- 注册
- 2002-10-07
- 消息
- 402,179
- 荣誉分数
- 76
- 声望点数
- 0
OTTAWA — Elvis Stojko admits it’s not a popular idea, but says it anyway:“Figure skating is not a sport. It’s a highly skilled form of athletic entertainment.”
OK, now that the winner of seven Canadian men’s championships, three world titles and two Olympic silver medals has everyone’s attention, let him explain.
A sport can be measured, Stojko says, but while a small section of figure skating can be measured to a degree, it’s generally subjective.
What about boxing, he’s asked? It, too, is an athletic activity in which judging frequently determines winners and losers. That’s true, Stojko allows, but at least a boxer could control the outcome by subduing his opponent before the judges filled out scorecards.
Skating’s biggest problem is the scoring system that takes the “magic” out of it, he adds. Moving from the practice of deducting points from a perfect mark of 6.0 for flaws to a formula based on points for various manoeuvres and skaters’ ability to execute them has created a copycat skating world in which far too many programs look alike.
“Coaches, choreographers and athletes are pulling out their hair because they have made it so complicated,” Stojko says in a telephone interview from the practically brand-new home he and wife Gladys Orozco have bought near Peterborough, Ont.
Stojko is now 44 and 19 years past his last world championship, but he’s still a brand name in figure skating, part of a Skate Canada mentorship program and once again a cast member of Investors Group Stars on Ice, which visits Canadian Tire Centre in Ottawa on the second of 12 stops on a sea-to-sea tour.
He’s also still confident in his abilities, saying devotion to training and a good diet would allow him to compete with the 21st century athletes half his age, but he doesn’t want to do that. Mostly it sounds as if he doesn’t want to do all that training again.
“I went through it already,” Stojko says. “I did the whole process, but I want to do other things.”
That list has included not only performing on stage in Chicago The Musical in Toronto in 2014 and in the 2016 made-for-TV movie Ice Girls, but also racing Go-Karts. Stojko finished third in the Rotax DD2 masters division of the 2015 Canadian championships at Bowmanville, Ont., and second in the same division of the U.S. Open at Las Vegas.
Now, though, he’s planning a hiatus from racing because there’s a load of landscaping required for that nearly new house. It could take a while, though, because Stars on Ice is on tour until May 21 at Victoria.
It has been a decade since Stojko last skated with this troupe, so why do it now?
“Because I can,” he says. “My body feels good. I’m in shape.
“I don’t slot myself in as 44. I’m still doing stuff I did when I was in my 20s, (quadruple toe loops) and that stuff. I’ll try it on the tour for fun.”
He applauds today’s athletes for taking training to another level beyond what it was in his day, but Stojko is also envious of the lighter boots and blades they use even as he laments the scoring system that, according to him, makes one footwork sequence look the same as the next.
Even so, he says it still belongs on the world’s biggest stage.
“Skating should be at the Olympics because it’s an entertainment value and it’s very difficult. It’s one of the most difficult activities on the planet. We make it look easy because that’s our job.”
Something that isn’t his job is governing the world of figure skating. If he could, though, Stojko would restore the old scoring system while implementing what he describes as a simple solution to prevent the kind of judging controversy that led to the change in the first place: the 2002 Salt Lake City Winter Olympics, when Canadian pairs skaters Jamie Salé and David Pelletier were only promoted into a share of gold with their Russian counterparts after many loud protests about the actions of a French judge.
Penalize the national skating federation, not just the judge, Stojko says. If one judge misbehaves, ban all judges from that country from international competition for a period of time.
It’s not all that different, he says, from the way competitive entries are distributed. A country with a medallist in a particular discipline receives three spots in the next world championship, those with top-10 results receive two and other nations only get one.
“That,” Stojko concludes, “would fix things up really quick.”
gholder@postmedia.com
Twitter.com/HolderGord
查看原文...
OK, now that the winner of seven Canadian men’s championships, three world titles and two Olympic silver medals has everyone’s attention, let him explain.
A sport can be measured, Stojko says, but while a small section of figure skating can be measured to a degree, it’s generally subjective.
What about boxing, he’s asked? It, too, is an athletic activity in which judging frequently determines winners and losers. That’s true, Stojko allows, but at least a boxer could control the outcome by subduing his opponent before the judges filled out scorecards.
Skating’s biggest problem is the scoring system that takes the “magic” out of it, he adds. Moving from the practice of deducting points from a perfect mark of 6.0 for flaws to a formula based on points for various manoeuvres and skaters’ ability to execute them has created a copycat skating world in which far too many programs look alike.
“Coaches, choreographers and athletes are pulling out their hair because they have made it so complicated,” Stojko says in a telephone interview from the practically brand-new home he and wife Gladys Orozco have bought near Peterborough, Ont.
Stojko is now 44 and 19 years past his last world championship, but he’s still a brand name in figure skating, part of a Skate Canada mentorship program and once again a cast member of Investors Group Stars on Ice, which visits Canadian Tire Centre in Ottawa on the second of 12 stops on a sea-to-sea tour.
He’s also still confident in his abilities, saying devotion to training and a good diet would allow him to compete with the 21st century athletes half his age, but he doesn’t want to do that. Mostly it sounds as if he doesn’t want to do all that training again.
“I went through it already,” Stojko says. “I did the whole process, but I want to do other things.”
That list has included not only performing on stage in Chicago The Musical in Toronto in 2014 and in the 2016 made-for-TV movie Ice Girls, but also racing Go-Karts. Stojko finished third in the Rotax DD2 masters division of the 2015 Canadian championships at Bowmanville, Ont., and second in the same division of the U.S. Open at Las Vegas.
Now, though, he’s planning a hiatus from racing because there’s a load of landscaping required for that nearly new house. It could take a while, though, because Stars on Ice is on tour until May 21 at Victoria.
It has been a decade since Stojko last skated with this troupe, so why do it now?
“Because I can,” he says. “My body feels good. I’m in shape.
“I don’t slot myself in as 44. I’m still doing stuff I did when I was in my 20s, (quadruple toe loops) and that stuff. I’ll try it on the tour for fun.”
He applauds today’s athletes for taking training to another level beyond what it was in his day, but Stojko is also envious of the lighter boots and blades they use even as he laments the scoring system that, according to him, makes one footwork sequence look the same as the next.
Even so, he says it still belongs on the world’s biggest stage.
“Skating should be at the Olympics because it’s an entertainment value and it’s very difficult. It’s one of the most difficult activities on the planet. We make it look easy because that’s our job.”
Something that isn’t his job is governing the world of figure skating. If he could, though, Stojko would restore the old scoring system while implementing what he describes as a simple solution to prevent the kind of judging controversy that led to the change in the first place: the 2002 Salt Lake City Winter Olympics, when Canadian pairs skaters Jamie Salé and David Pelletier were only promoted into a share of gold with their Russian counterparts after many loud protests about the actions of a French judge.
Penalize the national skating federation, not just the judge, Stojko says. If one judge misbehaves, ban all judges from that country from international competition for a period of time.
It’s not all that different, he says, from the way competitive entries are distributed. A country with a medallist in a particular discipline receives three spots in the next world championship, those with top-10 results receive two and other nations only get one.
“That,” Stojko concludes, “would fix things up really quick.”
gholder@postmedia.com
Twitter.com/HolderGord
查看原文...
