Chinese Skating News, Pt. 3: A long & winding road to Beijing 2022

[On My Own]

Actually, It began in 18-19.

For S/H maybe. But I checked wikipedia for Peng/Jin and Boyang Jin, and they were both listed on Finlandia 2017. I guess for them it wasn't miscalculated.

 

[Sylvia]

Boyang Jin skated a clean SP in Torino today (4Lz+3T, 4T, 3A) and is in 1st with 97.89!
Yudong Chen, 17, landed a nice 4S & 3Lz+3T before falling on 3Aq and scored an ISU PB of 78.79 for 8th place - Gran Premio d'Italia is his official Grand Prix debut: http://www.isuresults.com/bios/isufs00102548.htm

Yi (Beverly) Zhu also scored an ISU PB of 60.00 with a respectable 8th place SP performance (3F+2T, 2A, 3Lo).

I missed seeing this news from last week (thanks, @Gris!):

Ashley [Shan LIN] went back to train in China recently.

Post by Team Ganicheva & Letov: https://www.instagram.com/p/CVnKDyGLBBb/

2021 Skate Canada International champs Sui/Han (80.07) and Peng/Jin (76.71) hold the top 2 spots after today's SP in Torino. This is P/J's only GP since they were (mysteriously) withdrawn last month from IdF in Grenoble, along with Wang/Huang.

Shiyue WANG/Xinyu LIU are 5th (73.28) and Hong CHEN/Zhuoming SUN are 9th (62.37) after the RD.

 

[Gris]

Thank you @Sylvia for the post!

Inner Mongolia TV's coverage of Hongyi Chen, who now trains there (her coach is now the coach of Inner Mongolia's figure skating program).

 

[raruki]

中国花样滑冰协会

www.cfsa.com.cn

According to CFSA, the Chinese Nationals will be held in Chengde, Hebei province from December 6th to December 12th.

Based on Hongbo Zhao, there will be 3 domestic competitions, including the nationals, along with the results from the international competitions, deciding the final slots of the Olympic team.

I don't think Sui and Han will compete in the
nationals because they will be qualified to compete in GPF, and the nationals will clash with GPF.

 

[On My Own]

Thank you @Sylvia for the post!

Inner Mongolia TV's coverage of Hongyi Chen, who now trains there (her coach is now the coach of Inner Mongolia's figure skating program).

Was she dropped from the national team, or...?

 

[On My Own]

I thought Zhu Yi was pretty nice here. She has nice basics. Clearly needs some training on the performance and better programs, but she didn't do badly, IMO. I guess CSA is waiting for An Xiangyi, but wouldn't be bad to have Zhu along with her... Forgetting Chen Hongyi (and Lin Shan) for the moment.

 

[On My Own]

"ChengPeng/YangJin on withdrawal from GP France: This is a decision made by our country as a health/safety concern because pandemic control within China is very strict, and why our country has done so well in handling the pandemic. After this we need to go home and quarantine." Link

How many people buy this?

 

[Gris]

"ChengPeng/YangJin on withdrawal from GP France: This is a decision made by our country as a health/safety concern because ********* control within China is very strict, and why our country has done so well in handling the *********. After this we need to go home and quarantine." Link

How many people buy this?

Wang / Liu also said they'd return to China because "safety first".

https://twitter.com/InTheLoPodcast/status/1457038296895344640

It sounds like a uniform diplomatic answer to me.

I think Yi did well too. Hope she builds more stamina next.

 

[clairecloutier]

So did Wang/Liu only have 1 GP to start with, or were they withdrawn from their second GP like Peng/Jin?

 

[On My Own]

So did Wang/Liu only have 1 GP to start with, or were they withdrawn from their second GP like Peng/Jin?

Withdrawn from NHK.

 

[feraina]

So they all have to do a quarantine? Darn. What about S/H and GPF? Will they withdraw?

 

[On My Own]

So they all have to do a quarantine? Darn. What about S/H and GPF? Will they withdraw?

I mean if they expect people to buy it, then they will withdraw S/H from GPF, won't they?

 

[feraina]

I mean if they expect people to buy it, then they will withdraw S/H from GPF, won't they?

You make it sound like there’s some kind of conspiracy. China doesn’t normally randomly withdraw skaters from GP’s. It makes even less sense to do it in an Olympic year. So why do you think all these athletes were withdrawn if it’s not something to do with the crud?

 

[On My Own]

You make it sound like there’s some kind of conspiracy.

That wasn't my intention.

 

[Karen-W]

Wang / Liu also said they'd return to China because "safety first".

https://twitter.com/InTheLoPodcast/status/1457038296895344640

It sounds like a uniform diplomatic answer to me.

I think Yi did well too. Hope she builds more stamina next.

You call it a uniform diplomatic answer, I call it towing the party line, and I do mean the Chinese Communist Party line. We've all seen how easy it is for the skaters out of favor with the federation/government are forced into retirement, and Peng/Jin have never been the favored skaters at home, hence their "Leftovers" nickname here.

 

[On My Own]

We've all seen how easy it is for the skaters out of favor with the federation/government are forced into retirement, and Peng/Jin have never been the favored skaters at home, hence their "Leftovers" nickname here.

I don't think it's this with P/J (whose results have been remarkable). Rather, they just aren't expected to win (and maybe not even a medal) at Beijing, so why waste money on them. Unfortunately, it's very much a state-funded program, and they do what is in their own interests, rather than the athletes'. (and, no, this isn't a conspiracy theory)

 

[kwanfan1818]

I don't think it's this with P/J (whose results have been remarkable). Rather, they just aren't expected to win (and maybe not even a medal) at Beijing, so why waste money on

They just earned the Fed 13K for GP Italia, and their travel costs are paid by the host. So what money are they "wasting"?

 

[Karen-W]

They just earned the Fed 13K for GP Italia, and their travel costs are paid by the host. So what money are they "wasting"?

I'm sure the Chinese fed spent at least that much to set up a training base in Italy for the last 3 weeks since Asian Open. 8 skaters plus coaches, support personnel and minders.

 

[kwanfan1818]

I'm sure the Chinese fed spent at least that much to set up a training base in Italy for the last 3 weeks since Asian Open. 8 skaters plus coaches, support personnel and minders.

And that's a sunk cost for S/H's benefit that could have been extended for part of the team through IdF France, with cv results/status established from Italy, at least according to posts here, paid for by P/J's earnings. (The Fed cleared $34K in total this weekend.)

 

[On My Own]

(The Fed cleared $34K in total this weekend.)

What do you mean by this?

 

[kwanfan1818]

What do you mean by this?

18K for S/H's 1st, 13K for P/J's 2nd, and 3K for W/L's 4th.

 

[On My Own]

18K for S/H's 1st, 13K for P/J's 2nd, and 3K for W/L's 4th.

No, what did you mean by the fed "cleared" money this weekend?

 

[kwanfan1818]

The prize money is paid to the Fed. They can demand what they want in repayment for training expenses, or, for example, in compensation for setting up a training base in Italy. So the skaters "pay them back" from their earnings. You don't think they just write checks to the skaters for the 90% required by the ISU do you?

 

[On My Own]

They can demand what they want in repayment for training expenses, or, for example, in compensation for setting up a training base in Italy.

So you think they'll take all the money from S/H, P/J, and W/L?

 

[kwanfan1818]

So you think the Chinese Fed pays for Lori Nichol and, pre-cv, long trips to Canada, and IAM entirely out of their own pocket?

 

[On My Own]

So you think the Chinese Fed pays for Lori Nichol and, pre-cv, long trips to Canada, and IAM entirely out of their own pocket?

Why are you taking this sarcastic tone? I asked a question. Don't bother answering if you don't know how to speak to people.

 

[maatTheViking]

I think there must be more to it than cost. Pairs is volatile and Peng/Jin has an outside medal chance? For the team event, Wang/Liu scoring well will be important even if they don’t have a medal chance? The more the program get in front of international judges, the better.

I don’t understand the ‘safety first’ statement - if Italy is safe so is IdF? Or are there simply different protocols at different events that warrants this? Clearly the protocol at SC was different than SKAM (which had no bubble)

 

[On My Own]

I'm sure the Chinese fed spent at least that much to set up a training base in Italy for the last 3 weeks since Asian Open. 8 skaters plus coaches, support personnel and minders.

CSA does take a cut of the skaters' earnings, but beside what you mentioned, I expect there are a lot of behind the scenes costs and expenses (seeing that there are three national competitions they intend to organize this season).

And please, if people think the athletes get none of their earnings. Their weibos are splattered with clothes and jewellery that speak far from it. Han Yan's fans specifically mentioned him paying out of his own pockets last season, for a new SP (that he never performed). Not something they'd have said if previously (when he was on the team) he'd not been getting any funding from the CSA nor getting to keep any of the money he'd earned.

I don’t understand the ‘safety first’ statement - if Italy is safe so is IdF? Or are there simply different protocols at different events that warrants this? Clearly the protocol at SC was different than SKAM (which had no bubble)

Not to mention, Zhao Hongbo did say they were going to be there for IdF (Canada, Italy, and France), and were only supposed to go back after IdF. So I don't think it has to do with "safety first".

France needs a booster shot beyond the Chinese vaccine (which isn't EU approved), but it'd be a pretty terrible reason to say they just weren't willing to get them an EU approved booster. A nationalist one at best.

 

[hanca]

I don't think it's this with P/J (whose results have been remarkable). Rather, they just aren't expected to win (and maybe not even a medal) at Beijing, so why waste money on them. Unfortunately, it's very much a state-funded program, and they do what is in their own interests, rather than the athletes'. (and, no, this isn't a conspiracy theory)

I don’t understand that kind of mentality though. If you have two decent pairs, why reduce your chances and put all your hopes on just one pair? They could support both pairs and it wouldn’t be taking anything from their number one pair. What happens if Sui/Han gets injured last minute? Or if one of them has just simple flu or something and won’t be able to skate on that day? When Russian federation had Zagitova and Medvedeva, they didn’t have the need to undermine one skater to support the other one; they supported both of them and then they got gold and silver.

 

[Jammers]

Yes i'm sure that China has handled this pandemic so well that they won't show what really happened when the shit hit the fan at the start of this nightmare. Communist governments aren't known for being forthright when bad things happen that might make them look bad just google Chernobly disaster.