Shibutani Return for Olympic Season

[Kelleys6th]

WOW! This is news!
Alex and Maya Shibutani will return to competition for the Olympic season of 2025-26!

Maia And Alex Shibutani Announce Return to Competitive Figure Skating | U.S. Figure Skating

www.usfigureskating.org

 

[Jarrett]

lol something no one would have ever asked for. Sorry shibs just being honest.

 

[Karen-W]

WOW! This is news!
Alex and Maya Shibutani will return to competition for the Olympic season of 2025-26!

Maia And Alex Shibutani Announce Return to Competitive Figure Skating | U.S. Figure Skating

www.usfigureskating.org

Being actively discussed in the US Ice Dance thread...

 

[Debbie S]

There are several pages of discussion already in the U.S. dance thread.

 

[MacMadame]

Not all of us go there regularly. Thanks for posting, @Kelleys6th.

 

[FSWer]

That's great news!!!

 

[manhn]

Thanks for the new thread, I would not be reading the US Dance thread intentionally otherwise. I looked it up, Coldplay’s first album, Parachutes, was released in 2000. Drat! Anyways, so I looked up Sibling duos in the 90s…Oasis (Coldplay adjacent!), Hanson (the Shibs would be perfect for Hmm Bop!), and Kid n Play. I also think they’d be great with the theme song for Friends. They could be Ross and Monica!!

 

[moebius]

I thought this was May Fools Day joke, LOL!

 

[Sasha'sSpins]

lol something no one would have ever asked for. Sorry shibs just being honest.

No one? Please speak for yourself. As a fan, I am THRILLED! Can't wait for the Olympic season to begin! First Alysa, now the Shibs!

Eta: What the heck! I'm doing cartwheels!

 

[Carolla5501]

lol something no one would have ever asked for. Sorry shibs just being honest.

I believe the correct statement is something you would not have asked for, I doubt you can actually speak for everyone in the world. Your statement is actually incorrect by at least one other response on this thread. So instead of being honest, you’re making up fake news

 

[my little pony]

I'm kind of surprised at how divisive this is. I'm much more vested after seeing the neigh-sayers neigh. pissing off this many people at once is a gift. come through shibs! they're gonna have to learn how to stand still and shimmy while clutching the boards though.

 

[manhn]

Exactly. As if the current teams are brimming with precise technique and originality. The Shibs should come to Saskatoon!!!

 

[overedge]

When Virtue/Moir returned to competing in Canada, there were several junior and senior teams who retired because they didn't think it was feasible to continue competing with one of the Olympic spots basically already filled. I'm wondering if the same will happen in the US with the Shibs' return.

 

[manhn]

And Canada got two gold medals out of it. Putting aside their allegations, although there was no absolute gold standard like V&M, the dance discipline for Canada between 2018-2022 was still pretty good with Paul and Piper, the Danadians and an up and coming L&L who did not retire due to V&M’s return.

 

[kwanfan1818]

Lajoie/Lagha didn't even compete seniors at Can Nats in 2018, and their Jr. title winning program scored 154.1, or 36.69 off W/P's score and ~25 points behind Soucisse/Firus's 4th place score. At the time, L/L were killing it in Juniors, but they weren't in contention for an Olympic spot for seniors. Virtue/Moir at similar ages having skated internationally as Juniors until that point, came within a few points of an Olympic spot in 2006 under Wing/Lowe. While I love L/L, and would rather watch them anytime, they were not in a place where V/M's return made any difference to their future. ETA: Actually it cleared out some teams that were ahead of them, who might have had the advantage of a later starting order.

 

[Jarrett]

No one? Please speak for yourself. As a fan, I am THRILLED! Can't wait for the Olympic season to begin! First Alysa, now the Shibs!

Eta: What the heck! I'm doing cartwheels!

I’m happy for you and us if they are up to snuff but I really don’t think ANYONE was asking for a shibs comeback. This is just out of left field at least to me. Michelle Kwan I’m waiting for your announcement!!!

 

[Willin]

The scoring will be interesting to see for a number of reasons.

We've seen teams take 1-2 years off, but 7 years is a long time and the ice dance judges may have moved on - especially given those judges are often somewhat friendly with the skaters and coaches and Alex/Maia don't seem to be that connected with the current ice dance social circles. So will their reputation hold up?

The power dynamic in politics has shifted from Michigan to IAM, and it sounds like now they're in California - which has 0 ice dance power. Marina may not even have the sway to help.

Their strengths are their technical skating - and their twizzles will still be a strength - but with the ISU trying to modernize ice dance they've taken away a lot of the technical stuff (full patterns, some leveled elements) in favor of creative elements and character steps. Not to say the Shibs aren't great performers - but the character step and creative GOEs often seem less about performance and more about politics.

 

[overedge]

And Canada got two gold medals out of it. Putting aside their allegations, although there was no absolute gold standard like V&M, the dance discipline for Canada between 2018-2022 was still pretty good with Paul and Piper, the Danadians and an up and coming L&L who did not retire due to V&M’s return.

It had an impact on other teams that were high-placing juniors or lower-placed seniors, at the time. Piper and Paul were already in the mix, as were the Danadians. I think the ones who decided to stay around were the ones that were already on the ladder, so to speak. Other teams decided to retire because they couldn't afford the resources or time to continue until things opened up more. I'm interested to see whether the same impact on future development happens in the US.

 

[Coco]

Are their recent vids of show programs? Please don't make me go to the dance thread.

 

[VGThuy]

Are their recent vids of show programs? Please don't make me go to the dance thread.

As far as I know, the last full programs they performed were from 2019 SOI. I posted clips here:

U.S. Figure Skating Hall of Fame Inductees Class of 2023: Maia Shibutani/Alex Shibutani and Paul E. George

I thought this deserved its own thread. Thank you to @Rukia for pointing this out in the Shibutani thread. https://www.usfigureskating.org/news/article/shibutanis-lead-us-figure-skating-hall-fame-class-2023 Ice dancers Maia and Alex Shibutani lead the U.S. Figure Skating Hall of Fame Class...

www.fsuniverse.net

 

[A.H.Black]

The scoring will be interesting to see for a number of reasons.

We've seen teams take 1-2 years off, but 7 years is a long time and the ice dance judges may have moved on - especially given those judges are often somewhat friendly with the skaters and coaches and Alex/Maia don't seem to be that connected with the current ice dance social circles. So will their reputation hold up?

The power dynamic in politics has shifted from Michigan to IAM, and it sounds like now they're in California - which has 0 ice dance power. Marina may not even have the sway to help.

Their strengths are their technical skating - and their twizzles will still be a strength - but with the ISU trying to modernize ice dance they've taken away a lot of the technical stuff (full patterns, some leveled elements) in favor of creative elements and character steps. Not to say the Shibs aren't great performers - but the character step and creative GOEs often seem less about performance and more about politics.

I agree with you that the scoring will be interesting. My memories say that when they were competing, the top teams all used to get level 4"s on everything and when someone got a level 3, it was a bit deal. These days, the levels are much lower on many of the elements (except lifts) and it's the GOE's that make the difference. I'm not sure if it's just that the rules make it harder to get higher levels, if the tech panels are more demanding, or if the skaters are just not as technically exact - probably a combination of all 3. If the Shibs can get all the level 4's they used to get, they could be very competitive.

 

[VGThuy]

I agree with you that the scoring will be interesting. My memories say that when they were competing, the top teams all used to get level 4"s on everything and when someone got a level 3, it was a bit deal. These days, the levels are much lower on many of the elements (except lifts) and it's the GOE's that make the difference. I'm not sure if it's just that the rules make it harder to get higher levels, if the tech panels are more demanding, or if the skaters are just not as technically exact - probably a combination of all 3. If the Shibs can get all the level 4's they used to get, they could be very competitive.

The point differentials between the levels also decreased, putting less power in the hands of the tech panel and more power into the hands of the judges, on top of increasing the GOE range which also did that.

 

[MacMadame]

When Virtue/Moir returned to competing in Canada, there were several junior and senior teams who retired because they didn't think it was feasible to continue competing with one of the Olympic spots basically already filled. I'm wondering if the same will happen in the US with the Shibs' return.

I would be surprised. They've been out for 7 years. I see this more like when Katerina Witt and Brian Boitano came back. Katerina came back for fun but Brian wanted to be competitive. But he didn't allow enough time to get his skills back and the Shibs have not given themselves a lot of time to get back to Olympic level.

 

[tony]

I would be surprised. They've been out for 7 years. I see this more like when Katerina Witt and Brian Boitano came back. Katerina came back for fun but Brian wanted to be competitive. But he didn't allow enough time to get his skills back and the Shibs have not given themselves a lot of time to get back to Olympic level.

In what world did Brian not allow enough time to get his skills back though? It's not as if he lost the triple Axel at any point - he had it in the pro competitions he was doing before that season and often doing 5+ triples in them. Also, his Nationals skate was quite strong even if he lost to Davis.

 

[Willin]

I would be surprised. They've been out for 7 years. I see this more like when Katerina Witt and Brian Boitano came back. Katerina came back for fun but Brian wanted to be competitive. But he didn't allow enough time to get his skills back and the Shibs have not given themselves a lot of time to get back to Olympic level.

Based on sightings in LA they've been skating for 2 months now there. That's not nearly enough time to get to the Olympic level given they've been doing minimal skating for 6ish years - especially given they're not getting consistent coaching.

However, I did see rumors they were spotted together skating last summer. If it really was last summer they started up again that may be enough time to be competitive for the team given the right political push and earning the right levels. Then again, they're training at a rink with no dance coaches, no dance judges, and who knows what plans to rectify that - so it's hard to say.

I find it very weird how disconnected from the ice dance community they are. In a discipline where politics are so important it's weird they're not social media friends with many current ice dancers/coaches and aren't training at a big ice dance center/camp with connections. LA as a whole has very limited ice dancing - there's coaches here and there that do pattern dances and tests, but the closest you'd go to find true high level coaches and partners is San Jose (and that's small fry developmental ice dance compared to CS, Canton, Montreal, etc). Massimo does have connections, but even he's primarily in the Bay Area and can't be firmly in their corner day in and day out.

 

[Theatregirl1122]

I find it very weird how disconnected from the ice dance community they are. In a discipline where politics are so important it's weird they're not social media friends with many current ice dancers/coaches and aren't training at a big ice dance center/camp with connections.

You sure do have a lot of theories about this, don’t you?

 

[MacMadame]

In what world did Brian not allow enough time to get his skills back though? It's not as if he lost the triple Axel at any point - he had it in the pro competitions he was doing before that season and often doing 5+ triples in them. Also, his Nationals skate was quite strong even if he lost to Davis.

Brian was skating much better about 5 months after Nationals where he lost to Davis and the Olympics where he came in sixth. If he had started about 6 months to a year earlier, I bet he could have been National Champion and maybe even an Olympic medalist for a second time.

 

[Willin]

@Theatregirl1122 Well, I mean, you can read into that what you will. And you're free to have your own theories about me and make fun of me as well.

But ice dance is political and that includes where you train, who you train with, who you've pissed off (remember Igor's teams getting dumped hard after his breakup from Marina?), and your public image. There's a reason skaters sacrifice a lot to move to IAM: their scores and results skyrocket because they're with the right people.

Even outside the politics I've seen ice dancers get penalties because they had no judges close enough to them to tell them what they were doing didn't fit new rule changes - and we've seen that on the Senior international level recently when skaters/coaches weren't in the right loops.

I know ice dance judges. I've competed ice dance. I have friends and coaches that competed ice dance. I know how this works. So go ahead, see it as petty and have a petty response. But it is a concern.

 

[tony]

Brian was skating much better about 5 months after Nationals where he lost to Davis and the Olympics where he came in sixth. If he had started about 6 months to a year earlier, I bet he could have been National Champion and maybe even an Olympic medalist for a second time.

But he didn't really ever stop competing, so I don't get what you're trying to say. He was always in pro events with a full arsenal of triples. Scott Hamilton IIRC said at the Olympics that the Axel in the short is the first one he saw him miss all week. Olympic nerves or whatever, but you could also say that of Browning who was a 4-time World Champion by that point with no break in training. Petrenko was winning everything in sight in his comeback year, too, and look how the Olympics went.

The Shibutanis haven't even skated in shows in a long time. Completely different scenario.

But also, let's remember James/Radford, after not competing for a while (in Eric's case 4 full seasons), not only were a brand new team but they were on the World podium in their first year together. No one knows how this is going to go. There's no 'precedent' in the past to tell us how it will, either.

 

[VGThuy]

I just keep reading more arguments supporting removing ice dance from the Olympics.