Hi,

I was just wondering if anyone else finds it VERY strange that USFSA has the same competition criteria (regarding standard tests) for both adult Silver and Gold. Both levels say a competitor at that level can not have passed any higher than the Standard Juvenile Free Skating test. Huh? So, you can go out and test Juv (which is essentially the gold test), but still skate silver. How ridiculous is that? It's not a huge issue at my level (Class III), but I can see where it would be in Class I. A young adult could compete at Juv through college on a college team, then decide to go the adult track...........with the decision to compete at either Silver or Gold. Was the same logic used for this as for the adult moves? One has to wonder. Anyhow, I think the criteria should be as follows:

Pre-Bronze - no higher that pre-pre
Bronze - no higher than pre
Silver - no higher than pre-juv (instead of the current juv)
Gold - no higher than juv

I'd like to see USFSA change this. Does anyone have any comments or opinions either way?

Thanks!

I think you are right. I have to skate Gold because of my ISIA tests as a kid - I passed level 6. For Silver, the level was 5. Why would it be different for USFSA? I never noticed that discrepancy, because it wasn't relevant for me (only passed the USFSA Preliminary freestyle as a kid because I was horrible at figures).

Here's another wrench in the works: When I took the Adult Gold MIF's, the Novice pattern with the inside threes was extremely hard. Now that I have taken the Intermediate test, with the power threes on the end, the Novice pattern isn't as scary. They took the move out of context -- there's a reason that they have done the standard tests in the order that they did -- and putting the Novice move into the Adult Gold test is kind of like pushing someone out of a plane before they had their first parachuting lesson. I'd like to see the USFSA replace that Novice move with the power 3's from Intermediate. I don't think it matters that the test would essentially mirror the standard Intermediate test, because the passing standards are higher for the Intermediate test than the Adult Gold (and having been there, I, and my knees, are well aware of the difference).

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I believe that thwe USFSA set that requirement because when most of us adults were child skaters, the Juvenile FS test requirements are the existing PreJuv test requirements.

Techskater,

Thanks for the information. I can see their logic at the time, but I'd think it would now be time to re-evaluate as skaters enter Class I that might have skated the current Juv. I'll have to get out my old rulebook to see what was on the Juv test when I skated in my mid-20's.........but we all know test level is nothing like what is expected in competitions, even back when many adults skated as kids. I took the preliminary test back then. The old preliminary test is what is now the pre-preliminary test. Because of that, I had to start out at bronze even though I'd tested under the old system and was no way a bronze skater.

My response from USFSA is as follows:

The reason the standard levels are included in the requirements
is as "disqualification" levels. We set the disqualifications at about one level above the "adult" level. However, not too long ago, a decision was made to have those who passed the intermediate test to skate in Masters Novice and not in Gold, hence, for Gold, the disqualification was lowered to juv. The reason for the disqualification levels is to keep the sandbagging to a minimum.