The Kings of Quad

[caseyedwards]

QR at worlds 2005 I would bet!

[umronnie]

QR at worlds 2005 I would bet!

yes

[umronnie]

So I spent a few days checking out records, trying to find the "next runner up". Turns out I was wrong about Stojko - he hasn't landed nearly as many quads as I thought.

I'm missing some data, of course (for early comps under 6.0 for which I could not find youtube clips) so I will list the precentage of competitions I managed to cover. Who wold you guess came next to Jobert and Plushy?

Yagudin - I managed to cover all of his competitions except for some qualifying rounds and easrly comps of 1996. With 92% of his competitions accounted for I have him at 56 quads at an astounding success rate of 90%! And to think he seemed vulnerable next to Plush.

For Goebel I covered 86% of his comps. I have him at 48 quads and an amazing success rate of 89%! I estimate his total at 56 (48/86%) - so about the same as Yags.

Lambiel I also covered 86% of his comps. Luckily there were more under CoP. I have him at 46 confirmed quads. His success rate is 72%.

Elvis is somewhere in the mid 20s, with a success rate of about 60%. Amazing that he's had such an impact on the sport with these stats.

Of the skaters in competition today I have:
Kevin Reynolds at 31 quads and a success rate of 63% (he tends to underrotate)
Takahashi at 23 and a 61% success rate
Chan at 20 and a 74% success rate
Brezina (mentioned above as "the next king") at only 7 quads and a success rate of 58%.
Will check up Fernandez and Amodio next. Anyone else?

Of course, Joubert and Plushenko are still competing, as well...

[Zemgirl]

So I spent a few days checking out records, trying to find the "next runner up". Turns out I was wrong about Stojko - he hasn't landed nearly as many quads as I thought.

I'm missing some data, of course (for early comps under 6.0 for which I could not find youtube clips) so I will list the precentage of competitions I managed to cover. Who wold you guess came next to Jobert and Plushy?

Yagudin - I managed to cover all of his competitions except for some qualifying rounds and easrly comps of 1996. With 92% of his competitions accounted for I have him at 56 quads at an astounding success rate of 90%! And to think he seemed vulnerable next to Plush.
...

I just noticed this addition to the thread - that's pretty neat that Yagudin managed so many, considering the length of his career and the age at which he retired. Mishin knows what he's doing with jump technique.

It's worth noting that unlike current competitors, the success rate of 6.0 skaters wasn't affected by UR calls. OTOH, not all of them had as many opportunities to include quads in their programs, due to SP requirements at the time.

[Willowway]

Not that these guys go into the Kings of Quads running (it was a different time) but each made quad history in their own way - Urmanov landed the first successful quad in Olympic competition at Albertville (his OGM performance four years later in Lillehamer, 1994, was quad-less and I think way off his best in many respects but he won); Kulik was the first OGM to land a successful quad as part of his O's winning performance (Nagano, 1998)

[flipforsynchro]

I'm expecting the next quad king to be Brezina. His jumping is just so explosive. His 3F is like 8 feet in the air. He has the ability to develop more than 2 different quads.

I'm guessing, though, that the first to do 3 diff quads in one competition may end up being Kevin Reynolds. He's got a good hit rate on the toe, sal and loop in practice so it's a matter of time before all 3 are done in competition. Doesn't guarantee him 'quad king' status, but will turn a number of heads.

I am one of Brezina's biggest fans and it would be amazing if he could. But he needs to seriously start actually landing all of his huge jumps in competition, and stop hunching over on some of them.

[spikydurian]

So I spent a few days checking out records, trying to find the "next runner up". Turns out I was wrong about Stojko - he hasn't landed nearly as many quads as I thought.

I'm missing some data, of course (for early comps under 6.0 for which I could not find youtube clips) so I will list the precentage of competitions I managed to cover. Who wold you guess came next to Jobert and Plushy?

Yagudin - I managed to cover all of his competitions except for some qualifying rounds and easrly comps of 1996. With 92% of his competitions accounted for I have him at 56 quads at an astounding success rate of 90%! And to think he seemed vulnerable next to Plush.

For Goebel I covered 86% of his comps. I have him at 48 quads and an amazing success rate of 89%! I estimate his total at 56 (48/86%) - so about the same as Yags.

Lambiel I also covered 86% of his comps. Luckily there were more under CoP. I have him at 46 confirmed quads. His success rate is 72%.

Elvis is somewhere in the mid 20s, with a success rate of about 60%. Amazing that he's had such an impact on the sport with these stats.

Of the skaters in competition today I have:
Kevin Reynolds at 31 quads and a success rate of 63% (he tends to underrotate)
Takahashi at 23 and a 61% success rate
Chan at 20 and a 74% success rate
Brezina (mentioned above as "the next king") at only 7 quads and a success rate of 58%.
Will check up Fernandez and Amodio next. Anyone else?

Of course, Joubert and Plushenko are still competing, as well...

Very interesting. Thanks for all the findings. Looks like Yag had the highest success rates. I am surprised that Brian is ahead of Plushenko in no. of quad jumps. Intuitively, I would have thought Plushenko is the man in quad jumps.

[Zemgirl]

Very interesting. Thanks for all the findings. Looks like Yag had the highest success rates. I am surprised that Brian is ahead of Plushenko in no. of quad jumps. Intuitively, I would have thought Plushenko is the man in quad jumps.

I believe all of Joubert's competitions are accounted for, while Plushenko still has one missing (2000 Finlandia Trophy). So it's likely that they're tied, or Plushenko might have one or two more. However, assuming Joubert will indeed skate a full season in 2012-13, which it looks like Plushenko isn't planning on doing, that should change.

I think the person who might come close to their totals, if he sticks around long enough, is Yuzuru Hanyu - mainly because he's still so young and started putting quads in his programs very early in his career: his first successful one, according to Wikipedia, was at the 2010 NHK Trophy (he was only 15 at the time).

[senorita]

How did you even find competition results of Plushenko, before 2000? He has a bunch of ancient competitions, I didnt know they existed.
Finlandlia trophy I never saw a video from there

anyway I found this data on his previous website, does it agree with your search?

Number of quads (clean) per season.
Total: 96 quads in competition

• 1997-1998: 1
• 1998-1999: 7
• 1999-2000: 12
• 2000-2001: 22
• 2001-2002: 15
• 2002-2003: 14
• 2003-2004: 16
• 2004-2005: 9
• 2005-2006: 7

Lol look what you can find on web archives, a comment about Filandia Trophy, the date is in 2000 ancient yahoo grooups???

[antmanb]

Not that these guys go into the Kings of Quads running (it was a different time) but each made quad history in their own way - Urmanov landed the first successful quad in Olympic competition at Albertville

Urmonov put his hand down on the landing of the quad toe in Albertville so it didn't count as the first quad at an Olympics. Looking it up it looks like Min Zhang landed the first clean quad in an Olympic competition in 1994.

[umronnie]

Just a few quick notes, and I will try to check some more info later.

Very interesting. Thanks for all the findings. Looks like Yag had the highest success rates. I am surprised that Brian is ahead of Plushenko in no. of quad jumps. Intuitively, I would have thought Plushenko is the man in quad jumps.

Well, they’ve both been competing for 11 seasons (Plushy took 4 years off in the middle for necessary repairs ;-) and have similar (though not the same) success rate. Actually Joubert has competed in a couple more events than Plush. For all of his health problems he’s been healthier than Plush. Also, when Joubert began competing the quad was allowed in the SP. It wasn’t in Plushy’s first two seasons, so Brian had more opportunities.

I believe all of Joubert's competitions are accounted for, while Plushenko still has one missing (2000 Finlandia Trophy). So it's likely that they're tied, or Plushenko might have one or two more. However, assuming Joubert will indeed skate a full season in 2012-13, which it looks like Plushenko isn't planning on doing, that should change.

I have Plushy at 94 w/o that Finlandia comp. Assuming he landed a quad in the SP and one in the FS that would put him at 96 – the number Senorita found.

I think the person who might come close to their totals, if he sticks around long enough, is Yuzuru Hanyu - mainly because he's still so young and started putting quads in his programs very early in his career: his first successful one, according to Wikipedia, was at the 2010 NHK Trophy (he was only 15 at the time).

It’s very difficult to predict. It would take years to accumulate a large number. A skater would have to stay focused, dedicated and healthy to do that. With the demands of CoP skaing, I’m not sure the latter is possible. Time will tell.

How did you even find competition results of Plushenko, before 2000? He has a bunch of ancient competitions, I didnt know they existed.
Finlandlia trophy I never saw a video from there

anyway I found this data on his previous website, does it agree with your search?

Some older competitions are on youtube. Some I managed to dig up eyesight reports at various FS boards. I can’t land a quad but I can dig up info…

The number 96 agrees with my data (I will compare yearly numbers later) but the sum of all the yearly numbers is higher than 100 – so I think either it is for all competitions, not just international ones, or it is the number of attempts. Oh, well, the search contiunues…

Lol look what you can find on web archives, a comment about Filandia Trophy, the date is in 2000 ancient yahoo grooups???

Yeah, but it doesn’t actually say what happened.

[senorita]

^no it doesnt say, but he is supposed to have landed at least one quad there to comment sth like

Is Evgeny FINALLY hitting all his quads?.This
has got to be his year

Thats why i posted it, i thought it was a help. The previous message has the results. Sokolova and Liashenko..ah..

The data I found though are really not dated because they stopped in 2006, but probably they have counted his russian competitions too.

[umronnie]

I have updated the "quad files" in honor of the Europeans, coming in under 3 weeks. Our two old warhorses will be going head to head.

Plushenko currently has 94 landed quads under his belt and Joubert has 96. It is unlikely that he will land the 4 he needs to complete the first one hundred in this competition (especially in view of his current training and coaching situation) but if he has a good competition he stands a chance to do it at Worlds. Plushy would need at least two competitions to complete his 6.

If you remember (or you can go upthread) the closest skaters after Joubert and Plushenko were three retired skaters - Yagudin with 56, Goebel with something in the low 50s (I don't have all of his results) and Lambiel with 46.

I have updated the files and added a few skaters I did not consider when I started this project. Would you care to guess who – of the skaters currently competing – leads the group charging after Joubert and Plushy?

[Zemgirl]

I'm going to assume nobody is too close in terms of number of quads landed, but if I had to guess who had a relatively large number, then in addition to Takahashi, Chan and Reynolds whom you've already mentioned, I'd go with Fernandez, because he's been doing a fair number of quads the last few years; and Tomas Verner, because for all that he pops a lot of jumps, he has been around forever and he didn't pop all of them.

[umronnie]

Good guesses, Zemgirl, but you are not even close. I'll post updated numbers for Verner and Fernandez later.

[wingnut]

Amazing thread, great work going through all the stats!

Pretty incredible to think that Plushenko and Joubert are so far ahead of everyone else. Really highlights how unique they are for competing at the top level for so long. It still boggles my mind that Plushenko first competed at Worlds in 98 and is still a relevant medal contender 15 years later. Can you imagine how many quads and/or World titles he could have had he competed more post-2006?

Who has the highest success rate between the two of them?

Also interesting about Elvis "only" landing 20-something quads yet having such an impact. I think the impact would be seen in his win percentage when landing the quad (at least in the 90s). The quad was his edge over the rest of the field. Without it he was hard to beat, but with it he was nearly unbeatable. At least that's how i remember it and that was certainly the mentality that pushed others to start doing it.

Here's hoping Plushenko and Joubert can both cross the 100 mark before they retire (one would think next year).

[Jenny]

Interesting indeed - my guess would have been Plush by a mile, but Joubert has certainly stuck with it!

As for Elvis and others whose main competing years were in the 90s, I think had there been more competition and more payoff, Elvis would have done more as would others. In those days it was a highlight, something to send them over the top, sort of like icing on the cake - now that it also results in big points, it makes sense to do them more often rather than just saving the effort for one jump in the LP.

Not that these guys go into the Kings of Quads running (it was a different time) but each made quad history in their own way - Urmanov landed the first successful quad in Olympic competition at Albertville (his OGM performance four years later in Lillehamer, 1994, was quad-less and I think way off his best in many respects but he won); Kulik was the first OGM to land a successful quad as part of his O's winning performance (Nagano, 1998)

I thought Kurt landed the first quad in competition - a Worlds in the late 80s?

[gkelly]

Quads weren't allowed in the SP until 1998-99.

[screech]

I thought Kurt landed the first quad in competition - a Worlds in the late 80s?

Kurt did the first ratified quad, but Urmanov landed the first in the Olympics. Elvis did the first quad in combination.

[WildRose]

Kurt landed the first quad in competition at Worlds in 1988. He landed a second (and much better one) at the Canadian Championships the following year. The second person to land a quad in international competition was Petr Barna at Worlds in 1989. (Kurt also landed a quad at 1989 Worlds but had a slight touchdown with his free foot so under the rules at that time it didn't count).