Friday, Feb. 22, 2002 / 1:27 p.m.

~Judges, Schmudges~

I don't understand figure skating at all. I watched it last night, once I realized it wasn't even going to start until 10:00 p.m. ET, on account of it's two hours behind in Utah�and the first few they showed, the first few women who skated, sucked. Gee, sorry, but it's true, and no, I couldn't do any better, but I know what I like, I know a little about good figure skating, and yeah, even the announcers knew it�those first few sucked.

So, the top four or five or six skate around 11:00 or so, and Sasha Cohen is nervous, we can tell, but holy moly, she is amazing, doing these splits in mid air, and her choreography is beautiful, she's not just holding her arms straight out, skating plainly from jump to jump, she has flair, style, unbelievable grace and poise, she's fantastic�but she falls. Once, gets up, recovers, keeps going, unlike that ridiculous water skier person who gave up after she fell. You could see it all over her, her posture, her sagging shoulders, her poor attempts at the jumps, all the singles in place of triples.

But Sasha gets these low marks.

Michelle Kwan. Oh, what to say, what to say? Am I the only one who thinks she is a diva? Am I the only one that thinks she is amazingly overrated? The Best Woman Skater of Her Generation??? Huh? Why? For what? What does she do that is so fucking wonderful? She hides behind closed doors awaiting her turn, while ALL the others are backstage with cameras in their faces.

She skates, she falls. She's one of those skaters who skates around with her arms outstretched, awaiting each jump, too intense, bound to fail. Hey, this is my opinion, and I recall loving her years ago, four or whatever, I was one of her fans, but since I've seen Sasha Cohen my appreciation lies elsewhere. I don't get the Michelle Kwan mania, not at all.

So, Michelle falls. She lands funny a few times. Not too good. Then Irina Slutskaya, and she falls, she lands funny, she doesn't look too good, but her marks are HIGH! Like 5.9s. Huh? See, I don't get figure skating, not at all.

Sasha did the splits, the jumps, she was beautiful except for one fall, yet her marks are low and the other ones who fell get high marks.

Turns out that if Irina gets higher marks in the long program (and 4 minutes is LONG!) than Michelle Kwan then Michelle Kwan can't win the Gold, but if Michelle Kwan beats Irina Slutskaya in the long program she automatically wins Gold, regardless of what Sasha and Sarah do. Uh huh.

It's this combined scoring thing.

Sarah Hughes is the wild card. She's the youngest, only 17, she's perky, cute, smiles a lot, enjoys the hell out of her skate, she is flawless, fucking FLAWLESS, does NOT FALL DOWN, and she gets 5.7s and 5.8s and 5.6s. Scott Hamilton says, "You can't get much higher than 5.8" and I'm thinking, yeah, you can, 5.9, 6.0! Idiot. Why so low???? She should have gotten 6.0s. Plain. Simple. Where is the justice??

So, the deal is this, you skate perfectly, with pizzazz, with style, with grace, with athletic skill, flawlessly, and you get semi-high scores. You fall down a few times, land all funny and you get high scores. You're Russian and you just might win. You're young and haven't competed much�forget it, they think you'll win next Olympics. Do I have this right?

And if you've got TONS of media pressure put upon you, you turn into a DIVA, fall when you skate and still walk away with a medal.

I do not understand figure skating at all.

Cost of the War in Iraq
(JavaScript Error)

Run, Kitty, Run!

Previous - Next

New - 2012 - 2009 - 2008 - 2007 - 2006 - 2005 - 2004 - 2003 - 2002 - 2001 - Profile - Contact - Notes - Rings - Diaryland - Favourite Entries - ReadMe - Surveys - Random Entry

Recent Entries:

It Was 40 Years Ago Today - 9:44 a.m. , Friday, Oct. 12, 2012

Dead Black Cat - 9:07 a.m. , Wednesday, Jan. 25, 2012

As Seen From Outer Space - 1:07 a.m. , Saturday, Dec. 05, 2009

I Survived to Tell the Tale - 7:29 a.m. , Friday, Sept. 18, 2009

Reading My Life - 12:55 p.m. , Saturday, Sept. 12, 2009

Happy Kitty

My Diary Was Reviewed at Ms Lovejoy's - Get Yours Reviewed Too!

Registered I was a nominee