Have been binge watching Crazy Ex Girlfriend on Netflix. In Season 2, the disordered protagonist
thought she was in the center of a love triangle, but ended up dumped by both guys. So she hit re-set with a complete makeover:
Now I won't be able to watch MTM II without waiting for chunks of Kirsten's hair to come unglued and litter up the ice.
I followed Four Continents on Goldenskate, learning that, as usual, the best skating is a combination of appealing program, a musical selection that doesn't depend on musicality for fans to appreciate (in fact, for some fans, the less rythmic, the better), and undefined performance attributes. The reality that so many fans critique ice dance programs while ignoring the skating explains why so many fans side-eyed the fact that the Shibs pcs came so close to Virtue and Moir's. I'd be down with that if a) the Shibs' skating in the free dance wasn't exquisite and b) if the opinion weren't accompanied by the comment that only Papadakis & Cizeron could deservedly approach Virtue and Moir's pcs. In reality, Papadakis & Cizeron's skating skills should have them off the podium, and probably in the bottom part of the top 10.
I love the integrity of the Shibutanis' skating. I lacked the motivation to create gifs of Davis White and Papadakis Cizeron's own knee slide transitions, but they're slop. A blatant stratagem to reset by not skating. But with the Shibs, as Alex swings Maia into her set up for her transition out of the spin, she is set down on an inside edge, slides out on an inside edge and transitions in the slide to an outside edge. She doesn't have to. She's on a knee. She can be as sloppy as she wants, but she's not. This is why I love Zoueva, this is why I love the two of them. The reason so many fans don't appreciate the Shibs is skating is the last thing they're looking at when they watch ice dance. And the commentators mash-up skating skills with performance values that's just a projection of their personal taste and shit they make up. Unlike with other sports, even gymnastics, the goal of the figure skating commentator is to make sure we know less, not more, about what's going on, and what factors into results, once the event is over.
I think everybody has a good idea where Worlds is heading, and I hope I'm right about it. But I also hope that the Shibs are standing on the second tier of the podium. The gap between Virtue and Moir and the rest of the field (placing the Shibs behind them) is nearly matched by the gap between the Shibs and the rest of the field.
Finally:
Mirai Nagasu remains, by far, the biggest ladies singles talent in North America. I don't know the reason why she has struggled to keep her head in the game, but certainly the USFSA has treated her as expendable despite clutch performances that outdo its pets Gracie Gold and Ashley Wagner. Gold is the definition of a talent that can't keep herself together long enough to put together a successful season, but the USFSA is always willing to start fresh with her. Nagasu they have been pushing out the door since 2013. So this makes me very happy.
This
Last year I figured between Dylan's injury, and what I had begun to figure was Lubov's ability to enjoy pairs skating without being intense about the result, they would end up 6 or 7 and never push to podium contention, which is where their combined talents appeared to position them when they first teamed up. Everybody says Ilyushechkina doesn't have her triple jumps, but she did have them once she and Dylan got their inaugural feet under them. This outcome says they can podium in Korea.
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| "Rebecca Bunch" |
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"Rebecca Bunch" |
I followed Four Continents on Goldenskate, learning that, as usual, the best skating is a combination of appealing program, a musical selection that doesn't depend on musicality for fans to appreciate (in fact, for some fans, the less rythmic, the better), and undefined performance attributes. The reality that so many fans critique ice dance programs while ignoring the skating explains why so many fans side-eyed the fact that the Shibs pcs came so close to Virtue and Moir's. I'd be down with that if a) the Shibs' skating in the free dance wasn't exquisite and b) if the opinion weren't accompanied by the comment that only Papadakis & Cizeron could deservedly approach Virtue and Moir's pcs. In reality, Papadakis & Cizeron's skating skills should have them off the podium, and probably in the bottom part of the top 10.
I love the integrity of the Shibutanis' skating. I lacked the motivation to create gifs of Davis White and Papadakis Cizeron's own knee slide transitions, but they're slop. A blatant stratagem to reset by not skating. But with the Shibs, as Alex swings Maia into her set up for her transition out of the spin, she is set down on an inside edge, slides out on an inside edge and transitions in the slide to an outside edge. She doesn't have to. She's on a knee. She can be as sloppy as she wants, but she's not. This is why I love Zoueva, this is why I love the two of them. The reason so many fans don't appreciate the Shibs is skating is the last thing they're looking at when they watch ice dance. And the commentators mash-up skating skills with performance values that's just a projection of their personal taste and shit they make up. Unlike with other sports, even gymnastics, the goal of the figure skating commentator is to make sure we know less, not more, about what's going on, and what factors into results, once the event is over.
I think everybody has a good idea where Worlds is heading, and I hope I'm right about it. But I also hope that the Shibs are standing on the second tier of the podium. The gap between Virtue and Moir and the rest of the field (placing the Shibs behind them) is nearly matched by the gap between the Shibs and the rest of the field.
Finally:
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| Mirai Nagasu wins bronze at 4CC |
This
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| Bronze medal |
Last year I figured between Dylan's injury, and what I had begun to figure was Lubov's ability to enjoy pairs skating without being intense about the result, they would end up 6 or 7 and never push to podium contention, which is where their combined talents appeared to position them when they first teamed up. Everybody says Ilyushechkina doesn't have her triple jumps, but she did have them once she and Dylan got their inaugural feet under them. This outcome says they can podium in Korea.
