (sigh) but hopefully he'll have better FS results at future comps this year. Canada is having one heck of a time finding a consistent men's skater right now but hope dies last ....

I feel his team overreached. He is getting his quad back, after a year of growth & adjustment. This would be a good time to focus on regaining the confidence that was impaired during that growth process. (Working on new skills in practice, but not overloading the competitive programs so much). He should be able to execute those axels. As the Canadian men go, it seems to me like he has the pieces. These programs just felt like there was too much. Also the Kill Bill is such a waste of his musicality & line.

 

[Dobre]

Second best in overall quality in the world only to Kagiyama.

Miura's spins & positions both need work.

----

I couldn't disagree more with whoever said this FS is a step up from Beauty & the Beast. I think it's a step down. He came out and skated angry last night though, which helped after a series of not-so-hot practices. (Dealing with a new level of expectations this season after proving himself last, I think. This is a good experience for him).

 

[Sylvia]

He [Miura] came out and skated angry last night though, which helped after a series of not-so-hot practices. (Dealing with a new level of expectations this season after proving himself last, I think. This is a good experience for him).

@Dobre, here was Kao Miura's post after his SP (cross-posting from the SCI23 News thread): https://www.instagram.com/p/Cy7j2vKOPhC/

A very disappointed Kao Miura 三浦 佳生 80.80 speaks to the press: “Since I came here I have some concerns about the ice and the quality of the ice. It is hard to get a good take off on my Salchow. The ice kind of bounces back to me. My trainings and condition have been good, but this situation makes me a bit anxious and I don’t know what to really do about it. I have to find a way to still do a good job. It was similar at last year’s Skate Canada, also the rink is a bit narrow for my liking. I fear I can’t find a solution in one day!”

Kao's 4S landed last night was 9.70 bv + 2.91 goe = 12.61 points!

 

[kwanfan1818]

When Rizzo does that half-rink one-footed glide with his arm up into his early big jump, I keep thinking he is doing the Queen Elizabeth II hand wave to the judges.

 

[Sylvia]

Liam is a dual citizen of USA & Canada, IIRC.

for skating well in front of his “home” crowd tonight!

From this Liam Kapeikis article before his GP debut at 2022 Skate America:

Kapeikis calls himself a “tri-citizen” as he holds citizenship for three countries – the U.S., Canada and Great Britain. His mother was born in Great Britain and obtained Canadian citizenship upon moving to Canada. Despite this fact, Kapeikis has no intentions of skating for another federation.

His mother, Louise, is listed on Connaught SC's website as the CanSkate Coordinator.