Plan B Forum

I haven't been following the skating in recent years, used to watch all the time growing up.

There's a Russian American kid from Fairfax VA who jumped quad axels by the half dozen in his free skate - he almost did 7!! I didn't even realize this revolution in figure skating had occurred - he's a real pioneer. Just won his second in a row world championship.

Some really terrific performances all around, including a brilliant one from the silver medalist from Kazakhstan.

If you didn't get a chance to watch it's worth some time on the YouTube to catch the performances.

It was freaking mesmerizing. I watched Shaidorov's skate and thought, how the fuck do you top that? And then Malinin got on the ice, and I said, oh, that's how.

And the two of them are only 20 years old, how many more years do they have to continue improving, and bringing along a whole field with them. 20 years ago, a male skater could win a world championship or medal in the Olympics without a single quad. Now they need to do six or seven to be a contender.

At the rate these kids are going, will we be seeing the first quintuple jumps in competition in the next few years?

The eventual quintuple jump wouldn't surprise me; like many other "artistic" sports, the emphasis has become more on strength and acrobatics and less on artistry. There's still some, but it's a smaller portion of the overall performance, in both men's an women's figure skating. Personally, I miss some of the dance elements and emphasis on them, but this is the way the sport is progressing. The same has happened with the Women's Floor Exercise in gymnastics. I think it's giving more of the crowds what they want, and it's inevitable.

That being said, I did see some superior short and long programs this year, and a lot of great jumps , b oth int hese recent broadcasts and the US championships earlier this year.