They are really wonderful. Thanks!

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Be confident in your dream. Act like it's a done deal. Plan like it's already happened. Be confident God will finish what He started.

Yes, I pulled mine out right behind you. She was about to ask me too!

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Be confident in your dream. Act like it's a done deal. Plan like it's already happened. Be confident God will finish what He started.

Yep. I gave it all to Phyllis!

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Be confident in your dream. Act like it's a done deal. Plan like it's already happened. Be confident God will finish what He started.

I won LE/C interp 1

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I've got mad salchow disease!

Congratulations!

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Terri C is a Bronze lady!
Gold Moves, here I come!

For those that like numbers, I made the following observation about the Championship Gold Men IJS scores

Averaging the 2009 scores and the 2010 scores:
2010 Technical marks rose 38.4% over 2009
2010 Component Scores rose 46.2% over 2009
2010 Total scores (after deductions), rose 42.8% over 2009

Flying Camel, Major congrats!!!!!!!
I missed it, what was your program?
Anyone know what the artistic interps were like?

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Recycle Love - Adopt a homeless pet

Some people got a mini fake farm tool set.

They were beautiful. I got one and I wasn't expecting to be so touched. Really made my day. (It's my 8th place medal! )

All I know is I've got a loooooong to-do list to accomplish between now and next year, which after looking at my pictures from my events just got even longer...lol. I do some very strange things with my hands/wrists/elbows and sometimes even get my shoulders in on the awkward action too. Probably left over from my days as a synchro skater and not having to think about my arms. And the lovely chicken wing I make with my right arm when I jump...I thought I had gotten rid of that, but guess not!

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2010-2011 goals:
Pass Junior MIF test
Don't break anything

NoVa mentioned hosting next year's ANs in his back yard. I'm all for that. Actually, I'm not picky. My only request is that we have an ANs where:

1) you can ask a question at the registration desk without receiving a blank stare in return

2) we have sweepers who aren't spending the entire time they are off the ice arguing, poking/slapping/pushing/shoving each other, distracting skaters who are about to compete, dropping crumbled cookies all over the ice (yes, it really happened), and all the other things they were doing (I know they're kids and they're volunteers and the days are long but still...I've never seen it quite like this, the ice monitors were doing more babysitting than ice monitoring)

3) we can get info we need on important things like practice ice and not 937 emails about an ANs blanket

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2010-2011 goals:
Pass Junior MIF test
Don't break anything

I wholeheartedly agree about the sweepers. I saw one of them poke Keith Newcombe's flower on his shirt literally as he's taking his guards off as he went out to skate and he looked pretty annoyed. I don't blame him. And then there was the one that threw the cookie crumbs on the ice as I was skating. Don't have them do hours at a time, that club was big enough that there could have been a different pair of girls every hour. And they should have been told to leave the skaters alone other than giving them their items. I know they're kids, but still.

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"Where are we going and why are we in this handbasket?"

Here's one I find very interesting. In Gold Ladies III (which would have been my group if I had gone), only two of the top six finishers even attempted an axel. Only one of those ladies attempted a double.

Of the 12 skaters, there were seven that attempted axels. Six axels were ratified (and four of those were from the two medalists who attempted them), five were downgraded. With the doubles, two ladies attempted them. One (a medalist) tried two, with one ratified and one downgraded, and the other had her attempt downgraded.

Contrast that to when I first competed gold ladies, back in 2003. Pretty much everyone did two axels (of varying degrees of quality), and many if not most attempted doubles. IJS sure has changed things.

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"The only place where success comes before work is in a dictionary." -- Vidal Sasson

"Never give up on a dream just because of the time it will take to accomplish it. The time will pass anyway." -- Unknown

Thanks! I skated as a cow and I improv'd about 75% of the program as I was skating it!

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I've got mad salchow disease!

I think it depends on the judging pannel. Some years in IJS a Gold skater who did not attempt at least an axel did not get very high component marks even though they had as much speed and good edges as anyone else in the group(thus making them not competetive in scoring). Other years(Last year Champ Gold Men for example) 2 of the medalist did not even attempt an axel or a double yet their component marks were competetive with the rest of the field. We like to think you can compare competition scores but in reality it depends on what the panel's expectations are. I still think the bigger issue should be that if Nats is going to be IJS then Sectionals should be as well. Not such a big issue for the men because there are so few but IMHO the ladies should be raising the roof to get this changed. Just my two cents.

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Why are you skating so slowly? Get out of my way!

If you skate faster, it makes everything look better!

The 6th place finisher in that group decided to take out her axel because she found that she could get more points for a salchow-loop than she would for a clean axel (and remove the possibility for a -GOE, a downgrade and/or a fall).

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I've got mad salchow disease!

I agree. Anyone know if the issue up at GC?

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"The only place where success comes before work is in a dictionary." -- Vidal Sasson

"Never give up on a dream just because of the time it will take to accomplish it. The time will pass anyway." -- Unknown

This is not a slam on anyone who has made these kinds of choices - they are being smart about skating under the IJS system.

However, it makes me wonder if the current quad controversy in the elite ranks isn't also an appropriate discussion at this level. Are we going to see more and more adult skaters playing it safe instead of pushing the envelope? I don't want to go back to the old days where we saw people who couldn't get anywhere close to landing a double trying them all over the place, yet is a trend of adult national medalists who don't skate elements at test requirements (ie the axel in gold) where we want to go either? Should the axel become a required element at gold like it is for masters int/novice? If we do this, do we risk losing older skaters who cannot do an axel any longer due to their age? Should we push for a different scoring scale for adults than elites? Would that make the risk of an axel worth trying instead of a sal-loop, for example.

Just throwing out thoughts. I don't have any answers or strong opinions (yet) on this issue.

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"The only place where success comes before work is in a dictionary." -- Vidal Sasson

"Never give up on a dream just because of the time it will take to accomplish it. The time will pass anyway." -- Unknown

I was discussing this a bit too. I saw the writing on the wall Friday night while watching the Gold Mens/Ladies and, knowing what my competitors were doing in Int/Novice, I knew that my program wasn't competitive enough even with my doubles. I chose to do steps over a spiral sequence (lots of points lost there) and my spins were levels 1/2/3 respectively while they did all level 3/4. Therefore much of my group got higher marks not on jumps at all but on spirals and spins. Even our Gold medalist said it's become a spin and spiral competition because doing doubles just doesn't get the points at our level. She thought I must have imploded because I was so far down, but I said, no I skated well with an axel and three clean doubles, one in combo. I just didn't focus on the spirals and spins the same way when choreographing the program.

Again, not slamming anyone. I really enjoy all my competitors and they are great girls, every one! And they were smart for sure. But it did shock me a bit to see so many of the Men in particular forgo the steps for a spiral sequence!

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No, and it will be a long while. It's expensive. Personally, I think they should run the numbers and see how much it could cost, then take a poll among the Championship qualifiers that said, "if it cost XXX to do IJS at Sectioanls, would you be willing to pay it?" I think we should have IJS at Sectionals, but I also would like to know how much it's going to cost us all before a final decision is made.

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I think the higher tech marks may be in part, that competitors are planning their programs much more more carefully so as to optimize points. Its a sport and that's fair and smart. The greater mystery to me is why such a difference in component marks from one year to the next in Mens Ch Gold. I'm also curious if there was the same level of year to year disparity in other events.

At the Olympics this year, there seemed to be a similar phenomena with so many 'personal best's being made.

IJS is complex and is really not all that "established." They added the extended spin position as a feature this year, which would benefit someone who struggles with multiple position changes in a spin. As skaters/coaches learn more, they plan better. They also push for higher-level ratings on the things they already do well, so I expect to see personal bests being set more and more.

I think what sk8er1964 is saying (correct me if I'm wrong) is that there should be a reward for risking it all. I feel more strongly that, if you don't have a solid *something*, don't put it out there and hope for a good day on the ice. That's just my opinion as a spectator. I cringe when I watch a skater (of any age) attempting something that's obviously beyond their mastery - you can see it from the entry and it just gets worse when they can't complete it. Not that it affects scoring tremendously, or does it?

"Winging it" definitely adds to the emotional impact of the sport, often leading to apres-skate meltdowns. Just sayin'

Since participation was lower this year than last, that would explain some of Pairman's statistics - when you compare different-sized populations, you have to make some assumptions. One might be to assume that the skaters who competed this year were the ones who had solid elements. They planned new programs or tweaked established ones to get as many points as possible under IJS. The skaters who didn't compete this year may not have been the strongest skater, perhaps lowering the prior year scores.

I'd like to think that skaters who weren't there are improving their consistency and will be back in the future with solid axels and doubles. Then you'll really see a jump in stats.

I'm not a statistics expert, but it might be more reasonable to compare different years' scores by including skaters who were in the same event this year as well as last year. Perhaps someone more knowledgeable can chime in.

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Overall the quality of skating in champ gold men was much higher than last year. I know I and the others sitting around me were very impressed with what we saw. It looked like a lot of them remembered that there is a second mark and put more effort into upping their skating skills, choreography, etc, rather than just focusing on the technical aspect.

And scores going up each year as the skaters get more experience with IJS and figure out how to maximize points is normal across the board with every discipline of skating.

Or would it help offset some of the cost of IJS at sectionals if skaters who qualify for a champ event at ANs have to pay an entry fee for ANs, too? I know that traditionally they don't, but if it means more money to help sectionals, it could be an option. (Waiting for uproar from champ skaters now on that suggestion...but it's just an idea that could help, even though in the long run it's not a whole lot of money.) It's just stupid that to qualify for every other national competition we have in the US (nationals, JNs, synchro nationals), those skaters get to qualify and skate at nationals under the same system...and adults get the shaft. We deserve to be taken seriously just like every other level/discipline of skating.

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2010-2011 goals:
Pass Junior MIF test
Don't break anything

I don't think they don't take us seriously. I just think it's more a cost issue.

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IJS at Sectionals was discussed at GC last year and I did get up to speak and and make the case for it. I said the adults were the only athletes (emphasis on ATHLETES, because we are!) in the country who had to qualify to their Nationals under a different system. I didn't come right out and say "It's not fair!", but it's not. I'd be interested myself to see the numbers as to how much more IJS would cost at Sectionals. I know I'd pay more to have it.

After the Championship events last year I heard a LOT of people talking about how they would be doing more complicated spins and spirals to max out points for this season and you could really see it this year.

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"Where are we going and why are we in this handbasket?"

From 2009, 5 out of 11 returned to this years event. 13 competitors total competed in 2010.