Deadspin.com asks: Does Figure Skating Really Need Age Minimums?

[Sylvia]

By Dvora Meyers: https://deadspin.com/does-figure-skating-really-need-age-minimums-1832204461
Excerpts:

Looking at Ando’s feat [landing 4S as a junior], the young Russian skaters’ jumping skill, and [Alysa] Liu’s accomplishment this past weekend, you might be wondering why these young skaters are being kept out of the highest echelon of competition? Why are the age lines drawn in such a way to keep athletes out of the Olympics who might otherwise have the skill to excel in these competitions?

Just because some young skaters can do jumps that the older women don’t doesn’t mean they are, overall, better skaters than their older counterparts. I’d say that the older skaters are still generally more skilled than the young girls who are doing quads. There is more to skating than the jumps and spins even if those elements are the most spectacular and most easily understood by a general audience.
Older—I cringe every time I type this word because these women are not old by any metric found outside of figure skating—skaters usually have better skating skills, the deep edges that allow them to accelerate with just a few strokes. And most importantly, they tend to be much better at performing and interpreting the music. Figure skating is an expressive, aesthetic sport so being able to interpret music and emote on the ice matters, even if it is difficult to measure and quantify. And even if “Will she/won’t she emote?” is not a suspenseful story the way “will she fall on her jumps?” is, both play roles in scoring.

 

[Sylvia]

I see that Lynn Rutherford tweeted the link to this piece yesterday and there's an ongoing discussion there: https://twitter.com/LynnRutherford/status/1090722436042182656
One of her replies:

In order to compete technically, younger athletes will be encouraged to do the tougher jumps .... The changes to U.S. judging/base values for the intermediates and novices demand it. Guess it's a case of either U.S. skaters compete with Russian & Japanese skaters, or they don't.

 

[ZilphaK]

I think the bottom-line question in this is whether we're at a point in scoring where TES and PCS are properly weighted, and --here's the hard part -- according to definitions that a majority agree on, and perhaps, taking into consideration what more casual viewers experience when watching the sport.

Personally, I'm not ready or willing -- or possibly able -- to tackle that question. I would say, as a purely gut reaction, that we may be closer to "perfect" when it comes to scoring men's events than women's.

 

[attyfan]

I wish someone would do some solid research into the injury issue (i.e., whether an age limit helps, how injuries could be prevented or reduced in severity, etc). We only know of the "big names", but there are likely to be a lot more kids who might be risking permanent harm even if they never get a "golden moment" (as Liu just got at Nats) Once research is done, then appropriate measures could be taken.

 

[Wyliefan]

I see that Lynn Rutherford tweeted the link to this piece yesterday and there's an ongoing discussion there: https://twitter.com/LynnRutherford/status/1090722436042182656
One of her replies:

Lynn doesn't seem to be grasping the point of the critiques, which surprises me. They're not that hard to grasp, and she's certainly not without intelligence.

 

[ZilphaK]

Also, and personally, my concern is, again, for skaters who may not have coaches who have experience in teaching "harder" jumps now pushing younger kids to try things that they are not suited to teach. There's a whole industry that I'm not sure is caught up as far as protections for kids and education for parents as to the when/where/why/how of safest practices of elite competitive competition and training.

 

[wickedwitch]

I wish someone would do some solid research into the injury issue (i.e., whether an age limit helps, how injuries could be prevented or reduced in severity, etc). We only know of the "big names", but there are likely to be a lot more kids who might be risking permanent harm even if they never get a "golden moment" (as Liu just got at Nats) Once research is done, then appropriate measures could be taken.

But age limits don't prevent young skaters from trying the hard jumps.

 

[attyfan]

But age limits don't prevent young skaters from trying the hard jumps.

When we are talking about 13 year olds, we do not expect kids of that age to act reasonably in protecting themselves -- that is why adults are supposed to do it. If, in fact, research shows that age limits do prevent serious or permanent injury, then, at the very least, young skaters should not even be given a chance to be rewarded for taking such risks. Should actual research justify it, I would recommend that USFS (and the ISU) go as far as banning a coach (or a rink) that does not take action to prevent such attempts -

 

[rfisher]

If younger skaters don't learn the difficult jumps, then girls will never learn the quad and 3A. Tuk was doing a 3A as a junior. She just wasn't putting it in competitive programs because it wasn't necessary. Many of them learned to do the quad jumps and didn't compete with them for the same reason. Now, others are doing them in competition and there you have it.

Even the boys/men. If they don't master the 3A and or quads as juniors, most don't as seniors.

And, @attyfan, who would do such a study? That would take 5-10 years to follow skaters in order to get any quantifiable data. I don't think there is any database that has which skaters learned what jumps at what age and if they suffered permanent injury then or later.

 

[nylynnr]

Lynn doesn't seem to be grasping the point of the critiques, which surprises me. They're not that hard to grasp, and she's certainly not without intelligence.

Lynn wanted to solicit opinions and keep discussion going. Interesting topic with a lot of valid points on both sides.

 

[Tinami Amori]

if there was internet and social media in the 1970's, the same discussion would be held "because of triple jumps" vs. "doubles", and how "young ones can do it easier than older ones".

Carolina Kostner, as she got older, pushing 30's, lost consistency on her triples... Why not hold a conversation "Women want to compete past 30! 30 is a new 20 in 21st century. But in late 20's they lose consistency on triples.

LET'S EXTEND THE AGE LIMIT to 25....

 

[Spun Silver]

Lynn doesn't seem to be grasping the point of the critiques, which surprises me. They're not that hard to grasp, and she's certainly not without intelligence.

Or maybe she doesn't see it the same way you/they do. But how nice of you to say she's not stupid.

As for research, I'm sure there is lots of it going on. For example, here's a longitudinal study from Japan that concludes that muscle tightness is associated with certain ankle and knee injuries. The footnotes cite various other studies. https://www.dovepress.com/injuries-...th-gener-peer-reviewed-fulltext-article-OAJSM

One would probably need access to a good medical-academic database to see most of the research. I doubt it's a fast process to get answers to all of our questions. But here is a synthesis that appears on more than one hospital website. It makes me wonder how many of these best practices, like avoiding learning new tricks during a growth spurt, are known and used across the country. Promoting that knowledge could be an important function of USFSA (maybe it already is?). https://www.urmc.rochester.edu/orthopaedics/sports-medicine/figure-skating-injuries.cfm ETA: This new book indicates that USFS is trying to bring current research to bear on athletes' training: https://today.uconn.edu/2018/02/figure-skating-book/#

I'm also wondering how real is the incidence of young bodies permanently broken by figure skating. This is a sort of meme these days but could it be a myth? Tara Lipinski used to be a poster child to warn against youthful overuse injury but she seems to be doing fine. Julia Lipnitskaya has been mentioned in this thread, but she's back on the ice. People are concerned about Zagitova but it's a stretch to call the European silver medalist broken. It's a real question -- I'd just like to see more evidence before trying to solve a problem that may not be as widespread as we think.

Basically, I'm in favor of evidence based decisions (so boring!). Until we have more evidence , I favor keeping the current age limits and working on (a) strongly promoting best injury prevention practices, and (b) judging. "Higher, faster, stronger" is the Olympic motto and I don't want to see skating lose sight of that. For all the people who say, "I want to see mature lady skaters, not empty virtuosity," I would wager there are as many or more who say, "Wow, I want to see that guy who does five quads or that kid who does three triple axels!" The system can be tweaked to encourage judges to reward artistry and skating skills even as the quest for virtuosity continues.

 

[Wyliefan]

Or maybe she doesn't see it the same way you/they do. But how nice of you to say she's not stupid.

I'm just a nice person. Seriously, she's not in the least stupid. She just didn't seem to be responding directly to the points people were trying to make.

 

[analia]

Age limits are completely arbitrary. Kostornaya is skating with more maturity than most senior ladies out there. If "health" of children is the concern here it's difficulty that should be limited, not age of participating in competitions. And yet no one is comfortable saying only one quad/3A should be allowed per program. Honestly learning a quad/3A is much more dangerous and injury prone for a 20 years old than for a 12 years old. This season's men's competitions are scary hot messes and we are not talking about 13 year old boys.

 

[AxelAnnie]

I think looking at Michelle or Tara as comparisons re age limits is a specious argument.

Social Media's impact on the people in the sport can be crushing Tara's Loop/loop was eventually career ending. Tara IIRC would practice a jump 1,000,000 times.

Kids have no way to measure or understand the possible consequences to their bodies and souls with the constant pounding.


Inside the Teenage brain

Because the prefrontal cortex is still developing, teenagers might rely on a part of the brain called the amygdala to make decisions and solve problems more than adults do. The amygdala is associated with emotions, impulses, aggression and instinctive behaviour.

The teenage brain does not develop the ability to reason consequences of their action today on their future. Hence, I would advocate for age limits.

Some kids may navigate the waters better than others, but how can we know? So placing an age limit at least keeps them in a more sheltered environment. No one should win sr. Nationals at 13.

And I would put an age limit on performing quads and triple axels in competition. We don't need anymore Julias, Sotnikovas, Lipinskis or any of the myriad of Russian phenoms, who will most likely be done before they even have a chance to start.

 

[Spun Silver]

You are writing off a lot of skaters. There goes that iconic Girl in the Red Coat program. I guess there goes Mao. She was doing the 3A at 14 (maybe younger for all I know). There go Kihira and Kostornaya. Don't think I can go along with you here!

 

[AxelAnnie]

You are writing off a lot of skaters. There goes that iconic Girl in the Red Coat program. I guess there goes Mao. She was doing the 3A at 14 (maybe younger for all I know). There go Kihira and Kostornaya. Don't think I can go along with you here!

Is it worth the cost?

 

[Spun Silver]

Is it worth the cost?

I'm honestly not convinced about the alleged high cost. I would have to see more quantitative data before advocating a rule change that would "cost" us those skaters.

 

[giselle23]

If they lower the age limit, they need find a better way of rewarding whatever counts as artistry these days. Otherwise, junior skaters with quads and 3As will always be able to rack up enough TES points to overcome a skater with more mature artistry. Under the old system, there was parity in the two marks and judges were able to make that distinction (except at 1998 Nagano when they gave Tara nearly the same second marks as Michelle). The IJS has certainly moved the sport forward on tech but has devalued artistry so much that young skaters are focused only on the jumps. This is ironic since it is exactly what was not supposed to happen when the age limit was imposed.

 

[Sylvia]

Bumping up this thread from early 2019 rather than starting another thread...

Norway's proposal to raise minimum age for women's singles skating to 17 receives Russian backlash:

Norway submit figure skating age limit rise despite Russian backlash

The Norwegian Figure Skating Association has submitted a proposal to the International Skating Union in a bid to raise the minimum age for women's sin...

www.insidethegames.biz

ETA:

Норвегия внесла предложение о поднятии возрастного ценза в фигурном катании

В настоящее время во взрослые соревнования допускаются фигуристки, которым исполнилось 15 лет на момент 1 июля

tass.ru

"Probably, if adopted, the changes will take effect from the 2022/23 season - that is, after the 2022 Olympic Games in Beijing."

 

[starrynight]

I think it would be a good thing to allow the young girls the opportunity to go through puberty and make the necessary adjustments without being in the glare of the international spotlight.

I do actually wonder if this very quiet season might actually work in Trusova/Kostornaya/Scherbakova’s favour by allowing the growing pains to be worked through without the drama of international competition.

I think it’s sometimes the psychological damage out of faltering at a very delicate age in the international spotlight that ends careers early.

And if skaters can be great at 15 why can’t they be great at 20?

I think that having an even playing field that doesn’t involve chasing an age window of 15 - 17 would be better. Just look at the way everyone is focusing on Valieva just because she will be 15 for the Olympics.