What is the difference between a Death Spiral/Inside Death Spiral?

[5Ali3]

Here are the guidelines for the tech panel calling death spirals and their features, which may answer some of your questions:
http://www.usfigureskating.org/conte...id%20Pairs.pdf

That document is outdated, because the definition of a death spiral changed - again - this year. The traditional idea of a death spiral is that the man is in a pivot position while the lady circles around him, supported by one blade and connected one-hand-to-one-hand. When boys were men and Mr. Nicks and Luddy ran the world, the boys were supposed to be in a low pivot, sitting back as far as possible, while the girls were as low to the ice as possible; there was (ideally) a single straight line that extended from the girl's skating leg through her linked arm to the boy's linked arm to the boy's free arm. Meno and Sand are a great example of this style of death spirals.

When death spirals got levels, they started getting higher and higher and higher and uglier: unanticipated consequences. Over the past (what are we at now: five years? six years?) half-decade, the ISU keeps becoming stricter about the position in the death spiral. This year's new rule says that a death spiral will receive NO VALUE if the lady's head never reaches the level of her knee, with her hip about in line with the knee-head connection. This is NOT the traditional position, because it eliminated the arch that has been the traditional goal of the lady's position. At the moment, the word on the street is that this new provision requires only that the lady's head reach the level of her knee-hip for a split-second. This isn't in writing yet, but it's supposed to be in the official clarifications out of Frankfurt.

It seems to me from years of watching but not paying close attention that on the back inside death spiral sometimes the lady is supine (face up) with the handhold leading the travel of her body, and sometimes she is prone (body facing down) but arched up to look up at the partner, with her blade leading and the handhold following her body. That body position is also common in forward inside death spirals.

The IJS position rules eliminated the upward-facing position several years ago; it doesn't allow the head-hip-knee requirement, so it's no-value.

And is it possible to transition from one to the other of those positions just by speeding up or slowing down the lady's travel in relation to the man's, or are the two possible positions mutually exclusive in the same death spiral?.

Do you mean the BiDS face-up and BiDS twisted-over? Um... [contorts body] Well, I guess that it's possible, but that doesn't explain why someone would want to. Why don't we have a smilie for "my back hurts just thinking about it?" I suppose this will have to do: ()

[lt901]

Keep in mind that the skater's body position (leg extension, back arch, head placement) will be affected by the skater's anatomy: how the skeleton is articulated, and the proportion of weight carried on each side of the midline, as well as the physical range of motion of the shoulders, spine and hips. The coach may wish to have a skater try for an unusual position, but there are physical limits unique to each skater.