2023 Grand Prix Final - Men SP: “The Quadruple Revolution”

[victorskid]

The SP results

​

1​	Ilia MALININ	USA	106.90​	62.53​		44.37​	8.93​	8.89​	8.75​	0.00​	#5​
2​	Shoma UNO	JPN	106.02​	58.91​		47.11​	9.36​	9.39​	9.46​	0.00​	#2​
3​	Yuma KAGIYAMA	JPN	103.72​	58.09​		45.63​	9.07​	9.00​	9.25​	0.00​	#3​
4​	Kao MIURA	JPN	94.86​	51.67​		43.19​	8.64​	8.54​	8.68​	0.00​	#4​
5​	Kevin AYMOZ	FRA	93.20​	47.70​		45.50​	9.11​	9.21​	8.93​	0.00​	#1​
6​	Adam SIAO HIM FA	FRA	88.36​	43.53​		44.83​	8.96​	8.96​	8.93​	0.00​	#6​

Protocols: http://www.isuresults.com/results/s...------QUAL000100--_JudgesDetailsperSkater.pdf

 

[npavel]

https://www.isu.org/figure-skating/rules/fsk-regulations-rules/file

page 105
2. The Senior Short Program shall consist of the following required
elements:
Men
a) Double or triple Axel Paulsen;
b) Triple or quadruple jump;
c) Jump combination consisting of a double jump and a triple jump or
two triple jumps or a quadruple jump and a double jump or a triple
jump;
d) Flying spin;
106
e) Camel spin or sit spin with only one change of foot;
f) Spin combination with only one change of foot;
g) Step sequence fully utilizing the ice surface

 

[Holy Headband]

Great choice by the audio producer to turn the music up to 11 during replays so that I can’t hear Ted and Mark ***ing off Shoma and Adam as I watch all this unfold on my phone on the bus.

 

[tony]

And yeah, Malinin & Kagiyama a point apart in PCS and 0.50 apart in skating skills.

Fire them all

Judge 5 living in my world where they though the Axel could not be in the solo jump, -5 for Ilia lol

 

[Karen-W]

And yeah, Malinin & Kagiyama a point apart in PCS and 0.50 apart in skating skills.

Fire them all

Judge 5 living in my world where they though the Axel could not be in the solo jump, -5 for Ilia lol

Nah, Judge 5 ain't living in your world. Your world is one in which judge 5 would have some 'splaining to do about why he doesn't know the rules and we all know, from the ice dance discussions recently, that's not the ISU's reality.

 

[Wyliefan]

I'm caught up with everything else, junior and senior, but men's replay isn't up yet, so I came on over to spoil myself. Good for you, Ilia!

 

[Karen-W]

GoldenSkate quote from Ilia post-SP - seems his team did consult with some judges locally before the GPF about the 4A and whether it was allowed or not.

Golden Skate on Instagram: "Ilia Malinin 🇺🇸 PB 106.90 including first ever landed quad Axel in the SP 💪🏻 “I came here to surpise everyone. It was a lot of pressure on me. I knew it would be really hard for me to train it [the quad Axel] and do it.

100 likes, 1 comments - goldsk8 on December 7, 2023: "Ilia Malinin 🇺🇸 PB 106.90 including first ever landed quad Axel in the SP 💪🏻 “I ca..."

www.instagram.com

 

[tony]

I've been trying to find links to Wayback copies of the technical panel rules for the last decade (and more) and I can't find anything that says the Axel-- of any rotation-- cannot be done as a solo jump. Maybe it was in a different clarification than the one I was specifically looking for, or maybe it was changed after Mao Asada was doing the 3A in the short in 2010 as a combo. There had to be a rule that stopped her from doing 3A, 2A, 3Lz+3Lo, for example, but the archives are skimpy for that long ago.

 

[Frau Muller]

Ooooo, Ilia’s quad axel in the SP has perturbed a few.

 

[skatingguy]

I've been trying to find links to Wayback copies of the technical panel rules for the last decade (and more) and I can't find anything that says the Axel-- of any rotation-- cannot be done as a solo jump. Maybe it was in a different clarification than the one I was specifically looking for, or maybe it was changed after Mao Asada was doing the 3A in the short in 2010 as a combo. There had to be a rule that stopped her from doing 3A, 2A, 3Lz+3Lo, for example, but the archives are skimpy for that long ago.

I think you've got that right - I was thinking it was changed after the 2009/10 season, but wasn't certain.

 

[AYS]

These are further the comments below the rules that @npavel posted. It permits what Ilia did, since it only specifies that the 3 axel can't be repeated, and since triples and quads are different jumps per the rules. That judge effed up. The computer initially probably thought that was the axel of the program - which would have been invalid, if he'd gone on to not do the 3 axel. These things happen when you're a trailblazer.

@tony That layout would not have benefitted Mao anyway, since she'd be trading out a higher valued jump for a lower valued jump by including a double axel instead of just doing the 3axel has the axel, so why would she consider it.

Jumps b) For Senior Men any triple or quadruple jump is permitted, when a quadruple jump is executed in c), a different quadruple jump can be included as a solo jump. For Senior and Junior Men and for SeniorWomen, when the triple Axel Paulsen is executed in a), it cannot be repeated again as a solo jump or in the jump combination. For SeniorWomen any triple jump is permitted. For Junior Women and Men only the prescribed double or triple jump is permitted.

 

[Kateri]

That layout would not have benefitted Mao anyway, since she'd be trading out a higher valued jump for a lower valued jump by including a double axel instead of just doing the 3axel has the axel, so why would she consider it.

Double axel was mandatory for women, back then.

 

[PRlady]

Somehow slept through this but will watch on replay. Top three are so tight, three points is nothing for these guys, any can win.

 

[AYS]

Double axel was mandatory for women, back then.

Forgot about that.

 

[tony]

Double axel was mandatory for women, back then.

Forgot about that.

Yes, and with the layout I suggested, she would’ve avoided having to do the combo with her most difficult jump and potentially losing all the points if she couldn’t get a second jump around, etc.

So I guess I’ve slept on the rules for 13 years

 

[topaz]

Some really excellent performances today. Shoma's sp was mesmerizing. I was really into it. The step sequence choreography is just beautiful movements after another.

Yuma skated a little tight but still impressive.

Ilia's confidence is growing with each competition. I love the new costume. He was overscored in some aspects of the PCS; he should be 5th in PCS but should be less pcs score. (edited)

Adam - such a shame about the opening combo botch. But that choregraphed footwork is swoon worthy. I love his short program.

 

[Karen-W]

Some really excellent performances today. Shoma's sp was mesmerizing. I was really into it. The step sequence choreography is just beautiful movements after another.

Yuma skated a little tight but still impressive.

Ilia's confidence is growing with each competition. I love the new costume. He was overscored in some aspects of the PCS; he should be 5th in PCS.

Adam - such a shame about the opening combo botch. But that choregraphed footwork is swoon worthy. I love his short program.

Hmmmm... someone didn't read the scores. Ilia WAS 5th in PCS.

Shoma 47.11
Yuma 45.63
Kevin 45.50
Adam 44.83
Ilia 44.37
Kao 43.19

 

[kwanette]

Some really excellent performances today. Shoma's sp was mesmerizing. I was really into it. The step sequence choreography is just beautiful movements after another.

Yuma skated a little tight but still impressive.

Ilia's confidence is growing with each competition. I love the new costume. He was overscored in some aspects of the PCS; he should be 5th in PCS.

Adam - such a shame about the opening combo botch. But that choregraphed footwork is swoon worthy. I love his short pr

 

[Frau Muller]

New costume alert for Ilia.

Looks like the same red matador jacket to me. So is the black braiding different?

Other silliness:
Could somebody please explain why Shoma’s Claire de Lune begins with I Love You, Kung Fu? Was this invented by Fanyus?

 

[her grace]

The difference in skating skills quality between Malinin and the entire rest of the field is vast. They shouldn’t be in the same ballpark, let alone a point apart.

Quad axel was cool, though.

 

[Karen-W]

The difference in skating skills quality between Malinin and the entire rest of the field is vast. They shouldn’t be in the same ballpark, let alone a point apart.

Quad axel was cool, though.

Somehow, the judges in the arena never see it the way the armchair judges at home do. So very odd.

If you want to complain about presentation/interpretation being less than, sure, I might give you that, but this PCS argument is always about the skating skills part of it and I'm just gonna posit the theory that perhaps his skating skills are quite good seeing as no one else in the world can land a 4a.

 

[topaz]

Hmmmm... someone didn't read the scores. Ilia WAS 5th in PCS.

Shoma 47.11
Yuma 45.63
Kevin 45.50
Adam 44.83
Ilia 44.37
Kao 43.19

Thanks for pointing that out. I edited my post to include an update.

 

[tony]

Somehow, the judges in the arena never see it the way the armchair judges at home do. So very odd.

If you want to complain about presentation/interpretation being less than, sure, I might give you that, but this PCS argument is always about the skating skills part of it and I'm just gonna posit the theory that perhaps his skating skills are quite good seeing as no one else in the world can land a 4a.

Skating skills literally have nothing to do with the ability to rotate or land a jump. Some of the top jumpers of the past had abysmal skating skills, or average at best (think Joubert, Goebel, Van der Perren, etc). How could we forget Brandon Mroz, the first ever to land a 4Lz, and his skating skills? Boyang Jin perhaps and his influx of multiple quads? Daniel Grassl? The Chinese men of the late 90s and early 2000s who had the most gorgeous quad technique but almost nothing else?

So I have zero idea why you would try to make that connection.

The judges don’t see a whole lot of stuff, but if you want to sit here and argue for starters that Malinin and Kagiyama are a half a point difference to the casual eye in skating skills, then okay?

For what it’s worth, said it earlier this year and I’m still sticking to Ilia being right around an 8 PCS average at best. But I think I also snarked that I would be whining about his PCS scores come the GPF

 

[her grace]

If anyone wants to see what’s included in the definition of skating skills or the other program components, it’s here: https://www.isu.org/figure-skating/...n-presentation-and-skating-skills-charts/file

 

[Karen-W]

Skating skills literally have nothing to do with the ability to rotate or land a jump. Some of the top jumpers of the past had abysmal skating skills, or average at best (think Joubert, Goebel, Van der Perren, etc).

So I have zero idea why you would try to make that connection.

The judges don’t see a whole lot of stuff, but if you want to sit here and argue for starters that Malinin and Kagiyama are a half a point difference to the casual eye in skating skills, then okay?

It's not my argument to make. The judges in the arena made their marks.

Here's the thing, most of the resident FSU armchair judges haven't been to a skating competition in person in quite awhile or haven't seen the slater they're dissing live recently. What slays me is the level of absolutism that some people have. We see this with skaters who have a reputation for URs - once you get that, it's hard to shake even when people who are in the arena watching the programs in person are reporting that the jumps of the skater in question are looking more fully rotated than in the past. And yet some folks here are absolutely certain, every single damn time, that X skater UR whatever jumps. The same can and often is true for PCS. Once a skater gets labeled as "terrible skating skills" it's as if they're never able to shake that label. I can provide example after example of skaters for whom both situations apply and it's almost always the same folks who are sitting behind a computer or on their phone regurgitating the same critiques and they're almost never ever in the arena. It's as if you see only what you've been conditioned to believe is true and while that's your prerogative, it would be nice if, once in awhile, you ponied up the money to go see these skaters in person before hitting the same old notes as before about what is wrong with their skating.

 

[tony]

It's not my argument to make. The judges in the arena made their marks.

And they also made their PCS marks for the Russian women for years and years and almost no one had problems repeatedly ripping into questioning those marks, for example.

Here's the thing, most of the resident FSU armchair judges haven't been to a skating competition in person in quite awhile or haven't seen the slater they're dissing live recently. What slays me is the level of absolutism that some people have. We see this with skaters who have a reputation for URs - once you get that, it's hard to shake even when people who are in the arena watching the programs in person are reporting that the jumps of the skater in question are looking more fully rotated than in the past. And yet some folks here are absolutely certain, every single damn time, that X skater UR whatever jumps. The same can and often is true for PCS. Once a skater gets labeled as "terrible skating skills" it's as if they're never able to shake that label. I can provide example after example of skaters for whom both situations apply and it's almost always the same folks who are sitting behind a computer or on their phone regurgitating the same critiques and they're almost never ever in the arena. It's as if you see only what you've been conditioned to believe is true and while that's your prerogative, it would be nice if, once in awhile, you ponied up the money to go see these skaters in person before hitting the same old notes as before about what is wrong with their skating.

If people would actually read the rules and criteria behind everything and invest some time into learning about the scoring rules of the sport, that’s a different story. You know I’ve repeatedly gone out of my way to explain rules & criteria and for a lot of people, it just is another skim past the post and continue on. Even today I showed I don’t know every rule update 100 percent and I was convinced for a minute that Ilia either didn’t know the rules or that he was making a statement and throwing the Axel jumping block away. But as someone who has skated, who landed doubles very quickly into my progression and found jumping to be the easiest part of the sport, I consider myself to know a little something about Skating skills (the work it takes) and overall technique and multi-directional skating, depth of edges, speed, and all the like. Malinin is not an exceptional skater on that front yet; not even close in fact. Doesn’t mean it won’t come, but I’m also not a fan of throwing higher PCS at someone just because of their longevity as a senior or their jumping passes

 

[thvu]

If people would actually read the rules and criteria behind everything and invest some time into learning about the scoring rules of the sport, that’s a different story. You know I’ve repeatedly gone out of my way to explain rules & criteria and for a lot of people, it just is another skim past the post and continue on. Even today I showed I don’t know every rule update 100 percent and I was convinced for a minute that Ilia either didn’t know the rules or that he was making a statement and throwing the Axel jumping block away. But as someone who has skated, who landed doubles very quickly into my progression and found jumping to be the easiest part of the sport, I consider myself to know a little something about Skating skills (the work it takes) and overall technique and multi-directional skating, depth of edges, speed, and all the like. Malinin is not an exceptional skater on that front yet; not even close in fact. Doesn’t mean it won’t come, but I’m also not a fan of throwing higher PCS at someone just because of their longevity as a senior or their jumping passes

It's almost as if people forget the big fed PCS boost, or the TES boost to PCS. We all openly discuss how Plushenko didn't deserve the 9s he would get in PCS, as if it's a well-known joke.

I have talked to judges and heard first-hand how some don't know the rules. I got into an argument with a well-known US judge about the rules for under rotation. He insisted I was wrong about what the < and << meant, and what deductions judges are supposed to make. When presented with the ISU document proving I was right, he dismissed me and wouldn't discuss it further. He also claimed that technical panels call consistently, and that if the technical panel calls a jump rotated, or a take-off edge clean, then that's what happened.

There's the actual rules and guidelines that judges are supposed to follow, and then there's what the judges actually do. They're not the same thing.

 

[Karen-W]

It's almost as if people forget the big fed PCS boost, or the TES boost to PCS. We all openly discuss how Plushenko didn't deserve the 9s he would get in PCS, as if it's a well-known joke.

I have talked to judges and heard first-hand how some don't know the rules. I got into an argument with a well-known US judge about the rules for under rotation. He insisted I was wrong about what the < and << meant, and what deductions judges are supposed to make. When presented with the ISU document proving I was right, he dismissed me and wouldn't discuss it further. He also claimed that technical panels call consistently, and that if the technical panel calls a jump rotated, or a take-off edge clean, then that's what happened.

There's the actual rules and guidelines that judges are supposed to follow, and then there's what the judges actually do. They're not the same thing.

You're one of the few posters here, at this point, whose opinion I take at face value because I know you attend competitions in person routinely and like to sit behind the panel and sneak a peek at what they're doing or not doing.

I'm not disregarding the issues with the scores given, but I also think some FSUers are relying too much on whatever reputations skaters get as they move from junior to senior without seeing them skate in person and then choose to tune out completely the observations from those in the arena who have seen these skaters in person more than once over the course of a few years.

Isabeau gets slammed for her super-slow jump entry, Lindsay gets slammed for URs, Ilia gets slammed for his poor PCS, and yet all three of those skaters have made obvious, visible efforts to improve those weaknesses and yet, the armchair judges are wedded to the skaters' reputations as immutable fact. It's annoying.

 

[Miezekatze]

Skaters jumps also vary greatly from competition to competition or even within a single skate . Often skaters start underrotating more if they get tired during a skate or have a bad day.

 

[mtnskater]

Just watched men’s short. What a great group of incredibly accomplished skaters each in their own right. Hard to say who is best on any given night because of the greatness that all have with various strengths and weaknesses.

My first thought about Ilia was “Oh no do not do a quad axel in the short!” So risky. Was certain it would cause him to bomb. Then I thought “How can he do a quad axel and a quad lutz in that heavy looking jacket?” Remembering how Chen had to have loose fitting t-shirts. Then he lands the quad axel and made history in the short. Just wow! Respect!! Then I see the X invalid element in the score tracker and thought OMG if he doesn’t get credit for that it would be an abomination for the sport. Thankfully he did. I’ll leave it to the armchair rule minions to hash that out on the Boards. Yes, his skating skills are a bit weaker than the other guys but his technical prowess makes up for it. I’m still waiting for him to use his long lines to better effect especially in the camel spins.

For me I enjoyed Shoma and Ilia the most and agree with the judges. Yuma was a bit tight and just slightly off, still excellent. Shoma may be short, but he does create stretch and line and his performance quality is so high. Major props! I didn’t really scrutinize his jump landings like I often do, because I enjoyed the performance as a whole so much.

Kevin was wonderful with his edges and glide and emotion. Kao still doesn’t do a lot for me but is of course excellent overall. Adam was disappointing because he didn’t repeat his Grand Prix performances here. Nerves kicked in too much. We know he can be great. Incredible field! Happy figure skating fan here!