The International Skating Union (ISU) has adopted amendments to the Figure Skating Rules for the 2020/21 season. The organization clarified the criteria for evaluating the elements in single and double skating and reviewed the cost of some jumps. In the future, these changes may significantly affect the content of athletes' programs and their results.
Figure skating fans were first struck by how the basic cost of individual jumps changed. So, the triple lutz has ceased to be the most valuable after the axel in its category. Previously, his nominal score was 5.9 points, but now it is equal to a triple flip and will have the same 5.3 points. This can be called good news for skaters who could not cleanly perform the triple lutz due to landing on the wrong rib - such problems plagued Yevgeny Medvedev and Alena Kostornaya. Now they will be able to switch to a triple flip, avoiding loss in points. But other athletes who have triple lutz turned out right now will lose their advantage.
The quadruple jumps underwent even more significant processing. Previously, the cost of lutz was 11.5 points, and the rittberger was “cheaper” by one point. Now both jumps, like the flip, have a nominal value of 11 points, that is, from the point of view of the rules, they are the same in terms of complexity of execution.
First of all, those skaters who in their speeches relied on the quadruple Lutz as a more expensive jump in four turns will suffer from these amendments (formally, the quadruple axel is considered the most expensive, but not a single skater has managed to perform it purely on the competition). In particular, Lutz is the crown of the Russian skaters Alexander Samarin and Anna Shcherbakova. At the same time, those athletes who were able to perform the fourth Rittberger, but left it in reserve due to insufficient cost, will be able to try again to include it in their programs.
If these amendments were adopted before the last Russian championship, they would significantly affect the final results in women's competitions. So, according to the calculations of users of social networks, the cost of an arbitrary program of Shcherbakova would have been lower, and she would have scored 257.89 points instead of 261.87 points. At the same time, Alena Kostornaya, who took second place, would have remained with 258.11 points and would have become the first.
According to the president of the Russian Figure Skating Federation Alexander Gorshkov, the new cost of lutz and rittberger will make athletes pay attention to the second jump.
“The main motivation for ISU, I think, was the desire to raise the profile of the Rittberger. They decided to pull him to the tooth jumps. Rittberger is very complex and has not been appreciated before. Of all the four, I would call it the most difficult. A few of our guys know how to do a rittberger in training, but hesitate to insert into the program. They make a choice in favor of the Lutz, and they can be understood. I risked, I remember, only Sergey Voronov was close. Now there will be more desire to fulfill, ”Gorshkov told Business Online.
At the same time, the famous choreographer Ilya Averbukh expressed bewilderment by the amendments. He believes that the base cost of jumps should reflect the fact that lutz is more difficult to perform than other jumps.
“I find it strange to level the quadruple Lutz, Flip and Rittberger. Lutz has always been the most expensive leap, the flip less expensive, and the rittberger even smaller. It is strange to equalize them; for me this is a very strange decision. Is ISU trying to make the skaters learn not only Lutz in this way? I don’t see big crime. ISU is always trying to make a wider range of jumping performance, ”Averbuh answered in a conversation with Sport24.
According to the Honored Trainer of the USSR Tatyana Tarasova, changes in the base cost of quadruple jumps will not have much impact on figure skating. For her, it is more important that such elements are still rated much higher than jumping in three turns.
“I think that these changes are insignificant, there is nothing wrong with them. Almost everything remains, the changes are very small. The most difficult leap in terms of cost remains an axel of 3.5 turns. The difference in cost from a triple to a quadruple jump is large, which is correct. Triple jumps jump the whole world, and quadruples - units. Of the girls, these units can be counted on one hand, the boys - twenty. And that is precisely why the price difference between the triple and quadruple remained so large, ”TASSA said.
Another change in the rules concerns the gradation of undercropping on jumps. Now, for skaters, different sanctions are provided for the unfinished last turn before landing - if the undercount is more than 180 degrees, from 90 to 180 degrees and exactly 90 degrees. Previously, there were two degrees, and they were indicated in the protocols by ticks. Now there will be three of them, and a jump with a 90 degree undercut will be indicated by the letter q.
If the shortfall is less than a quarter of a turn, then the jump will not lose in the base cost - the judges will only be able to slightly reduce the added value. This can be called an encouragement for those who are trying to perform quadruple jumps, but are afraid of losing points for an incomplete last turn. Another nice bonus for individual skaters was that now creative and challenging trips will be encouraged with extra points.