It’s important to remember that the salchow, toe-loop and loop are pre-rotated in nature. The flip to some extent, and the lutz pre-rotates the less.
In this very good video, Jason Brown shows all triples in real time, then in slow motion.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iKulecXlyFs
I’m only doing singles myself, I have started working a tiny on my first double, the salchow, but when I look at this video, I see my coach instructions apply for triples as well, and I assume also quads. I apologize if I’m not able to explain this properly, I'll try my best.
The salchow take off starts backwards, on the left, inside edge, but you stay on the curve on the ice until you «snap» the left toe pick in at «the end» of the curve, It’s tricky, not to early, not too late, the more rotations, the more power you need, the longer you wait. When the snap comes, your foot and leg turns, you pull in and lift and of course your body also turns, so when the toe pick snaps and you actually leave the ice, your body is faced forwards - and you've already turned 0,5 rotation on the ice.
(So the toe pick is involved in the edge jumps too, but the toe pick on the same foot as the edge, not the opposite leg, as in the toe jumps).
In the toe loop, when the toe pick goes in, you’re almost in a pivot position. The right leg glides on the curve with the heal leading. You don’t lift until the body is forwards, which is why the toe can’t lead, then it becomes a waltz jump/axel.
The loop is somewhat similar to the salchow, as in the loop the skater also stays on the curve, here right, outside edge, and then snaps the right toe pick into something that my coach describes as a «fish hook» (that’s what the tracing should look like on the ice). When the snap comes, when you pull in and lift off the ice, you are facing forwards (like in the salchow).
The flip pre-rotates less, but it’s really important to not just slam the toe pick in and jump straight up. The toe pick goes in, and the legs glides towards each other, the knee is «open», pointing outwards, and at the same time you pull the arms in. It should be like a rubber band first stretched, then being pulled in. And when your feet meet, and your knee open, you start to lift (all this happens really, really fast). You prerorate a little, but not as much as in the three before mentioned jumps. The body position is similar to a loop, but the important difference is that the toe pick on the right foot goes in, not the entire blade.
The lutz has the same pulling in-rubber band mechanism as the flip, not slam toe pick and lift, but of course, taking off from the outside edge requires even more body strength and control, because you then have to rotate in the direction that’s not the most natural standing there on the outside curve. Since your body strength and position in the take off is so important, you don’t prerotate that much. The video of Shcherbakova vs. Jin shows that Jin does it very good, and that Shcherbakova prerotates.
Which leads me to the toe pick vs. full blade discussion. Flip, lutz and toe loop does not take off with a full blade on the ice. The clean toe pick goes in, the skater lift. Shcherbakova’s lutz in the video is very much like a loop. Especially when she pre-rotates like she does. This is not picking on one particular skater, I write about her, because this particular video was posted. I’m sure there is many more who does this. Shoma Uno’s flip is the same. (And I’m a huge fan of his). His quad flip technique is horrid. I took a screen shot during his last GP comp, and the take off is more than weird, body position and all.
https://imgur.com/gallery/xAg1BaR
This doesn't really show the full blade vs. the toe pick, it comes a little later in the take off, mostly his flip looks like a loop, but you can see how is body is all off, his legs far apart, and his arms all wrong. The right arm should stay back longer, then pull in to power up. These things should be punished as bad take off, and also pre-rotation, though this screen shot doesn't show it.
As someone pointed out, the toe pick on flip and lutz goes in in line of the left foot. Right behind, not to the side. Good coaches will correct your technique if you do, and the judges can give you -1 to -2 for bad take off, it has happened to me personally
So, I think the ISU should adress the problems of pre-rotations, but we keep in mind that some jumps are pre-rotated by nature, a quad loop is really 3,5 rotation, and that’s the way it is. Boyang should get tons of credit for his quad lutz, and Anna and others who jumps like her should be punished for bad take off, and for the pre rotations.
It's not great but it's not to the levels that it should be downgraded to a triple... or that you can tell with certainty. Sorry, this has gotten off topic again
Those are much more stable from program to program.
