I confess that I have watched the free skates much less than the short programs. The work on the short programs took me a lot of time, and these are programs… short. Doing the same work on the longer programs would be very long. And to distinguish all the steps, as Roseline Winter and Elisa did for the short programs, is beyond my ability. At the moment I recognize some steps and turns, not all of them, so I am able to get a general idea of the program, but I risk being inaccurate in the details. This means that, as with the short programs, I looked at the free skates element by element, counting bullets and deductions, but for the PCS I was a little less precise. This time in my analysis I start with Hanyu.

If you need it, I remind you of my introductory post with the rules and explanations on my work:

The Beijing programs: the scores. Introduction

and my analysis of the short programs:

The Beijing Programs: the scores. Nathan Chen’s SP

The Beijing programs: the scores. Yuma Kagiyama’s SP

The Beijing programs: the scores. Shoma Uno’s SP

The Beijing programs: the scores. Yuzuru Hanyu’s SP

I watched Hanyu’s free skate in this video:.

4A

I’ve looked at this 4A countless times, from I don’t know how many angles. The jump is underrotated, regardless of how much I may wish otherwise. I noticed that, regardless of the rules of geometry, for not all skaters exist the same rules, or the same angles for the underrotated. As far as I’m concerned, certain principles of geometry, such as certain principles of morality, leave no room for discussion. This jump is missing between 90 ° and 180 °. End of speech. There are bullet 1, width, and bullet 6, on the music. With a -5 for the fall and a -2 for the missing rotation, we arrive at a final GOE of -5.

This is one of the two falls that led to Hanyu’s program being capped on components. Unlike what fans of other skaters believe, I have no difficulty recognizing that Hanyu has fallen twice. Hanyu fell, how could I ignore it? But everything must be taken into account, not just falls. Dick Button also fell into the program with which he won Olympic gold in 1952. So what? Beyond the fall, what Button did was extraordinary, he deserved his win. The programs must be looked at in their entirety. So let’s look at it, this fall.

In my series of screenshots I also kept the seconds. Two seconds pass between the moment when Hanyu’s blade hits the ice and when Hanyu makes the final pose. Two dynamic seconds, with Hanyu always moving, and the jump which, despite the landing problem, is complete, complete with the final pose. I’m not saying that since Hanyu did the final pose, the mistake doesn’t count. I too assigned the -5 in GOE. And there must be a deduction of -1.00 for fall into the TSS. But Hanyu didn’t lose transitions, and he didn’t lose his connection with music. Do you want to see what a devastating fall looks like? Since in this case it didn’t feel right to use images of other skaters, I used what is probably Hanyu’s worst fall in a competition program.

As you can imagine, I have no problem recognizing all the mistakes made by Hanyu in his long career. He is human, he does difficult things, it is normal that sometimes he makes mistakes. This is Skate America 2012 free skate. In the short program he had set his first world record, in the free skate he made one mistake after another and had to settle for second place finish.

This is the third fall of the program, which took place on the final 3F after those on the two initial quadruples. At one point Hanyu is lying on the ice, totally passive. Four seconds after his blade hits the ice, he still has one hand on the rink. It takes him another three seconds to get back into the program, seconds he spends taking a run in a hunched position. Rightly, with such a run-up, the technical panel canceled its choreographic sequence. The fall cost Hanyu a lot in terms of points, because it affected two elements, one that received the lowest possible GOE and the other that was canceled. To clarify, he scored 3.73 points counting both of them. Two weeks earlier at the Finlandia Trophy the same elements had brought him 7.71 points, and the flip had also received a call on the wrong edge (also at Skate America there was the call on the edge, but with that fall the call was irrelevant, the GOE would still have been -3). I think the difference is clear for all. For the fall of Skate America 2012 Hanyu deserves lower PCS, for the one on 4A not so much.

Check out what Jenny Mast says from 19:08 pm about this judges seminar:

Of course no two situations are identical. Sometimes we can have a fall with a very quick recovery. It can be down un, and sometimes after the fall the skating skills are maintained… some even are energie and try to do even better after a fall. Other skaters after a fall… their skating skills for example may diminish, they may start to become very careful, tentative, pull back and skate at a different quality than before the fall or interruption. In those two cases the reflection of your mark for skating skills would be different. The same can be said for transitions. You could have a fall, get right back up, maybe miss a step or two and completely pick up your transitions, and continue on with your program. Others may have a ten seconds where they get up, they brush themselves off, they check their outfit to make sure it’s still okay, they brush the snow of their knees, they look around, they start skating pushing off of toe picks, go to the other end of the rink and then say “I think i’ll keep going”. That is a completely different impact on your transition score, as I am sure you would imagine. You go into performance. Performance… they have an interruption, they’re no longer involved in their program […] It’s up to you to determine when do they reengage into the performance and when are they intellectually, emotionally involved again in the performance. The same can be said for composition, and of course the same thought process for interpretation and timing. So no two situations are the same.

Mast clearly explains that the situations are very different. So why the ISU fixed a roof? That’s nonsense. But, as long as the rule exists, I apply the roof. Hanyu fell, I apply the rule, even if his program was not impacted by this fall more than on execution of the 4A, the only element that should have been affected in the score.

I apply the rule, but if I see an unjust rule it is my right/duty to protest against that unjust rule, and to try to convince to change the rule.

4S

Here, unlike the way in which Hanyu performed the 4A, the rotation is complete. I believe the technical panel was misled by the fall. Jumps that end in a fall are often underrotated. The skater falls because he does not land properly and cannot control the landing. Not that this is true for everyone: some skaters land jumps so often without a part of rotation that, for them, that’s the normal landing, and they often manage to mask the mistake.

In the case of Hanyu, a technical panel that had no clear ideas saw the fall and opted for the wrong call. As far as you can look at the jump, there is no way of being able to call it underrotated, so the technical panel choose to award a q, and this is a mistake. To clarify: the take off is in screenshot 4, the landing is in 10.

Before anyone can tell me that with a fall the jump still deserved a -5, so Hanyu was not damaged by the wrong call, I invite all doubters to read the rules again. In the short program a jump that does not correspond to the requests must have as final GOE -5, even if not all judges remember it (see, to believe, the marks assigned by Deborah Islam and Deborah Currie to Matteo Rizzo and Kao Miura at the last NHK Trophy), but in free skate the mark can be higher.

In this case there are bullet 1, width, and bullet 6, jump on the music. Starting from +2 and with a deduction of -5 for the fall, the final GOE is -3. And since some say I forget the falls, this is the fall:

Two seconds elapse between the first screenshot (left) and the last one. A short time, even if in this case Hanyu’s fatigue in getting up is a little more noticeable, his body slides a little on the ice, and there is no final pose. Since there is a cap on the components I apply it, and with two falls the cap is low. Had it not been for it, I would have judged this fall with a greater severity than that on the 4A, but not with the same severity with which I would have judged the fall of Skate America 2012. Perhaps the ISU does not have clear ideas about the situations in which the judges must have discretion and those in which they must not.

3A+2T

Six bullets present, the combination deserves a +5.

3F

There are bullets 1, 3, 4, 5 and 6. And 2? I would really like another angle, because I don’t know. I really couldn’t figure it out. Watching the video it seems that Hanyu enters the jump with a really slight inside edge.

In these screenshots, looking at the blade there is a minimum inclination, it would seem a slight outside edge, but the position of the shoulders contradicts this feeling and confirms the impression of the video, it looks like an inside edge. And in the end the edge looks like it might be flat. When in doubt, according to the rule we must go in favor of the athlete, but since we are talking of Hanyu and that I am one of his fans, in order not to risk helping him with my support, I call him a flat edge, I do not give him bullet 2, and from + 3 initial and with the deduction I settle on +2.

And since I like to be clear about everything, I didn’t make an insignificant call just to pose as a correct person. I broke the rule choosing to be strict with Hanyu, something I never did with the other skaters. If I hadn’t called the flat edge, I would have assigned the jump to six bullets, for a final GOE of +5. Choosing to call the flat edge in this case means removing 1.59 points from Hanyu’s score. On a mistake I’m not sure he did.

FCCoSp

Six bullets present, the spin deserves a +5.

StSq

Let’s start with the level. Hanyu hopped on the turn, but even if for the umpteenth time the technical panel has not noticed anything, the correct level is 3, not 4.

If anyone believed that I would indiscriminately raise Hanyu’s scores just because I cheer for him… no. Maybe I make mistakes, and if you notice a mistake I ask you to point it to me. But I’m really doing the control. I look at the elements, and I wonder about their execution.

And speaking of execution, there is a movement that does not convince me. It doesn’t convince me now that I know what he did, he didn’t convince me live. I love this step sequence, but for me at one point Hanyu got out of balance. I swear, I was afraid that his ankle had left him completely and that he would have fallen, right now:

This being the case, he can forget bullet 3, and bullet 5 as well. Final GOE +3.

4T+3T

This time the bullet 4 is not there, the last step is at 3:04, the preparation of the 4T starts at 3:08. There are bullets 1, 5 and 6. Unfortunately, the 3T is underrotated (and I don’t know what the technical panel probably was doing, because the calls that he should have made and did not make are very numerous, and they were fundamental to determine the final rank).

This means lower base value and no bullet 2 and 3. With the -2 for the error, the final GOE is +1.

4T+1Eu+3S

All bullets present (double three at 3:36, entry three in the jump at 3:38), GOE +5.

3A

All bullets present, final GOE +5.

ChSq

It is so beautiful that I propose again the most significant passages.

Twizzle and inside spread eagle + hop half turn.

Hydroblade (really impressive, even if I did few screenshots) + hop.

High choreo jump with change of balance in the air + majestic layback ina bauer.

All bullets present, final GOE +5.

FCSSp

All bullets present, final GOE +5.

CCoSp

There are five bullets, the 4 is missing, maintaining a centered spin, but it is missing so much that I also give it a -1 for traveling and I stop at +4.

PCS

I said I watched free skates less than I watched short programs. I have not done such a thorough analysis. There are however a couple of general considerations that can be made. The SS don’t change overnight. They can improve over a season, not in two days. So unless one day a skater – for whatever reason – skated one program really badly compared to his ability, there can’t be big differences in the SS of the two programs in the same competition. For this reason, I tended to keep the mark of the short program. When I haven’t, I explain why. In TR, on the other hand, there are differences. The program is longer, the jump elements go from three to seven, with three combinations and not just one. On a physical level, the program is much more demanding. For this reason everyone, including Hanyu, in the free program does a few less transitions, adds a few more easy moves. The mark is inevitably lower. The other three items, on the other hand, are those that vary the most, which are more related to the single program and to the single day. However, it should be remembered that if a skater runs long runs, he stops interpreting the program and loses the connection with the music, so I won’t give him too high marks. That said, let’s move on to Hanyu.

There is a cap in components, you know? As I have already written, I find it absurd, but as long as it exists, the rule must be respected. And what does the rule say? The rule indicates a series of maximum marks, which in the presence of two or more serious errors (and Hanyu fell twice) are 9.25 for SS, TR and CO, 8.75 for PE and IN, but also says Similar limitations must be applied to all levels of Skaters from extremely poor to outstanding. I mean, it’s not that if you don’t pass these marks, everything is fine, as several judges seem to have done. If a skater deserves 9.00 in SS, 0.75 points must be deducted from that 9.00, which is the scores he would have deserved without the mistakes, and he is awarded 8.25. Doing the contrary, assigning him 9.00 in any case, means penalizing those who deserve 10.00 by lowering their mark to 9.25, but not those who deserve lower marks, and this is not admissible. Hanyu deserved 10.00 in SS? No. The program is extraordinary, it remains the most complex of all those presented in Beijing, but it is not at the level of Rondo, and there are some problems. On the 4A he lost nothing in terms of steps or musical interpretation, the fall on the 4S, perhaps because he didn’t expect it, was a bit worse. And in one moment, during the step sequence, I got worried. This means that in SS I give him 8.75.

As for the other PCS, despite the mistakes Hanyu never stopped interpreting the program. Anyone who knows the story of Uesugi Kenshin knows that even the daimyo has had his moments of difficulty, but that he has always emerged from the difficulties to return to fight, without ever holding back. On an emotional level, the falls enrich the program, but the judges, or the spectators, cannot be expected to know the story of Kenshin. But the connection with the music and with the story that Hanyu was narrating has never failed, and everyone perceives this.

With the rules in effect at the time the competition was held, Hanyu could not receive the marks in the componets he received, but he still deserved high marks. Without the cap I would have been more generous, with the cap I would have been more severe than the judges were, settling on the maximum possible mark only in CO because Ten to Chi to is a masterpiece.

My score in the free program is ultimately a little lower than that of the Beijing judges. The left side is the simple transcript of the protocol, which you can find here. Beyond the green band there are the bullets assigned by me, and that I have listed above, then some important notes, the correct BV, the mark in the GOE taking into account bullet and deduction, the score of the GOE, and the total value of the element. Adding all the values of the technical elements with those of the PCS, found in the section below, this is the result: