The Skating Lesson

I felt like some of the comments regarding the Russian ladies were kind of gossipy and speculative in the Olympic recap. Like how Russia is manufacturing ladies to be thin and petite? Zagitova is 15 years old, plenty of normal, healthy females are small at that age and mature in their later teens.

As for Medvedeva, alarming weight loss really Dave? Sure she’s a very thin girl but she’s been that way since we saw her debut on the JGP. Maybe her limbs look thinner because she was injured and lost training time? Similarly, other people may gain weight when injured - both situations seem feasible. Also my mom is the same size as Medvedeva (162 cm/46 kg) and had 5 kids. She’s a healthy normal person.

Not saying that extreme dieting or use of medications for weight loss doesn’t work exist in sports, but unless he knows something specific, I feel the athletes should be given the benefit of the doubt. Body shaming comes in many forms and by basically saying the Russian girls only win because they are thin is taking away from their accomplishments. It’s a sport with learned skills, being skinny doesn’t automatically make you successful.
 
Loves_Shizuka said:
Just started watchng the technical recap - Dave describes Kristi Yamaguchi as "seems like a nice girl" ?!

That's a classy, grown woman and an OGM you're talking about there!
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From my understanding, and I could be wrong, I thought he was talking about Karen Chen, not Kristi.
 
honey said:
He was for sure talking about Kristi. I think his point was that while I’m sure Kristi is a great person and encourages Karen, she’s not the technician who is going to fix her jump issues.
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Oh, sorry. I was listening while doing something else. Kind of a strange way to describe Kristi :confused: I assumed it was Karen because she seems like a nice girl too.:)
 
aftershocks said:
I love how Doug Haw is so good at gut-checking Dave's snark-mode. At about 10:40, Doug responds to Dave's thrashing of Tammy Gambill with these words: "I'm not here to criticize Tammy. I'm only here to give her support ..."
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I really like Doug a lot. He proves there is no need to be miserable or snarky in an analysis. It's not easy to do! But it is possible. Also Kimmie M is good at this. IMO, of course.
 
GullyGirl84 said:
It seems odd that they know all of this obscure figure skating gossip, but that they didn't mention that Gabby Daleman was injured when they talked about her seeming "off" in the long, when it was pretty widely reported on Twitter after the fact?
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Ya. Dave has more ties to big American camps so he gets more detail there. I found out because someone sent me the tweet and, being in Canada, I heard her mention it in an interview. You'd really have to look to know....but yeah, it's there.

Also surprised they didn't know who Koenig was. A simple search would have revealed he skated with Peggy Schwarz in a few Olympics before she switched to Muller.
 
Willin said:
Watching this for Meagan! I'd love to see her get a podcast of her own! She's so knowledgeable and great at explaining things.
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Oh she has many options open to her going forward...and many ambitions on the personal and professional front. I think after SOI tours and some mind-clearing vaycay she'll start incubating a few of these plans and we'll hear about them.
 
alchemy void said:
Duhamel is amazing. :love: I could listen to her talk about skating all day. Thoroughly knowledgeable, well-spoken, and interesting.

Dave and his sidekick, on the other hand...
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Yeah. Actually, Dave makes me laugh and he does bring some info and insight to the table, once you strip away your feelings about his agendas or whatever.

I want to find nice things to say about Jonathan, but other than being a reliable sidekick I can't. Having someone on the vlog allows Dave to converse vs narrate but that's sort of where it ends in terms of value add.

I'm sure he's a nice guy but this thing isn't his forte. I also find his voice has this slightly pouty quality that creeps in that some may find endearing but for me it's hard on the ears when combined with his regional accent. Nothing he can do about it, and I understand that, but it clouds my enjoyment a bit.
 
I have no idea why Dave still thinks Alexa was blaming her poor performance in PC on the Parkland Shooting. I thought it was pretty clear that she was disappointed with the bad skate because she was planning to dedicate a clean skate to the victims?

It's also pretty bad of Dave to say that he blocked Alexa on twitter. He sounded like he has such sour grapes about her being sassy on social media. He's worse than she is...
 
I think it's becoming clear that Dave and TSL has close ties to Montreal because of lot of his really insider gossip seems to be coming from that camp and it explains a lot of his attitude towards competitors.
 
Willin said:
It's also pretty bad of Dave to say that he blocked Alexa on twitter. He sounded like he has such sour grapes about her being sassy on social media. He's worse than she is...
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This. I used to have no problem with his biting opinions. I have thicker skin than an elephant so if someone is critical to me I leave emotions out of it and determine if he is correct in which I’d consider changing and if it’s just dramatic bs I ignore it. But Dave for all his abrasiveness has the thinnest skin. His feelings are so easily hurt that I find it unbelievable and he is so knee-jerk in his reactions that he tends to block anyone with the slightest criticsm of him. It’s weird.
 
Yeah, the only piece of gossip that really seems to have come out of Montreal is Hawayek/Baker possibly trying for Gadbois. Since he just had Marie-France on the show, it's possible he got that out of her if true. Was there anything else?

Peepsquick said:
I don't think that Gadbois encourages gossip at all!
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I think they let out what info they want to and keep a lid on the rest. No different than any other camp. I think Dave had some access during the 2016-17 season, didn't he go down there to interview MF and H/D? V/M were on vacation. But he didn't seem to have that this season.

For all of his gossipy tendencies, he and Jonathan didn't seem to know that Gabby Daleman had sprained her ankle before the free skate!
 
oleada said:
Can Meghan have her own podcast and get rid of Dave and his useless minion?
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And yet... I enjoy their unique voice. Jonathan has a more artistic take on Ice Dance and Dave is Dave ... I alway take him with a grain of salt. He didn't mesh well at all with P/C when he tried to interview them. That interview was a (very predictable) train wreck! :blah: ... Dave and Gaby and Guillaume live on different planets. He didn't know how to deal with it/them!
 
I wonder where/who they are moving to. I am not sure they need a coaching change so much as more of a technical/jump advisor and TomZ and Christy Krall are both supremely qualified in this regard. I am not sure how much jump expertise Florida camp has as they seem to attract skaters with good jumps already and then focus the pairs side. Chris and Alexa have the pairs side though... they need the tech side. I am just curious as to who and where is a good fit for what they need. Change for the sake of change is not always the best.

Then again... with all they have been through... a fresh start just for a fresh start could also be what they need for themselves.
 
I am grateful for those who let me know what TSL is saying, so I don’t need to look. Unfortunately they do have a track record for reporting coaching changes.

I am shocked, frankly. Jason leaves Kori??? Alexa and Chris leave Dalilah???

The world as I know it is changing :eek:
 
@el henry I'm not sure if it was TSL or somewhere else, but I heard that Jason isn't for sure leaving Kori, but rather deciding whether to move to LA full time or split time between Kori and Frank Carroll.
 
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