In July 2020 I’ve started to write a lot of posts about the judging system and the scandals in the history of figure skating. I don’t have a precise plan, I write about what hit me in some way. I watch figure skating from 1989, and even if I’m a fan, if I appreciate one skater more than another (I was, and I’m, a fan of a lot of skaters, sometimes even at the same time of two or three that, among their, were strong rivals), I believe in sporting fairness. I believe that the strongest – perhaps the strongest only in that precise day – must win. The past victories, the potential, the love (mine, or that of the public), the expectations, the nationality, count nothing. The better skater – the one who in the days of the competition find the better equilibrium among high technical content, fewer mistakes and better artistic elements (figure skating isn’t only a jumps competition) – must win. If who win wasn’t the best on that days, we have a problem. Figure skating has a problem.
I’ve started to write highlighting problems, errors of judgment, details that seem very strange to me. I’m Italian, so I’ve started to write in Italian. A day I’ve noticed that several people outside Italy has started to read my posts. Someone has written that has read them using an automatic translator. If a lot of people is interested… perhaps I must try to make the things easier for them? Not for a desire for notoriety, but because if a lot of people talk about the problems in Figure Skating, those who can do it are more likely to actually do something to improve the situation. Do you remember Salt Lake City 2002? It was because of the scandal, the pressure of the press, that a second gold was awarded to Jamie Salé/David Pelletier, that Didier Gailhaguet and Marie-Reine Le Gougne were suspended for (only) three years and that the code of points of Figure Skating was changed. We must to talk about what we see that is wrong, because only if we work we can hope to improve the sport. Not for me, not for my favorites, but for all the skaters. They have dedicated their life, or at least a high number of years, to figure skating, and they deserves to be treated fairly.
So I’ve decided to try to write in English, even if it’s difficult for me. I always make mistakes, whether they are grammatical or simple typos. I’m sorry. I do my best, but from time to time you may come across a strange phrase because I did a mistake and I didn’t notice it. I’m slower, I make mistakes, but I hope to reach a higher number of people.
I won’t translate in English the posts of the past, but an explanation is necessary. I will explain what I’m doing here, so it’s easy for all to find it, to understand what I’m doing and how I’m doing it.
In figure skating there are a lot of problems, a lot of way to manipulate the results. There was the bloc judging, you can find several posts in which I talk about it, there was some specific agreements, and exchange votes, as in the 2002 Olympic Winter Games, there are exchange of signals between judges (read here and here, for example), there are judges that can influence other judges with their chatter, there are high marks given in some national championship in order to influence the international judges. For a history of some controversial competition of the past, You can read the posts that I’ve published (in Italian with quotes mostly in English) in October 2020 under the title Di giudici, giurie e giudizi equi. You can easily found them in the Archive. From January to February 2021 I’ve written also on Jon Jackson’s book On Edge. He was an important judge, so what he has written is really worrying and deserved an inquiry. The ISU has ever done one? I doubt it.
There are also psychological reason that explain how an honest judge can be influenced (read Thinking, Fast and Slow of Daniel Kahneman, book from which I’ve quoted some passages, to understand better)… Two posts are here (in Italian) and here (in English).
I could go on a lot. I’m trying to write about all that I know and all that I see.
A lot of my posts are about national bias. How I do calculate the national bias? And when the national bias is too high?
After 2018 Olympic Games, the ISU has suspended Mr. Huang Feng, the Chinese judge in the Pairs competition, for national bias.
I’ve talked about his suspension here. My words are in Italian, but there are several screenshot from the official document of the ISU, and all the screenshot are in English. The ISU has said that his national bias is too high, not I. So I can use his bias to check if the bias of the other judges are too high or if they give the marks to all the skaters with honesty.
Not all the biased judges can be detected by this type of control, in several cases is needed a control more accurate, and from time to time I’ll do a very accurate control, but for now I’ll explain the system with which I did most of the checks.
Do you know skatingscores.com? In the site are published all the protocols, implemented by several numbers that show better how each judge works. For every competition there is a national bias chart done so:
The chart distinguish from SP and FS. Sometimes a judge has judged only one of the two programs. In the Short Program the Chinese judge has given to the three Chinese pairs (added together) marks 4.22 points over the average. He has given to the other 19 pairs marks 0.19 points over the average. His national bias in the short program is of 4.03 points. In the free skate he has given to the two Chinese pairs marks 3.51 points over the average, and to the other 14 pairs 1.29 points under the average. His bias in the free skate is 4.80 points. In the whole competition his bias is 8.83 points.
According to ISU, 8.83 points is a bias too high. For the sake of calculation, I considered a bias of 9.00 points upwards as too high, even if sometimes I check a bias lower.
Just to understand the effect of a bias of 9.00 points, I’ve watched how points of difference there was among the first and the second position, the second and the third, the third and the fourth in the Men’s competitions, Ladies’ competitions and Pairs’ competitions at the lasts World Championship and at the Olympic Games in the last two and half Olympic four-year period, from season 2010-2011. In yellow I’ve marked the times that a medal would have changed owner.
65 out of 99 medal would have changed owner, this means that it’s really important that all the judges give the right marks.
9.00 points in a competition can be divided into 3.00 points in the Short Program, 6.00 points in the Free Skate. It’s right to consider too high a bias of 9.00 points even now, after the changes in the scoring system from +3/-3 to +5/-5?
We know which judge give every score from the 2016-2017 season, so I’ve watched the national bias for all the judges in the 2016-2017, 2017-2018, 2018-2019 and 2019-2020 seasons in the Olympic Games and in all the World Championships (senior and junior), European Championships, Four Continents Championships, World Team Trophy, Grand Prix Series (senior and junior, Final included) and Challenger Series. After collecting all the data, I’ve made some calculation. This is the way in which I’ve collected the data:
In the A-Q columns, not included in my screenshot, I’ve collected all the data. After, I’ve assembled them in several ways to make my stats. In the columns J-Q I’ve brought back the 2016-2017 season, in the columns S-Z the 2017-2018 season and so on. The columns are, from left, season, competition, discipline, name of the judge, nationality, bias in SP, bias in FS, total bias. I’ve highlighted in bold and with a font a little larger when the bias is too high, in red when a bias is negative (that is, when a judge was stricter with his compatriote than with the others).
For the screenshot I’ve enlightened the column O. That is the way as I make a lot of calculation. If the data are correct – and if you find a mistake I would like to know it, so I can correct my posts – the sums are correct because it’s the computer who made them.
As you can see, in the 2016-207 season there was 709 Short Program (in the screenshot there is written “conteggio”) in which a judge has judged a compatriote. The sum (“somma”) of all the bias is 1569.48 points, the average (“media”) is 2.21 points. If a 3.00 points of bias for the Short Program is too high, all the judges have an average bias of 2.21 points. I’ve made the same sums also with the Free Skate, for all the four seasons. For the total, because the number in which a judge has judged a compatriote is different from SP to FS (at the ISU Championship not all the skaters go to the Free Skate, the judges can change, and there can be injuries), I’ve made the sum among the average bias for the SP and the FS.
In the next screenshot there is the average bias, considering all the judges. The first line is the sum for every season, under there are the numbers (sums, number of competitions and average bias) for every season, first in the Short Program, after in the Free Skate, and finally there are the sums for the whole competitions.
As you can see, the season with the higher average bias is the Olympic season, where is the most important competition. The last two season have the average lower, so, assuming that the fair judges continue to be fair, and that the unfair judges continue to be unfair, we can say that, if a bias of 8.83 was high at the Olympic Games, it is too high even now.
Until someone can prove to me that I must change the value beyond which I consider that the bias is too high, I will always make my stats with the value fixed at 9.00, knowing that sometimes an expert judge can stay below 9.00 and equally distort the result of the competitions. An example? I noticed something strange in the way the Russian Elena Fomina give her marks. A check as this should be done for all the judges, unfortunately I don’t have enough time for them all. I’ve written about Fomina (in Italian) here.
ISU should watch carefully all the scores. I’m not in the ISU, I’m doing all the calculation in my spare time, so I can’t watch all the competitions, all the marks. I’m doing my best, but for me it’s only a start. If someone want to aid me, or make new stats in order to find all the biased judges, for me it’s ok. If someone want to translate my posts in his language, and repost them in any other platform, he can do it. You can translated – without even asking me – all the posts with the tag ISU that I’ve published, entirely or in part. I only ask to don’t change the meaning. I want fair judging, and only if a lot of people ask fair judging perhaps something will change.
Under the bias for seasons there is another table, with the bias for discipline. The higher bias is in Ice Dance, followed by the Men’s competition, the Pairs’ competition, and the Ladies’ competition.
In the future I will publish all the stats about the national bias of all the judges, but I’m also working on something bigger, and I don’t know how much time I’ll need to reach the conclusions. Speaking of national bias, I’ve stumbled in an affirmation made by an international judge, Jeroen Prins:
I’ve talked about his interview (in Italian) here. According to Prins
to single out specific countries is too difficult.
Ok, I’ve done the work for you. This is the national bias for every nation in the last four years:
I’ve explained above how I’ve done my calculations. For a better view I’ve colored some boxes. If the national bias for all the judges is of 1.99 points in the Short Program, I’ve highlighted in yellow the bias among 1.99 and 2.48 points, in orange the bias among 2.49 and 2.98 points, in red the bias among 2.99 and 3.48 points, in purple the bias over 3.49 points. I’ve done the same, with higher values, for the Free Skate and for the sums.
We must watch every judge, even in the nations with a high national bias there are fair judges, and even in the nations with a low national bias there are unfair judges, but to identify the national bias is possible. We need only time, patience and attention. If the ISU will do the courtesy to send to me the marks of all the judges, with their names, from the 2004-2005 season, I will check the national bias for them, so they can suspend all the biased judges.
I’ve already published the average bias for all the judges in all the four season here. The post is in Italian, but in the text I mostly explain what I’ve explained here in English, so you can ignore my words and scroll the page downward. In my opinion it’s worth it.
Under the last screenshot that I’ve published also here, there is a screenshot in which I’ve brought back only the national bias of the 13 nations that has had a skater on the podium in the last four years at the Olympic Games, at the World Championships (only senior), at the European Championships, at the Four Continents Championships or at the Grand Prix Finals (only senior). I’ve done it in order to highlight the behavior of the judges of the strongest nations. Only three nations, Canada, Germany and Japan, seem to don’t have problems with national bias, but even if a nation don’t seem to say to his judges to judge the competitions in a certain way, every judge must be watched for his marks, not for the marks of his nation. So, under this screenshot, there is a screenshot in which I explain the way in which I’ve collected the data for all the judges, how I’ve made a summary, or an average, of the marks of every judge, and finally a long series of screenshots with the average of all the judges.
In the columns DG-DK the judges are listed by alphabetical order, in the columns DM-DQ the same judges are listed by bias, to the higher from the lowest. The judges highlighted in yellow are the judges most active, who have judged at least in six competitions.
When I will have time, I will publish all the data.
These are several posts about some specific problem with the actual judging system:
Figure skating and judges with the ISU judging System, on Men at the OG 2018, Men at the OG 2010, Men at the WC 2017, and links to some interesting articles;
Again on figure skating and judges with the ISU judging system, on Ladies at the OG 2014, some strange marks in several competitions, judges, technical panel and the most worrying things according to the ISU;
The ISU judging system, the past and the Olympic Games, with the links to several articles written before the OG 2018, what happened on the Men’s competition at the OG 2018 and the way in which the ISU check the judges’ work;
Giudici olimpici e national bias, that I’ve written before. If the previous posts are on the competition after the competition ended, I asked to myself if we can forecast if some judge will be problematic. I’ve written several posts, all in Italian. This is the first, but there are also
Giudici olimpici e national bias. I giudici;
Giudici olimpici e national bias. Giudici all’opera a Pyeongchang/1. Da Deborah Noyes (AUS) a Daniel Delfa (ESP), in which I’ve checked how has judged the competitions all the judges before and at Pyeongchang. The order is alphabetical by nation;
National bias before the Olympic Games.
The 2018 Olympic Games now are the past. In 2022there will be the Olympic Games again. I don’t want to see there biased judges. With four years for my analysis – four, not two – we know which judges are usually the most biased. The ISU should not send them, and if the ISU don’t care, it will be the IOC that must ban them. And the IOC should make clear that if a judge give to their compatriote marks too high, his nation can’t send any judge in the next Olympic Games. Which are the most biased judges? I’ve checked all the competition for all of them, you can see their behavior here:
National bias: all the bias/1: from Maira Abasova to Yury Balkov;
National bias: all the bias/2: from Diana Barbacci Levy to Oksana Dolgopolova;
National bias: all the bias/3: from Igor Dolgushin to Deborah Islam;
National bias: all the bias/4: from Limin Jao to Elisabeth Louesdon;
National bias: all the bias/5: from Joern Lucas to Tarja Ristanen;
National bias: all the bias/6: from Sharon Rogers to Jacqueline Wickett-Warren;
National bias: all the bias/7: from Dough Williams to Kadi Zvirik.
In this post I tried to put my blog in order, dividing the posts by type and inserting links to numerous interesting articles:
For now I’ll stop here. If something general will come to my mind, I’ll add in the future, so that all the basic information can be find easily in one place.
