seraphcelene (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
seraphcelene) wrote2010-02-19 03:25 pm
seraphcelene) wrote2010-02-19 03:25 pm
Oh, noes ... Plushenko vs Lysacek and the Great Quad Debate
http://sports.yahoo.com/olympics/vancouver/figure_skati ng/news?slug=es-thoughts021810&prov=yhoo&type=lgns
Oh, Elvis Stojko, drinking the same Kool-Aid as Yevgeny Plushenko. Although I can understand the disappointment, I don't share it. I don't think that Evan Lysacek winning gold is a betrayal of all things Olympic. I don't think it's a move backwards for the glorious sport of figure skating, and I don't think it was all *that* surprising.
I haven't watched figure skating in years. I gave it up because of disgust. My annoyance, however, was a result of a trend in opposition to Stojko's prediction for the abandonment of figure skating by the Youth. I thought the focus was too much on the jumps. What I had found was that figure skating had begun to sacrifice artistry and musicality in favor of the quad. It was all that anyone could talk about and watching skaters move from one end of the rink to the other in preparation for that daunting and unreliable quad was disappointing because it seemed like a lot of the in-between content was being left out. There was more prep time required and if they fell, well alot of people didn't recover.
I fell in love with figure skating in the first place because it was a combination of strength, skill, power grace and beauty. It's amazingly complex and subtle, but then you had these bursting jumps that, when properly placed, enhanced the choreography magnificently. Watching the men's competition had become all about who could land a quad and who could do it in competition. I got tired of watching jumping beans in a jumping competition because figure skating was never all about the jumps.
Now, granted, I am by no means an expert, but watching the two programs last night, I did think that Lysacek's program was cleaner, and, independent of the quad, stronger. There were fewer obvious flaws and the other elements seemed more precise. Between all of his jumps and that swaggering personality, Plushenko's performance was more dynamic and, overall, more charismatic. It's actually the performance I preferred for no other reason than that it was flashier. But. Watching the two, I felt they were evenly matched and I really had NO IDEA who would win gold. Now, here is where I listened very carefully to my dear friend, Scott Hamilton. (Scott Hamilton who I've watched and adored for as long as I've watched skating and I thought that he was very fair in his analysis of last night's skating.) He didn't seem particularly invested in a winner, but stated repeatedly that both skaters deserved the medal they got for such strong, but very diverse, performances. What he did qualify for Plushenko's performance was the Quality of the Elements/Execution. And, let's be really honest here, the spins weren't as fast or as elegant, especially those sit spins, and his execution was questionable on some of the jumps. In the Olympics where the caliber of the athlete's means that everything comes down to hundredths of a second, that counts for something.
Those kinds of errors or "flubs" disrupt the overall flow of the performance, and I imagine that counts against the scores for presentation. If this were football, we could equate those flawed jumps in the neighborhood of an incomplete pass. The receiver catches the ball in the end zone and goes down. However, he juggles the ball and loses it when it hits turf. Although the ground can't cause a fumble, the ref can rule it an incomplete pass if the player doesn't show that he has control of the ball. If we look at it that way, last night, Plushenko wasn't always in control of the ball. But this is figure skating, not Pro Football.
I thought Plushenko's performance was awesome. I also thought Lysacek's performance was awesome. At the end of the night, waiting with bated breath while Yevgeny Plushenko sat in the kiss and cry for his scores, I had NO IDEA who would win gold. I was, however, thrilled that it was Evan. I could see that Plushenko was totally surprised, he was all ready with the celebratory fist pump only to find that his score didn't award him the gold. The thing is, I don't think that a quad should mean an automatic win. At this point, I still don't see what value a quad adds to the performance as a whole over a triple or a triple combination. It showcases the skater's physical prowess, sure, but artistically the difference seems minimal in comparison to the difference between a double and a triple.
But, I suppose, such are the birth pains of progress. I also remember Midori Ito and Tonya Harding adding the triple axel to the lexicon of women's figure skating. To this day not many women perform them, probably because the sport does have a preference for the dainty ballerina skater than the more powerful, athletically built skaters like Harding and Ito. An argument can also be made that those skaters aren't as generally graceful as the "ladylike" skaters. However, I think more women should jump triple axel's. They are pretty damn awesome to watch, but again, it can't be in sacrifice to the other elements of the program.
To be honest, I thought Plushenko held the edge because, with the exception of the sit spins that I thought were awkward and slow, Plushenko had a solid and thrilling skate. It wasn't until Scott Hamilton slowed the footage and pointed out the other problems with the jumps and the transitions that I saw that the program wasn't a guaranteed win. BUT! The question became, how do you decide? What trumps what? I think the judges made a good call. I think that you need both artistry and athleticism and I think that you have to give respect to both, but I don't think that automatically landing a jump or even a combination, as impressive as it is, should be the benchmark for the win. We're talking about a sport of subtleties. And the quad is a hammer over the head. But what about the other things. What about the arms and the footwork (which I, personally, love! Does anyone remember the AWESOME Yuka Sato or Kurt Browning?), the musicality, the spins, the grace. Because like it or not, figure skating IS dancing on ice, with jumps. It's the intersection of beauty and athleticism. Concepts that are NOT mutually exclusive. Plushenko and now Stojko seem to have fallen into the silly, misogynistic trap of thinking that dancers aren't athletes. Anyone who's watched a ballet or a dance sport competition, knows the truth. Anyone who's ever taken a dance class knows it too. Dancing is hard fucking work. It requires precision, endurance, stamina, will power, physical strength, and a high pain threshold. You have to make your body do these crazy, impossible things and you have to make it look pretty, and you have to make it look easy.
Now, I still prefer pro skating to amateur, the laundry list of required elements in amateur skating hurts my eyes AND the routines, but last night I had hope that maybe, just maybe, figure skating isn't going to devolve into a jumping contest. If I wanted that, I'd wait for the Summer Olympics. Stojko says that he isn't biased, but I have to wonder. He was supposed to jump a quad-triple combination in the 98 Nagano games. He was scored for a triple-triple, possibly the result of under-rotation of the jump. He had suffered a pretty serious groin injury at the time. Maybe he feels the sting of Plushenko's loss just a little keenly. Whatever it is, you go ahead, Elvis Stojko. You can take Mr. Plushenko and all of your bitter grapes and go watch your hockey if that makes you feel better. Figure skating will continue to be strong and beautiful without you.
Although, let me add, that if Yevgeny Plushenko managed to come back in four years, skate a clean, dynamic program AND land a quad I would be only too happy to cheer him on because he is an AMAZING athlete.
Oh, Elvis Stojko, drinking the same Kool-Aid as Yevgeny Plushenko. Although I can understand the disappointment, I don't share it. I don't think that Evan Lysacek winning gold is a betrayal of all things Olympic. I don't think it's a move backwards for the glorious sport of figure skating, and I don't think it was all *that* surprising.
I haven't watched figure skating in years. I gave it up because of disgust. My annoyance, however, was a result of a trend in opposition to Stojko's prediction for the abandonment of figure skating by the Youth. I thought the focus was too much on the jumps. What I had found was that figure skating had begun to sacrifice artistry and musicality in favor of the quad. It was all that anyone could talk about and watching skaters move from one end of the rink to the other in preparation for that daunting and unreliable quad was disappointing because it seemed like a lot of the in-between content was being left out. There was more prep time required and if they fell, well alot of people didn't recover.
I fell in love with figure skating in the first place because it was a combination of strength, skill, power grace and beauty. It's amazingly complex and subtle, but then you had these bursting jumps that, when properly placed, enhanced the choreography magnificently. Watching the men's competition had become all about who could land a quad and who could do it in competition. I got tired of watching jumping beans in a jumping competition because figure skating was never all about the jumps.
Now, granted, I am by no means an expert, but watching the two programs last night, I did think that Lysacek's program was cleaner, and, independent of the quad, stronger. There were fewer obvious flaws and the other elements seemed more precise. Between all of his jumps and that swaggering personality, Plushenko's performance was more dynamic and, overall, more charismatic. It's actually the performance I preferred for no other reason than that it was flashier. But. Watching the two, I felt they were evenly matched and I really had NO IDEA who would win gold. Now, here is where I listened very carefully to my dear friend, Scott Hamilton. (Scott Hamilton who I've watched and adored for as long as I've watched skating and I thought that he was very fair in his analysis of last night's skating.) He didn't seem particularly invested in a winner, but stated repeatedly that both skaters deserved the medal they got for such strong, but very diverse, performances. What he did qualify for Plushenko's performance was the Quality of the Elements/Execution. And, let's be really honest here, the spins weren't as fast or as elegant, especially those sit spins, and his execution was questionable on some of the jumps. In the Olympics where the caliber of the athlete's means that everything comes down to hundredths of a second, that counts for something.
Those kinds of errors or "flubs" disrupt the overall flow of the performance, and I imagine that counts against the scores for presentation. If this were football, we could equate those flawed jumps in the neighborhood of an incomplete pass. The receiver catches the ball in the end zone and goes down. However, he juggles the ball and loses it when it hits turf. Although the ground can't cause a fumble, the ref can rule it an incomplete pass if the player doesn't show that he has control of the ball. If we look at it that way, last night, Plushenko wasn't always in control of the ball. But this is figure skating, not Pro Football.
I thought Plushenko's performance was awesome. I also thought Lysacek's performance was awesome. At the end of the night, waiting with bated breath while Yevgeny Plushenko sat in the kiss and cry for his scores, I had NO IDEA who would win gold. I was, however, thrilled that it was Evan. I could see that Plushenko was totally surprised, he was all ready with the celebratory fist pump only to find that his score didn't award him the gold. The thing is, I don't think that a quad should mean an automatic win. At this point, I still don't see what value a quad adds to the performance as a whole over a triple or a triple combination. It showcases the skater's physical prowess, sure, but artistically the difference seems minimal in comparison to the difference between a double and a triple.
But, I suppose, such are the birth pains of progress. I also remember Midori Ito and Tonya Harding adding the triple axel to the lexicon of women's figure skating. To this day not many women perform them, probably because the sport does have a preference for the dainty ballerina skater than the more powerful, athletically built skaters like Harding and Ito. An argument can also be made that those skaters aren't as generally graceful as the "ladylike" skaters. However, I think more women should jump triple axel's. They are pretty damn awesome to watch, but again, it can't be in sacrifice to the other elements of the program.
To be honest, I thought Plushenko held the edge because, with the exception of the sit spins that I thought were awkward and slow, Plushenko had a solid and thrilling skate. It wasn't until Scott Hamilton slowed the footage and pointed out the other problems with the jumps and the transitions that I saw that the program wasn't a guaranteed win. BUT! The question became, how do you decide? What trumps what? I think the judges made a good call. I think that you need both artistry and athleticism and I think that you have to give respect to both, but I don't think that automatically landing a jump or even a combination, as impressive as it is, should be the benchmark for the win. We're talking about a sport of subtleties. And the quad is a hammer over the head. But what about the other things. What about the arms and the footwork (which I, personally, love! Does anyone remember the AWESOME Yuka Sato or Kurt Browning?), the musicality, the spins, the grace. Because like it or not, figure skating IS dancing on ice, with jumps. It's the intersection of beauty and athleticism. Concepts that are NOT mutually exclusive. Plushenko and now Stojko seem to have fallen into the silly, misogynistic trap of thinking that dancers aren't athletes. Anyone who's watched a ballet or a dance sport competition, knows the truth. Anyone who's ever taken a dance class knows it too. Dancing is hard fucking work. It requires precision, endurance, stamina, will power, physical strength, and a high pain threshold. You have to make your body do these crazy, impossible things and you have to make it look pretty, and you have to make it look easy.
Now, I still prefer pro skating to amateur, the laundry list of required elements in amateur skating hurts my eyes AND the routines, but last night I had hope that maybe, just maybe, figure skating isn't going to devolve into a jumping contest. If I wanted that, I'd wait for the Summer Olympics. Stojko says that he isn't biased, but I have to wonder. He was supposed to jump a quad-triple combination in the 98 Nagano games. He was scored for a triple-triple, possibly the result of under-rotation of the jump. He had suffered a pretty serious groin injury at the time. Maybe he feels the sting of Plushenko's loss just a little keenly. Whatever it is, you go ahead, Elvis Stojko. You can take Mr. Plushenko and all of your bitter grapes and go watch your hockey if that makes you feel better. Figure skating will continue to be strong and beautiful without you.
Although, let me add, that if Yevgeny Plushenko managed to come back in four years, skate a clean, dynamic program AND land a quad I would be only too happy to cheer him on because he is an AMAZING athlete.