Third look at what Jason Brown, Donovan Carrillo, Nathan Chen, Yuzuru Hanyu, Yuma Kagiyama, Shoma Uno and Deniss Vasiljevs did between one technical element and another in the short program of the 2022 Olympic Games. Previous posts can be found here and here.

Movements on two feet

I have put together in this section spread eagle, ina bauer, but also movements that do not have a specific name and that for some reason – usually because the skater has tested his sense of balance – seemed interesting to me. I ignored the movements that are too short, those that, rather than a precise position, are the passage from one position to another.

Ina bauer. By now we know well the movement of arms that Brown does in this program, unfortunately we also know well that butt outside.

This is a series of quick steps/twirls on the toe picks, Brown uses the whole blade. Really good musicality.

Lunge followed by a spread eagle. On the lunge I will dwell later. I remember that inside spread eagles are simpler than outside spread eagles for the simple fact that it is more natural for us to lean forward rather than backward. If in doubt, you can always give it a try and ask yourself in which position you are most afraid of falling, and therefore in which position you tend to lean less. And there is another feature that distinguishes the two spread eagles. The trajectory is – to a greater or lesser extent – curved. For the inside spread eagle the skater’s face and chest are tilted to the side of the curve, the angle formed by his feet is less than 180°. How much it is lower depends on the curve, however it is lower. For the outside spread eagle, the nape and back are tilted to the side of the curve. The angle formed by the feet is greater than 180°. Maybe only a little, but it is superior. Getting to a higher opening of the legs, of course, is more difficult.

The movement is short, it is nothing special, but it is true that it is perfectly inserted in a continuous flow of movements. Butt aside.

Another short ina bauer. There are no long-held movements, Brown tends to move quickly from one to the other, giving variety to what he does.

Carrillo started his program with a pivot. Pay no attention to the first darker screenshot: the TV director superimposed Carrillo’s foreground, which we see fading, on the other image, and this is the effect. Curious details come out from time to time in the screenshots. In one of Brown’s twirl images, the movement of a hand ahead of his head almost makes him look bald…

At first Carrillo is careful to keep his center of gravity central, only at the end he tilts, testing his sense of balance a little. To recover the balance quickly he widens the other foot.

Besti squat. Not perfectly done, the thighs should be more horizontal and the back straighter for the correct movement.

Here Carrillo is on two feet, and on two feet it is easier to maintain balance, but he tilts a lot to the side. In the previous post I looked for those moments when skaters put their sense of balance to the test. Those movements were all on one foot. That’s on two, and that’s why I put this series of screenshots here, but Carrillo puts himself to the test in his own way.

Carrillo’s second besti squat, a little longer and in a better position.

Carrillo’s new lateral inclination. He is always on the two feet, but leans a lot, plays with his sense of balance a lot more than Chen or Kagiyama did in the previous post. Or even in this. I have yet to write the text, but I have already done the screenshots, I know what the skaters have done.

Outside spread eagle, good edge, position not so good: Carrillo is a little too “seated”.

Inside spread eagle. This is a very short movement, Chen has just finished the twirl I saw in the previous post. Then… I was undecided as to how many screenshots to dedicate to Chen’s subsequent movements.

The series of screenshots begins with the spread eagle we just saw. In the third screensot Chen ends the spread eagle in a clumsy way, we see him very contracted. His movements appear anything but natural, less than elegant. In the sixth screenshot he leans forward. It’s a choreographic choice, okay, but how stiff are his shoulders? How cashed is the head in the body? Then he stops abruptly, first with one foot and then with the other, which makes easier the balance control, balances for a moment on the toe picks – two, not one, as we saw Hanyu and Uno do – and he starts forward again, with a movement in which he brings his butt out and a long, not elegant stride, but his only purpose is to gain speed.

Inside spread eagle. Nothing special, the edge is not deep, the movement is short, and the position is not particularly elegant.

Outside spread eagle. In this case the movement is longer, and the outside spread eagle is more difficult than the inside one. You can see it better from the video than from the screenshots, also because this is not the best shot to evaluate the position. Chen enters the movement with his body slightly bent in half, he is a little seated. Then gradually he aligns his legs and back. How does he do it? Moving on to a flat edge. In fact, he has removed the major difficulties of the movement. And, when he leaves the position, he reminds us once more that he doesn’t know what elegance is.

This is nothing. For real. I complained that Chen does nothing, but that’s not quite the case. He did some glide. On two feet. In a so stable position that cannot be more stable, and always slightly bent forward, just to make sure he is not running the slightest risk. I haven’t looked at all the skaters, such an accurate control takes time, but Carrillo has a better edge control than Chen, he risks a lot more than him. Carrillo. I’m not talking about Vasiljievs, who is on yet another level. Or about Brown.

Hanyu started his program with a two-turn pivot. I have already talked about the beauty of this movement, the perfect alignment of the body.

It may seem strange that I make a comparison between Hanyu and Carrillo, with his one-turn pivot. The two skaters are on very different levels in all aspects of skating. I do this for one reason only, which is not to belittle Carrillo. It is to show that Hanyu’s elegance is perceptible in every gesture. Just compare the two positions, the alignment of the head, back and legs, their inclination, to understand that there is an abyss between the two skaters.

Two skaters can do what, in name at least, is the same gesture, and at the same time make two very different gestures.

Ina bauer. I might get repetitive in saying that Hanyu bends his legs and not his back to lower himself, and that the alignment of his body is always perfect. But this is a fact.

Outside spread eagle. The movement is long, the edge is deep, and the body position is perfect. Even when he ends the spread eagle.

Outside spread eagle. The two spread eagles are immediately before, and immediately after, the salchow. At the National Championships Hanyu had no difficulty completing this section of the program, in Beijing his skate went into a hole in the ice and the salchow became a single. Considering that Hanyu has not gone out of balance and has not lost any choreographic passages, this is only a base value problem, his components weren’t affected. Weren’t affected in the execution, but several judges, applying wrongly a rule, lowered his score, and this is a huge mistake on their part, a mistake that (together with several other mistakes) affected the result.

Hanyu’s movements are perfect. And if in the previous post I had talked about the perfect structure of the first part of the program, started with a pivot and continued with a forward spiral in arabesque, and ended with a backward glide in arabesque followed by a pivot, the insertion of the salchow between two outside spread eagle is a further confirmation of the perfection with which this program was built.

Hanyu does a short ina bauer, then concludes the movement with a curve on which he bends forward for choreographic reasons. A fundamental difference between the bent of Chen and that of Hanyu is that Chen almost always keeps the head raised, breaks the line of the back, and his shoulders are rigid. Chen tilts because in this way it is easier to maintain balance, or seek speed. Hanyu’s body is collected on itself in a relaxed way, the head line is an extension of that of the body. He tilts because he is transmitting pain.

Second pivot. I could have put it in the positions in which Hanyu plays with his balance, which with Hanyu it is possible to do with many movements. Hanyu tests his sense of balance continuously. In the previous post I talked about the landing of the triple axel, I had not written anything about the fact that before the triple axel, before that counter that is normal for him and for the others not, he had made two backward crosswroll with very accentuated movements of the arms Therefore he had deliberately tested his sense of balance before and after a jump that many struggle to perform correctly, despite a long run-up and doing nothing at the landing.

I watch another detail.

In the first pivot Hanyu bends the leg he has put forward, the right leg. In the second the leg forward is always the right, but it is straight, it is the leg behind, the left, that it is bent. They are two similar positions, and very different. And the edge on which Hanyu is skating is really deep. Of course, the second foot provides him with stable support, but you have to know how to do this movement, be sure not to slip. And perfection in composition is confirmed once more.

Ina bauer. Also in this case the movement does not last long, but he has just come out of a spin – like all the right-handed skaters he does the spins in the counter-clockwise direction – and performs this movement in the clockwise direction. Watch the video to see how little time he needs to finish a technical element and fully return to the role he is playing. 0 seconds. Leaving the curve of the spin, he is already in the ina Bauer. We talked about flow? About seamless?

Hanyu bends to the side, testing a bit his sense of balance, even if the fact that he is on two feet makes it easier to maintain balance. In some ways the movement is similar to that of Carrillo, but with an important difference: both times that Carrillo lowers sideways, he gets up again remaining on the same curve. Hanyu lowers himself on a curve and when he gets up moves on the opposite curve, which makes the movement more complicated.

Really long outside spread eagle done by Kagiyama. Since four skaters have made an outside spread eagle I look at their positions.

Two skaters, Hanyu and Kagiyama, have a good position, relaxed, elegant, and with a good edge. Two, Carrillo and Chen, no. Both of them are seated, and when Chen is no more seated, his edge is flat.

For Kagiyama I have not found other noteworthy moments.

A push, a curving glide, and Uno stops for a moment on the toe picks. The gesture is important at a choreographic level, it is done to build the atmosphere, it shows us that Uno tries to work with the whole blade, but the position is static, there are no balance problems. When he start to move again, Uno does a lunge.

Uno has a tendency to make his choreographic movements, his glides, on two feet, in simple positions. He does a little scene, but he’s not doing anything difficult.

We are just before the 3A. At the National Championship Uno had made an outside spread eagle, here he opted for an inside spread eagle, and I wonder if the choice of the simplest movement is dictated by wanting to go on the safe side. Of course, there is a choreographic movement of the arms. However, this passage is slightly simplified. We could also speak of the fact that for the umpteenth time he has the butt outside.

Ina bauer on a curve.

Inside spread eagle. The entrance, the exit, and the position of the legs are not really beautiful.

Besti squat. Vasiljevs lowers well, with a nice movement, reaches the correct position, and moves the balance forward working well on the edges. He is on two feet, but Vasiljevs knows how to maintain balance when he changes position.

This gesture is better understood from the video, where it is possible to appreciate the speed of execution. From the screenshots you can only guess thanks to the movement of the pigtail. Vasiljevs is moving quickly, suddenly blocks, suddenly throws the weight of the body forward without getting unbalanced, and starts to move again instantly.

For today I stop here, but on my computer there are still some screenshots. Enough for another post.