Lysacek and Plushenko - the Controversy is Killing the Sport

Men's figure skating is NOT damaged. If anything, the competition rose to new levels with the rivalry between Evan Lysacek and Evgeny Plushenko. As a result, it rose to new levels of controversy as well. Both men were virtually tied after the short program. Lysacek barely edged out (pardon the pun) Plushenko to win the gold.

To be honest, I thought Plushenko had it until everything started to slow down. His spins started to creep. The landings to his jumps were scratchy and forced through. It wasn't a skate for someone of his stature. Even the commentators were calling how close this competiton was, and what the final analysis would come down to.

It amazes me that a coach can belittle the Olympic champion, the sport of figure-skating, and athletes combined in a statement that says without the quad, the men might as well skate with the ladies. That by not giving the gold to Evgeny Plushenko, the sport has been set back twenty years. Come on, Alexei. You're a coach. You're supposed to set an example instead of demeaning what skating, and the Olympics, are about. Disagree by all means, but where is your sportsmanship? For the record, Plushenko is now a three-time medalist in Olympic Men's Figure Skating. Three times. That's not a loss.

He's not the only one to feel this way regarding the competition result. Elvis Stojko, former men's silver medalist and quad king, moans in a near duplication of a quote from Mishin that this decision has "killed the sport". He believes figure skating has come down to the spins and footwork, that the jumps no longer matter. Never mind that the quad king had to rely on some fancy footwork himself back in the day. Of course, his fear is that skaters will start holding back. An Olympic champion without the quad? Why don't we take out the jumps altogether and make it an art, he asks.

In a way, he's got a point. We don't want to make it less challenging. But figure skating has been a sport long before the quad. It should not be the deciding factor of a competition that is supposed to emphasize grace and control on the ice, not revolutions in the air. Even Elvis himself once said that it doesn't matter how many times one rotates in the air; what mattered was skating with conviction. Backtracking your words now, Elvis? I suppose there is no technical skill to the rapid changes of direction during the insane footwork patterns we now see, or the change of edge now executed during a spin. Shame on you.

Since when does a quad dictate the sport? By that reasoning, take out the choreography, the spins, the footwork. The gliding moves are already missing. Let's just put the skaters out on the ice, line them up in a row, and let them jump. If the quad is the only thing that matters in figure skating, then this is a time-saver. We don't even have to worry about the costumes, or music. Just go out in warm-up suits. Get a panel of judges out on the ice with notebooks. Let them stare and mark and analyze the angle of take-off, quality of edge, the rotation and tilt in the air, how hard the toe dug in for the landing, and if the landing was forced out or properly checked. Then they can watch the next jump, and the next jump, sequentially.

Oh, wait. This format's familiar. It was called school figures. No one wanted to watch the necessary perfection of edge quality, so it was taken from the sport. How many times did one see a spread eagle in this event? A spiral? For that matter, any edge-controlled glide? Which skaters are more fun to watch? The ones who flap around like chickens during their routines trying to catch up to the rules? Or the ones who actually took time to skate with their hearts?

Quad emphasis. Please. THAT is killing figure skating.

You can find more articles on figure skating, including the Plushenko/Lysacek controversy, at Yahoo Sports. www.sports.yahoo.com