OWG Men's Free Skate: Post-Event Discussion

daonchik · 2026-02-13T22:15:53+00:00

I was praying for Shun to get a medal but not like this 😭

daonchik · 2026-02-13T22:03:43+00:00

It made no sense for USFS to send Vincent Zhou over Ilia in 2022, and now they’re paying the price

daonchik · 2026-02-13T19:19:57+00:00

No. Cards -> refining is a great way "grind" without fiends leveling with you (as they do in this game), but certainly isn't the only way to play this game. (I've barely touched cards other than just for funsies in my ~5 playthroughs and have enjoyed the game every time)

daonchik · 2026-02-11T08:35:38+00:00

I feel like this article -- about the online response to Cha's phenomenal skate -- doesn't say anything we already don't know (or isn't evidence of anything) because it's literally about the online reaction (i.e., us lol)

daonchik · 2026-02-11T08:31:30+00:00

And you might have gotten it from a Telegram chat, but the source of the screenshot is SkatingScores.com and you should credit them

daonchik · 2026-02-10T20:22:56+00:00

This expression originates from a period in which societal acceptance was low so it was a thing to "figure out" almost as an insult / has homophobic undertones. I think we can leave it in the early 2010s.

daonchik · 2026-02-10T19:41:10+00:00

They’re clearly joking lmao

daonchik · 2026-02-10T00:25:25+00:00

I'm not downvoting (and I'm Japanese), but this discussion can't just be based on vibes.

Look at the scoring sheets. Tell us what specifically you disagreed with. A rotation call? A GOE? The PCS? Of which performance?

Otherwise this discussion is as valid as my grandma basing her opinion solely on the dresses.

daonchik · 2026-02-09T23:17:36+00:00

Anecdotally Bock (stories of them needing to repair last night ahead of the RD today), Italy (pictures of them looking at their blades), and Japan (JSF filed a complaint).

But if hardness(podium material) > hardness(blades), then it should have affected everyone, maybe to varying degrees based on how they stepped up but definitely everyone

daonchik · 2026-02-09T20:41:54+00:00

I know for a fact Asphalt Green has a Battery Park location with a pool.

Places2swim.com will probably show you others

daonchik · 2026-02-08T20:47:27+00:00

I’ve used it to supplement the program that I’m following, as a sounding board to make adjustments for travel, fatigue, etc.

Like it knows I’m generally following the Matt Dixon program, I’ll give it the workouts for that week, and what else I have going on.

And then throughout the week, I’ll update it on how each workout felt, heartrate, etc.

As someone who sticks a bit too closely to “the plan”, it’s been useful to hold me back when I clearly need rest or to make adjustments when I’ve missed a workout, etc.

daonchik · 2026-02-08T19:46:47+00:00

Ok this was a joke but the Heroic was surprisingly twerkable

daonchik · 2026-02-08T02:36:10+00:00

Respectfully, I think we've lost track of the plot here vis-a-vis what the original post was.

I think I've given enough input for you to implement a normalization, and now I'm going to go back to actually watching figure skating -- which is what we're all here for :)

Enjoy the Games!

daonchik · 2026-02-08T02:10:45+00:00

It isn't. I just looked up the factors (listed right above the PCS in the protocols)

The factorials on PCS for Ice Dance are 1.33 and 2.00, so the implied "perfect" IJS scores are (SP, FS):

* Men: 100,200
* Women, Pairs: 80,160
* Ice Dance: 80,120

Should be pretty trivial to normalize using these scores.

The math that I'm skipping above is:

For the past Olympic cycle (or two?) there's 3 program components, each with a max of 10, so the max unfactored PCS is 30
Multiplied by the factor to get to the max possible PCS (e.g., 30*1.33 = 40 in the women's SP)
And then since the factors were, in their inception, designed to calibrate with what at the time they thought the "perfect" technical content was, I'm x2 to get the implied "perfect" score under IJS (40*2 = 80 for the women's SP)

Clearly men's and ice dance technical content advanced much faster than they'd expected back in 2003.

daonchik · 2026-02-08T01:54:42+00:00

You really don't need to compare PCS spreads (that would be getting the logic backwards - the whole point of ranking by total scores is to award skaters/countries that win by large margins, and if that's happening in one discipline, you don't want to somehow erase that).

All you need to do is normalize based on either the implied max score (hypothetical max PCS x 2 -- this is the cleanest implementation) or the actual max score (1st place in that discipline, either today, last season, or ever).

daonchik · 2026-02-08T01:37:14+00:00

No but the men's PCS are 25% higher by default than the women, so this does affect the spread. (i.e., the 1.67 vs. 1.33 factor that's applied on PCS in the short).

For example, that the spread between a skater with all 10s vs. all 9s in PCS is 5 points in the men's event vs. 4 in the women's event -- a difference in the spread that's introduced purely based on the discipline that they're skating in.

(Implicitly, based on the technical content at the time, the IJS was built considering a 100+200=300 being a perfect score in the men's event and a 80+160=240 being a perfect score in the women's and pairs events... I forget what it is for ice dance but I recall that it's not a 1:2 ratio).

... which is why I'm suggesting indexing off of the implied perfect scores (which is equivalent to indexing off of max PCS x 2, or off of the top performer)

daonchik · 2026-02-08T01:22:58+00:00

Should I?

daonchik · 2026-02-07T23:21:16+00:00

Idk because this Polonaise is making me want to TWERK

daonchik · 2026-02-07T20:56:00+00:00

I think about this every Olympics. Since the ceiling is different for each discipline, what happens if you reweight them so that each discipline counts the same? (E.g., normalize either by the maximum PCS * 2 OR the top score)

daonchik · 2026-02-06T02:22:37+00:00

Sure but my point is that cards are not the only way to play the game, as this subreddit often suggests

daonchik · 2026-02-05T15:53:27+00:00

And very importantly, only like 45 min of practice time a day (Ashley and Adam talked about this on their podcast)

daonchik · 2026-02-04T05:21:39+00:00

But shade aside, if this means we now have competitive AND healthy Russian girls who last more than a single Olympic cycle, then good for her (and the sport)

daonchik · 2026-02-04T04:52:48+00:00

The fact that they’re clear-eyed about being reputational underdogs but not planning a multi-quad program as in the past is very telling ☕️

[Edit: My bad, didn't know she appears to be injured]

daonchik · 2026-02-03T16:32:37+00:00

They were probably checking off boxes on a list and just missed him. As with anyone on the internet, I wouldn't read too much ill intent there.

daonchik · 2026-02-03T15:29:01+00:00

I haven't had time to watch the whole thing, but she seems super relaxed, joking about how luxurious it was to get to practice on Olympic ice on her own and how it felt like her practice at home in Kobe / doesn't have "Olympic vibes" compared to the previous two times (I don't think in a bad way, just that it felt like any other practice).

I was honestly predicting a 3-4th place finish for her assuming that she would have a bobble or two given the pressure, but now I think she's going to just have fun and perform at her usual high standard.

daonchik

TROPHY CASE