Breakthrough of Sinitsyna and Yametova, Danielyan's back problems: consolidated rating of single skaters in the 2022/23 season

The fight against Valieva's quads

At her home stage, Kamila Valieva found herself in a very difficult situation for herself: her rivals were Veronika Yametova, who, after the first start in the Russian Grand Prix, was called perhaps the main discovery of the current season, but also Ksenia Sinitsyna with her than incomparable skating.

Both of these skaters performed their programs without visible errors, but still the gap from Valieva turned out to be cosmic.

Hand on heart, it should be noted that a good half of this gap was formed not so much as a result of a real assessment of the skating of the still Olympic champion, but thanks to the background in which the reputation of the most talented single skater in the history of figure skating lay, her difficult story in Beijing, capable of knocking out a tear even a marble statue, Kazan entourage, and nostalgia for the flying, half-roller quadruple sheepskin coat and triple axel, which were Valieva's hallmark last season.

In fact, Camila is still far from ideal form, a little heavy in jumping and skating, and her free program, which sounded so strong in September at open skates, is losing its shine before our eyes.

Judge for yourself: if the production was conceived as a not too veiled message to the whole world: “Look what you did to me!”, This implies exactly the performance that Valieva demonstrated in the Olympic team tournament.

Confident, unmistakable, with the most difficult jumps.

Now, one can only say about the production that Camila seems to be trying to catch up with some elusive image: she is waging an uncompromising struggle not with the world, but with a quadruple sheepskin coat, and this struggle is still not in her favor.

But Valieva is fighting - and this is a plus, allowing her to outstrip almost all Russian single skaters in the ranking.

One of the main impressions of the tournament in Kazan is, of course, Ksenia Sinitsyna.

To interpret the classics in watercolor on ice without missing a single nuance of the music, and to preserve this picturesqueness from the first to the last sound, is a special talent that only Caroline Kostner possessed absolutely brilliantly.

In my opinion, none of the acting prims, including Valieva, has such a subtlety of perception in Russian single skating.

Moreover, it is incredibly difficult to say which of the programs Sinitsyna succeeded better: last year's Tchaikovsky's Lullaby staged by Vera Arutyunyan, or arbitrary variations on Bach's music by Maria Kasumova.

The skater turned both one and the other into a masterpiece, although it is worth noting that such skating has always been for a connoisseur.

I think that's why Ksenia remained third in the sum of two programs, although she won the free program over Veronika Yametova.

The disadvantages of Sinitsyna are the lack of ultra-si, and no amount of watercolor can compensate for this at the present time.

Ksenia, according to her, is trying to restore the quadruple sheepskin coat, so one can only wish her success in this.

With the perception of Yametova, everything is more difficult.

She is very original in skating, but any originality, in order to make her a world-class phenomenon, must be very carefully and very piece by piece.

The visiting card of the figure skater is colossal energy.

Actually, this is the main plus: Yametova, being perfectly trained, not only competes, but plays in competitions with the passion of an incredibly energetic child.

But in the minuses, there is still the same limitedness in terms of ultra-si.

The absence of a triple axel and quadruple jumps does not yet allow putting the young Yekaterinburg woman in the top three of the rating, despite the second place, after Valieva, on the Kazan podium.

ISU Parallel Grand Prix winner Luna Hendrix has taken on a new lease of life this season.

At the European Championship last year, she became the fourth (the first after the Russian goddesses), at the world championship she lost only to Kaori Sakamoto.

The Japanese won the first round of the ISU Grand Prix in the USA, gaining slightly more than Hendrix in Angers, but it makes sense to put the Belgian higher.

It is one thing to represent a country with the richest figure skating traditions, professional coaches and fierce competition, and quite another to actually train alone under the guidance of your own brother with money donated by the fans.

Summary rating of singles after three stages of the Grand Prix

1. (1) Sofia Akatieva (Russia)

2. (2) Kamila Valieva (Russia)

3. (3) Adelia Petrosyan (Russia)

4. (4) Sofia Samodelkina (Russia)

5. (-) 

(Russia)

6. (-)

(Russia)

7. (-)

(Belgium)

8. (5) Alexandra Trusova (Russia)

9. (6) Rinka Watanabe (Japan)

10. (7) Kaori Sakamoto (Japan)

Aliyev's stability and Danielyan's pain

The third stage of the Russian Grand Prix could have been the stage at which Arthur Danielyan returned, but became a triumph for a completely different skater.

Dmitry Aliev won the second victory in a row, surpassed his Moscow result, although in general he performed in a similar way - he doubled the first of two triple axels after three quadruples (in Moscow, Aliev almost fell from this jump).

But this should, of course, be discounted.

Danielyan and Aliyev, to some extent, are united by the fact that they both struggled with rather serious injuries for a long time.

Dmitry treated his ankle, Arthur treated his back, and it seems that he never recovered.

Back injuries are insidious in that they are difficult to hide even with the help of painkillers.

If it is still possible to somehow compensate for damage to the ankle by transferring part of the load during landings to the knee, then here the body involuntarily reacts by turning on the block in the most traumatic moments for the back.

For example - on landing from jumps.

And the amplitude immediately disappears from skating.

This is roughly what happened to Danielyan, and even in the short program.

And, given that the competition in men's single skating is getting tougher every year (the excellent performances in Kazan by Andrey Mozalev and Ivan Popov are an example of this), the return may not take place this season.

Is it a loss for Russian single skating?

In my opinion, yes.

Arthur has a very rare "Chaplin" ability to skate very expressively and at the same time ironically, seemingly without even putting any effort into it.

This makes his skating extremely attractive to the public and self-sufficient even without quadruple jumps.

But triples, one way or another, you need to jump.

It may sound harsh, but in this regard, it doesn’t matter if your back hurts or not.

Out on the ice - ride!

That is why, in fact, Aliyev's return is so valuable, if not to the peak of form, but to his somewhat forgotten skating.

He rightly retains his fifth position in the ranking.

At the ISU Grand Prix, he was opposed in absentia by Adam Xiao Him Fa, who plays for France (he defeated quite interesting Japanese Sota Yamamoto and Kazuki Tomono in Angers, although he lost the short program to them), but, figuratively speaking, there is a time bomb hidden in his skating: the skater it is common to “fall out” of rotation on multi-turn jumps, which means that with any more serious competitive stress, landings can no longer be saved.

Therefore, before his second performance in the series (it is scheduled for November 18-20 in Sapporo), Adam goes under Daniel Grassl and Gleb Lutfullin.

Summary singles rating after three stages of the Grand Prix

1. (1) Shoma Uno (Japan)

2. (2) Mark Kondratyuk (Russia)

3. (3) Ilya Malinin (USA)

4. (4) Kao Miyura (Japan)

5. (5) Dmitry Aliev (Russia)

6. (6) Daniel Grassl (Italy)

7. (7) Gleb Lutfullin (Russia)

8. (-)

(France)

9. (-)

(Russia)

10. (8) Alexander Samarin ( Russia)