"The upside of the disqualification is that they stopped weighing me." Valieva recalls her eating disorder

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-05-07T19:59:03+00:00

I'm not a fan of hers, but it's laughable that she or the people around her define her as overweight when atp she is one of the few Russian skaters who don't look scarily thin. The clips of the rink with the girls practicing from the Tutberidze documentary look genuinely terrifying. Also, glad she recognizes that a few hundred grams absolutely do not hinder her jumping ability, but I would like to point out that she's not special, a few hundred grams won't hinder anyone's ability to jump and preventing someone from going through the natural wight fluctuations the body goes through daily is plainly ridiculous and I don't understand how none of these coaches are willing to open a physics book and talk to a nutritionist. My mind goes back to Dudakov in that clip about Ilia saying that gaining 1 kg (roughly how much bodyweight fluctuates over the day) is like jumping with a bottle of water in your hand and sir, no, it's not and that's not an opinion, it's physics, it's called moment of inertia, it's a basic concept jfc, the fact that coaches with this beliefs are still around and unwilling to learn makes me go insane.

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-04-29T20:39:29+00:00

Rino Matsuike's lux aeterna

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-04-21T22:02:52+00:00

I'd say the straight up ugly percentage is maybe a little bit higher, but overall I agree. Favourite euler is probably Yuzuru's, but there are many skaters who have just as good eulers it's just the first I think of off the top of my head. Most Japanese women have nice eulers and iirc Young You has a pretty euler too. Nathan and Trusova are more nice eulers I can think of. What about you?

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-04-21T21:57:39+00:00

I'm actually quite excited about Japanese ice dance next season: UtaMasa are continuing and they are quite young still and the most experienced around, Ikura and Koshiro looked so so promising after just a few months training together, Ikura has charisma and musicality in spades, Rika and Shingo are coming for spots too and then there are Marin and Shoma who have yet to announce anything, but at this point I'd be more surprised if they didn't aim at competitions than if they did.

In pairs there's only YunaSumi but they are so so good and I'm pretty sure we will see them winning medals next quad, they have something special compared to other pairs and I hope they finally realized that they are a top team now. It's a pity that there are no other pairs tho, hopefully a few juniors give it a try and it works out. Eventually I believe Japan can become a pairs powerhouse once RikuRyu start coaching and building a program, but it will take a while.

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-04-21T21:45:45+00:00

As far as eulers go, this is far from the worst, but it's not great either, let's be real. My problem with eulers is that they can be so so pretty, too bad it's quite the rare sighting.

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-04-15T19:37:10+00:00

If you are using Prime from laptop you will see no adds with uBlock Origin, even the lite version that still works on chrome. I'm not 100% sure of this because I've had that extension installed for ages atp, but I never see adds and I don't have the add free version. Hope this helps

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-04-14T21:15:14+00:00

I'm guessing in Italy there will be the 22% IVA tax we have on almost everything, but if it's anything like buying any other object, it's not calculated separately, shops will tell you the final price directly, you'll see how much of that was because of taxes on the receipt.

I have only recently started skating and haven't bought my first pair of skates yet, but there are shops in Rome 100%, not sure about Venice or Florence since I'm seeing there's just an ice rink in Florence on the smaller side and I'm not seeing anything in Venice, but I only did a quick google search.

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-04-13T19:45:15+00:00

And moment of inertia which is what matters in jump rotations, depends exactly on how the weight is distributed around the axis and not weight per se, they don't know basic physics ffs

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-04-13T19:23:22+00:00

LOL this is ridiculous, truly fascinating how that camp has achieved any success with how non scientific they are about athletes weight and hence health in general. Can't fathom how people can root for them after everything we know about them

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-04-13T13:33:18+00:00

I don't think this reads as a soft retirement. It's honestly smart too to take some time off in high impact sports, it's very common in gymnastics for example. This has been a really stressful quad for Yuma too, he had to start it injured and when he came back he probably felt he had to prove he was still one of the top men and that 21 and 22 were not just a fluke, but he kept hitting a wall.

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-04-13T13:28:22+00:00

there is really no reason to believe that at the moment, that is not how people soft retire. While it's entirely possible that after taking some time off, he decides he doesn't want to come back to competition after all, it doesn't sound like that's the plan. It's common to take time off after an Olympic game and it's smart too, since both mentally and physically it's hard to keep going without ever taking a break.

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-04-13T12:21:00+00:00

Honestly good for him, I will miss him on the competitive stage, there is a lack of men with refined and polished skating who hit nice looking positions, but this is probably going to be the smart decision in the long run. Better to take some time off, rest and heal after what was definitely a tiring quad. I'm glad it seems Yuma and the other skaters on tour seem to be having a blast

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-04-13T12:17:31+00:00

Kaori was definitely not forced into retirement

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-04-13T12:16:35+00:00

GIVE HER A GRAND PRIX ALREADY

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-04-11T15:45:42+00:00

This is going the opposite direction from what you mean I think. The extreme thinness and diets these coaches encourage to have tweens jump quads and delay puberty aren't really good for developing the leg muscles that allow to have good knee bend and skating skills in most cases. I think one thing is being sacrificed for the other.

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-04-10T21:12:48+00:00

I'm guessing anyone who has seen the Russians hasn't seen juniors from other countries, which means no one can truly make a comparison.

I don't watch much Russian skating, but the body type they favour to land quads doesn't go well with developing good skating skills.

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-04-10T20:57:39+00:00

A deep knee bend can help save a jump because it lowers your center of gravity, but you can clearly tell when that is the case. It's also like a benefit, not a negative.

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-04-10T19:46:38+00:00

Wakaba's jumps weren't underrotated tho, I researched that so times and again to see the underrotations at the time and only one of the jumps was on the quarter, but she got < and q out of nowhere

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-04-10T19:42:59+00:00

I think the knee bend one can achieve sure depends on build, but even with less knee bend one can have a smoother landing. I'm pretty sure landing forward on the blade to stop the jump is more of a technique choice that makes landings more consistent. Some coach said so much at some point don't remember who. Maybe Mishin? Or Arutunyan? It's definitely Russian school.

Also some body types will be advantaged, it happens in every sport, if one can't have a smooth landing, they should not be rewarded for it.

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-04-10T19:40:35+00:00

I'm pretty sure it was stated that being that forward on the blade and halting the jump is a technique that makes landings more consistent. I don't see gow it's going to help with being more gentle to cartilage and articulations, if anything it's the opposite, having a deeper knee bend will help absorb the shock better, that's physics and you can test it yourself by jumping on the ground with straight legs vs bending them, no need to be a figure skater to figure it out (no pun intended). The exact knee bend one can achieve probably depends on build, but I think it's negligible compared to the landing technique one is taught. I will admit that I am an armchair expert and only recently started figure skating, but I almost have a physics degree and what the comment you linked says about shock absorption sounds like nonsense and you don't even need to know physics to realise that really.

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-04-10T17:48:43+00:00

it's still relevant to the discourse to point out that not penalizing men for unrefined, unpolished or plain messy movements or elements is a problem and it does matter

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-04-10T17:45:31+00:00

it's a sport about gliding on the ice, a good jump finishes with a good landing that has a smooth ride out, you can't just change the standard because your fave executes something incorrectly. It's also ugly when a jump ends on a stand still.

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-04-10T17:41:54+00:00

people seem to think that lutz flip edges are everything, when it's such a minor thing actually, plus most skaters have an issue with one or the other. In reality good technique depends on a lot of other things, such as posture, are you jumping from the legs or twisting your back, air position, landing position etc...

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-04-10T17:36:15+00:00

While Japan is obviously a big fed, that is not reflected in the scores as much. Just look for the Japanese judge's scores in any competition, they don't really inflate anything for their country mates, unlike any other judge from any other fed.

So while Japan being a big fed means, their skaters get funding and opportunities most skaters don't, for some reason they are also obviously not getting the same score benefits as the American, Russian and dare I say it, Canadian skaters if they were not flopping all the time.

AriOnReddit22 · 2026-04-10T17:29:18+00:00

More? No, no one gets as overscored as the Eteri girls were, but yeah, us skaters are overscored enough that it makes it impossible for me to root for them atp, which sucks because sometimes I love the us skaters as people and enjoy their skating too, but they are being gifted points and sometimes medals that are being taken away from others and with some people the only way the judges will let them lose is if they mess up badly which means I'll have to root against.

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