Not always easy to figure out figure-skating scoring

Spokane is about become the focus of the subjective world of international figure skating.

Some of the world’s best skaters, including three reigning world champions, will descend on the Lilac City to battle next weekend in the first-ever continent-based team competition called the Team Challenge Cup.

Every time a skater or skating pair takes the ice, they will open their display of skill and beauty to panels of experienced judges and technicians. But much of the viewing public likely will not know very much about how the competition is decided.

“I think the hardest part for making it completely fan-friendly is just the level of detail,” said Juliet Newcomer, who is the director of technical services for U.S. Figure Skating. “Unless you are on the panel and want to work your brain really hard, most average fans are not going to figure out the level of each spin or whether a jump is fully rotated.”

For decades, figure skating used a single panel of judges and the 6.0 scoring system. Under that scenario, the judges decided everything from the skater’s technical ability to required jumps and presentation.

But that all changed following a scandal in which two French officials were found to have colluded to fix the results of the pairs event at the 2002 Winter Games in Salt Lake City.

As a result, the sport in 2004 adopted the International Judging System, which added a technical panel to assist the judges. Under the new scoring system, the judges continue to grade the overall presentation and artistic displays by the skaters.

But it added technicians whose jobs are to determine whether a skater completed enough rotations for a jump with four complete rotations, called a quad, or if the skater failed to execute the jump and should instead be graded as a triple. And if there is a question, it all goes to a video review.

“They broke up the jobs,” Newcomer said. “The judges can get into more detail about how they are grading. And the technical panel can get into more detail about how they are assessing difficulty.”

Rewarding difficulty

At one time, skaters often specialized their routines and perfected certain moves that they would repeat several times during a routine to give themselves an advantage.

For instance, Olympic and world champion Scott Hamilton said he started his famous back flip, which isn’t considered one of the required elements, because one of his early competitors did it.

Over time, skating officials developed a standardized list of jumps, spins and lifts that all competitors must incorporate into their routines to give them a baseline for comparison.

But to score those jumps and spins, officials have come up with numerical values for each. For instance, judges give a triple toe loop jump a base value of 4.3. But they give the same toe loop jump a base value of 10.3 if the skater can complete four rotations in the air to make it a quad.

Judges then determine the skater’s grade of execution. That means they decide how well the skater incorporated the jump into the routine and how the skater performed and landed the move. Judges can give or take away points based on how poorly or well the skater completed the jump.

“That’s where I think it gets confusing for the average fan,” Newcomer said. “It looks like a clean, beautiful program, but they score lower because of some elements had lower levels of difficulty. That’s where that controversy comes in. It gets into the different opinions about what is more valuable.”

Using the same toe loop jump as an example, if a skater falls during a quad attempt and gets a four-point deduction, they still would score a 6.3. However, if the skater lands a perfect triple toe loop, the most points he or she could get are 6.4, she said.

“The system is trying to encourage people to go for difficulty,” she said. “But, we don’t want people doing eight jumps they can’t land and not rotating on any of them. If you really can’t do it, you are going to get penalized for trying.”

Subjecting fans to the subjective

Ramsey Baker, director of marketing for U.S. Figure Skating, said he understands how many fans still yearn for the days of the 6.0 scoring system.

“I actually feel the (new) system makes more sense,” he said. “When you undergo change, one that had the long history that we had, there is always going to be second guessing.”

Hamilton, who will be the broadcast host for CBS, said even he had trouble adjusting to the change.

“I resisted the scoring system and I’m in the business,” Hamilton said. “Imagine how the average fan feels like.”

But the system, which puts a premium on pushing skaters to attempt the hardest moves, helps the sport, he said.

“Change is hard, especially with something as iconic as the old scoring system,” Hamilton said. “But the more difficult the program … the better the skate.”

Skating officials have worked with television partners who add new graphics listing the required elements so viewers can more easily follow how they are being scored.

“There are intricacies on the levels of spins, but the explosive maneuvers – the jumps – (viewers) will be able to tell success over failure,” Hamilton said. “I think they are learning how … to kind of pick up the language.”

Newcomer also pointed out that the IJS system produces a score sheet, called a protocol, that they immediately put online so that fans can look to see how judges scored the routine.

“It’s basically a report card. They get a lot of feedback,” she said. “It shows the elements that were called and how the judges viewed them. But in the 6.0 system, unless you talked to judge, you really would not know why he ranked Tara Lipinski ahead of Michelle Kwan.”

Regardless of the numerical values, panels of judges, technicians and video review, the sport will always come down to subjective opinions.

“We have very passionate fans,” Newcomer said. “Whenever skaters are close, you are going to have people who feel strongly both ways and probably within the judging panel itself. Under any system we use, I think there are going to be disputes.”