kittyprincessofcats · 3 years ago
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My fucking villain origin story, istg.
Like holy shit, I mean... Imagine being Wakaba in this situation! Other people have said it before and I’ll say it again: Imagine narrowly missing out on the Olympics once, then spending the last few years being told you’re not good enough to keep up with the Russians, then spending all that time struggling and learning a 3A... and when you finally make it to the Olympics, land that 3A and skate the short program of your life there, you get scored almost 10 points behind a skater with the same program content, except that skater:
- has worse skating skills that you
- uses cheated jump technique
- isn’t nearly as good of a performer as you
- had two mistakes in their SP: stumbled and almost fell on the 3A landing and the combo looked really shaky, too
- and is literally proven to have doped.
Like holy shit, I’d be furious and I understand why Wakaba was furious. I know that Kamila’s always overscored to hell and back, her scores are literally in a whole new dimension of overscoring, but 82 with an almost-fall and that combo? I’m not trying to shame her for struggling under these circumstances, but there’s no way in hell that should be her score.
If this sport doesn’t go through some major reforms SOON, there’s literally no saving it.
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kittyprincessofcats · 3 years ago
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"You could bring up the Sotnikova vs. Yuna Kim thing from Sochi again, but we won't do that now - because Yuna Kim absolutely SHOULD have become an Olympic Champion for the second time there... but the thing took place in Sochi and not in Seoul."
- Siggi Heinrich, German Eurosport commentator
LOUDER FOR THE PEOPLE IN THE BACK
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kittyprincessofcats · 3 years ago
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“And that Anastasiia Shabotova of all people opens this short program, a former Russian skater who, in the ARD-documentary about Kamila Valieva and this doping topic said: ‘Yes, at our practices there are pills lying around everywhere’ - then she was made into a persona non grata [...] and changed skating federations, had to revoke her statements by the way, and on top of it all she now skates for Ukraine of all countries in an extremely heated-up political situation.”
- Siggi Heinrich, German Eurosport commentator
HOLY SHIT. I’m so glad they just openly talked about this! Daniel Weiss could never. Also, this is the kind of thing viewers should know!
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kittyprincessofcats · 3 years ago
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Also, I hate how because of this scandal, the attention is entirely on Kamila. Daniel Weiss literally won’t shut up about her in his commentary.
Can we, just for once, especially now that we know about the doping, actually pay attention to non-Russian athletes??? Can we talk about their qualities, their stories, their Olympic dreams for once?
It’s bad enough that they constantly get told they’re not enough and that they now have to compete in a game they know is rigged where they won’t even get a proper medal ceremony if they win... it makes me so angry.
And the thing is... for Russia, whether Kamila loses the medal in the long run doesn’t matter. She gets to have this moment now, and that’s what they care about. If the results get revoked later, Russia can make her their martyr figure who “unfairly lost her medal because other people were jealous” and the real medalists will never get the respect, admiration, attention, sponsorships, etc. they deserve. They’ll never get that moment on the Olympic podium. It’s so incredibly cruel to them and I wish commentators would talk about that for once. My heart goes out to every clean skater in this event.
(And to every skater who lost a medal to an Eteri girl EVER because they’ll never be recognized for the titles and medals they should have.)
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kittyprincessofcats · 3 years ago
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Back to watching THE SHITSHOW and...
Siggy Heinrich: “Everyone’s talking about Eteri’s coaching methods now, but you have to remember that Russian also just sounds very harsh to our [German] ears. You have to take that into account and be careful with what you say.”
OH HELL NO, WE’RE NOT DOING THAT. As someone who literally speaks Russian (and German, of course) - Piss all the way off with that excuse, Siggy! (It’s not even true? If anything, German’s known for sounding harsh?)
Also... when we call Eteri’s coaching abusive, we’re not talking about her tone? Does he think we haven’t read the interviews with her former students? That we haven’t heard about all their injuries? That we haven’t read Eteri’s own interviews? That we don’t know about the smelling salts or the weigh-ins, or how they weren’t allowed to drink water at the Olympics, or... I could go on, but then we’d be here all day.
Like... FFS, she literally doped (read: poisoned) her student and ruined the health of countless others! We are SO far past giving her the benefit of the doubt it’s not even funny.
I’m done with commentators, none of them are good.
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kittyprincessofcats · 3 years ago
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Questioning Wakaba’s SP score with Siggy Heinrich and Hendrik Schaumberger (German Eurosport commentators)
In the middle of Wakaba’s skate, when all those boxes went yellow:
Siggy: “They ran out of green color.”
Hendrik: “Yes.”
When replaying the 3A:
Hendrik: “Yes, that was fully around!”
Siggy: “Yes, what are they shilly-shallying for there? That was brilliant! It was fully rotated, you’re right! And so was that! [the combo]”
During the replay:
Siggy: “She once got almost 80 points for the SP. That of course won’t happen today, because today it seems the judges were all sat on thumbtracks and told not to score too highly or else. Shame. I feel like as a judge, you should sometimes have to courage to say: ‘Okay, that was genuinely amazing’.”
Before the score was shown:
Siggy: “There’s got to be 76-77 points here. There has to be.”
After the score was shown:
Siggy: “Look at that. They’ve deducted five points [of the technical score], Hendrik! Five points!
Hendrik: “I don’t really understand that.”
[...]
Siggy: “And the PCs, too... okay, I can agree with that, but technically? I mean, do we have tomatoes on our eyes*?
Hendrik: “Maybe at most it would have been the second jump in the combo... but even that wouldn’t cost this many points. I don’t know.”
-------
I wanted to scream “IT’S BECAUSE SHE HAS THE WRONG PASSPORT!” at them because commentators really should have realized how that works by now. I don’t know if they all just really don’t get how deeply corrupt this sport is by the way they’re surprised at this BS scoring.
[* fun little language lesson: “to have tomatoes on your eyes” = a German expression that basically means to be blind, but in a metaphorical sense - you use it when someone’s not seeing something very obvious.]
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kittyprincessofcats · 3 years ago
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Apparently Yi Zhu got a lot of hatred on social media after the team event and gosh, I feel so bad for her.
Imagine representing a country that just doesn’t have any really good women’s single skaters, having to be the person who does the team event, knowing you’re considered the weak link in that team and the weakest one of those women and going out there anyways - and then getting hated on for just trying your best and having a hard time under that pressure. If anything, that was incredibly brave of her and I feel awful knowing that she got hate for it.
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kittyprincessofcats · 3 years ago
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I finally caved... I subscribed to Eurosport Player again just so I wouldn’t have to listen to Daniel Weiss and his BS commentary about how “doping’s okay, actually” anymore. Literally should have done this from the beginning, or at the latest from the moment he first gushed about how NC should be scored even higher.
(Someone told me he’s apparently known Kamila’s family for years and is really good friends with her mom... That at least explains why he had the nerve to try and go “Maybe it really was her grandpa’s medication”. Doesn’t make it less scandalous to hear a straight-up doping defense from a former skater, but at least I now know why he’s defending the adults around Kamila: He’s buddies with her mom.)
That said, I’m not watching anything today anymore, it’s late and I desperately need sleep. Good luck in the free Wakaba & Kaori!!! I’m so sorry you’re not getting rewarded as you should be (especially Wakaba - Kaori’s score seemed fine on it’s own, just the Russians were overscored in comparison), but I hope you can have skates you’re proud of, even if everything else is getting stolen from you.
(And I’ll try not to think about Rika and how she should be here... and how in a fair world without corrupt judging, doping, and abusive coaches (looking at Hamada and Lambiel here!), this would be her moment to fight for that Olympic Gold and she’d be one of the favourites for it, too. I just watched another video where she talked about these Olympics being her dream and my heart broke all over again. Everyone gushes about the Russians, but no one cares about everyone else’s dream getting destroyed. Queen Yuna really said it best of them all.)
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kittyprincessofcats · 3 years ago
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You know, I was going to write a post about how out of the ET girls present I enjoyed Anna’s SP the most because she at least connects with the music and performs to it.
But you know what, NO. No, I’m done treating any of them like they’re valid competitors who should be here. Invesitgate that entire school for doping, introduce some reforms to make the judging fair, ban Russia from the Olympics until this shit doesn’t happen anymore, and then we can talk about Anna’s musicality.
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kittyprincessofcats · 3 years ago
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Trying to watch the women’s SP and... I can’t stomach what Daniel Weiss is doing this time.
“There were different opinons on Kamila being allowed to compete. Russia celebrated it, many people in sport were sceptical or strongly disagreed. Each one of these opinions is justified.”
No??? No literally not??? Thinking someone who is proven to have doped - whether that’s her fault or not - should be allowed to compete is in NO WAY EVER justified? Shut up??
And then he shared his “personal opinion” that Kamila is so great that she doesn’t need doping, that doping doesn’t help with figure skating anyways (NOT TRUE) and therefore it shouldn’t matter... holy fucking shit, these people all just literally don’t care, I’m going to kill something.
... Literally, does anyone have a different way to watch, I can’t stomach this.
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kittyprincessofcats · 3 years ago
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Mana, you did so well! 😭😭😭 Shame about the 3A!
(But you know how during the Men’s SP I said I wanted to punch Stéphane Lambiel in the face? Yeah, the same applies to Mie Hamada. Among all this Tutberidze drama, let’s please not forget she’s not the only abusive coach out there, far from it.)
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kittyprincessofcats · 3 years ago
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LET LOENA HENDRICKX SAY FUCK
Siggy is saying that “such a beautiful lady shouldn’t say words like that” and I’m going to turn him and Hendrik off now because that sexism annoys me.
(Also because watching without any commentary is superior anyways.)
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kittyprincessofcats · 3 years ago
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WAKABA 😭😭😭
1st Olympic moment to make me cry: Wakaba’s SP in the team event
2nd Olympic moment to make me cry: Seeing Donovan skate at the Olympics
3rd Olympic moment to make me cry: Wakaba’s SP in the individual event - more specifically, the exact moment she landed that 3A was when I started to cry.
AND WHAT A GORGEOUS 3A IT WAS!!! 😭😭 The height, the power with which she jumped into that... that was one of the most beautiful 3As I’ve ever seen!
The score was an absolute hate crime, of course. Lower than in the team event?? You know, where she had the same content but with a 2A?? Just mathematically, how does that even make sense?? She was absolutely right to be furious at the score and I’m glad I’ve seen so many people comment on how it should have been way higher. If she was Russian, this skate would have broken 80 easily. I’m sorry Wakaba, I’ll fight the judges for you 🔪
It’s just heartbreaking to see how there’s literally no winning here if you’re not Russian. Even if you skate flawlessly and bring those ultra-C elements, the judges will find something they can deduct points for. It’s a competely corrupt sport and to see that so clearly at the Olympics... it’s frustrating and it makes me wish we fans could do something to save this sport.
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kittyprincessofcats · 3 years ago
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So yeah... the top 2 after the SP absolutely should have been Wakaba and Kaori (not quite sure about the order, but I think I’d put Wakaba in first because of the 3A).
I’m so proud of both of them for skating so well under these circumstances!
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kittyprincessofcats · 3 years ago
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KAORI 😭😭😭
Kaori, thank you for being the light in this final group of darkness! What a beautiful skate, I’m so glad I got to watch that!
And this SP really grew on me. I didn’t really like it at first, but now I really enjoy it. And what a beautiful dress, too!
And her reaction to her score and placement literally broke me. Honey, you deserve that and more ❤️
(Honestly, I’d say Kaori’s score by itself was fine. It’s just that the Russians were scored too generously and Wakaba too strictly in comparison. But for Kaori’s skate by itself, I’d say the score was about right.)
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kittyprincessofcats · 3 years ago
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The announcers introducing Kamila and listing her past achievements, in particular that she’s the European and National champion, now that we know that she was 100% doped for both of those competitions feels... well, it feels a certain way.
(Also gosh, if I thought I wanted to deck Stéphane and Hamada in the face that doesn’t even get close to what I feel when I see Eteri, Dudakov and the choreography thief with his ugly, self-sufficient grin.)
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