Courier Mail | ISU to introduce radical changes to stamp out ‘trading’ of young athletes

[Vagabond]

IIRC, Charlie White has described realizing, when he made his Senior debut that suddenly, everything was business. The change in mindset is probably difficult for most skaters at seventeen, but it must be much harder if they have to deal with it at fifteen.

 

[starrynight]

Then why aren't other girls who are the same age ( and maybe prepubescent body types) aren't gaming the system by being able to be as consistent and have technically difficult programs?

Russia's generous state run funding for figure skating combined with impressive training facilities attached to schools is a significant factor. There's a lot of incentives (financial, educational etc) there for really hard training that doesn't exist in 'pay as you go' systems where the training is extremely expensive and kids still have to go to school separately. Plenty of the Russian champs would have been lost in user pays systems due to lack of funds.

In many countries where children are legally obligated to go to school, the kind of heavy training required to be elite at 13/14 is actually impossible.

Not an expert - but I think, for example, the USA has a much more generous system for gymnastics, so that's why it has massive champions.