Who moved my Lutz?

[BigB08822]

Delete.

[mikemba]

But it doesn't even begin to make sense to compare the value of a three jump combination with a solo jump (the clue being one is three jumps the other is one). They are two different things completely and cannot be compared. You can only do one three jump combination in a programme and it is likely to be a high scoring element because of the fact three jumps are involved. I would say most people advocate making combinations worth more, not less because of the fact that second (and yes third jumps) in combination are more difficult than jump done in isolation.

It does begin to make sense to compare this. My point is that there are probably hundreds of women in the US who can do a 3sal-2toe-2loop combo, but probably fewer than 10 who can do a triple axel. So there is no way the former should be worth almost as much. Yes, a 3/2/2 is harder than doing a 3 a 2 and a 2 separately. But the sal combo I mentioned is much, much, much easier than a triple axel. I think that even the woman who landed it on TV, and who couldn't do a triple axel, lutz, flip, or loop would agree. Something is seriously wrong when an incredibly easier move scores almost the same as a triple axel.

By the way, I completely agree with those who say that 3-3 combinations should be valued more than they are. The fact that a triple lutz/triple toe combination is worth the same as the two jumps done separately not only makes no sense, it discourages women who can do the former from doing it (especially if that triple toe gets the same value tacked on the end of a double axel as it does tacked on the end of a triple lutz). Yet the lutz combo is so much hareder than the double axel combo.

For all its problems, one thing about the 6.0 sytem was that, even without specific values, judges often were very accurate in rewarding the more difficult moves. A triple lutz/triple toe didn't have a specific value, but you did indeed get rewarded for doing it. As one example among many, if two skaters did a clean 7 triple program repeating the lutz and the toe, and skater A had both a 3 lutz/3toe and a 3 flip/3 toe, and skater B had no 3/3s, skater A would win the technical mark, and rightfully so. Today (ignoring the 2nd half of the program rule for a second), they would be scored identically on the technical mark. That's ludicrous.

A real-life example: Michelle and Tara did the same 7 triples at the Olympics. Does anyone here really think that Michelle's program with no 3/3s was identically difficult to Tara's program with both a triple loop/triiple loop and triple toe/ 1/2 loop / triple sal? Even if you thought Michelle was a better skater, it would be very difficult to argue that their jumps were equally difficult. But again (forgetting the 2nd half rule for a moment) their base values would have been the same in teh new system.

[Vash01]

It does begin to make sense to compare this. My point is that there are probably hundreds of women in the US who can do a 3sal-2toe-2loop combo, but probably fewer than 10 who can do a triple axel.

Who are these US ladies that can do the 3A?

[mikemba]

I was being generous by saying "fewer than 10": it probably is even fewer than that, but that supports my point further: that the 3 axel is so incredibly much harder than the 3 sal/2/2 combo, that it makes no sense that the former, which very few women can do (and which some men even can't) barely outscores the latter done in the 2nd half, which probably hundreds of women can do.

Speaking of men, would we think that two men had essentially equally difficult programs if both did 6 triples with both doing a lutz, flip, loop, toe, and salchow, but for the other jump, Skater A did a triple axel in the 1st half, and Skater B did the 3salchow/2/2 in the 2nd half? Most of us would think the man with the triple axel had a much harder program than the man who did not, so why don't we think the same way for women?

[kittysk8ts]

I agree with your combo rule. I don't think it's logical to have same base value for a jump in combo or solo.
Anyway, I was one of those who didn't like Flutz in the 2000's. And I still don't like them. Really, Fumie Suguri or Alena Leonova were doing four 3Flip in their LP !

And Leonova's actual triple flip is seriously flawed as well. She cheats it on the entrance. I think flutzes should be penalized, otherwise what is the point? At this level of skating you have to split hairs and technique is the appropriate way to do so.