Figure skating is full of bans and restrictions. The elements must be performed in a strictly defined manner, the program must be built according to the generally accepted scheme, the wardrobe must be reliable and not theatrical, otherwise the athletes will inevitably face a decrease in points. But, despite the strict regulation of figure skating, there is only one forbidden element in it – somersaults. A spectacular jump with a flip of the body in the air was legally performed in competitions by only one person: the American Terry Kubicka. The athlete wanted to bring something new to figure skating, but his zeal was not appreciated: in 1976, the somersault turned out to be against the rules.
So why was the one-turn element banned in figure skating? Is somersaulting really as difficult and dangerous a trick as commonly thought? And which of the skaters has this jump? We tell you about it in the special project of the “Championship” “Anatomy of a figure”.
How did somersaults appear and be banned in figure skating?
The first appearance of somersaults in figure skating is associated with the name Terry Kubicki. The athlete performed this trick at the 1976 U.S. Championships: having done all the jumping elements, Terry somersaulted, literally surprising the audience. The athlete wanted to bring something new to figure skating and promised to perform somersaults until he was forbidden to do so. A month later, Kubicka repeated the trick at the Innsbruck Olympics, and then at the 1976 World Championships. The risky element managed to become the hallmark of the American, but after the end of the season it was banned.
The ISU explained its decision by saying that somersaults on the ice are too dangerous. The officials also had another argument: in their opinion, the jump, which migrated to figure skating from acrobatics, violated the aesthetics of the sport. Kubicka himself is inclined to believe that the ISU simply did not understand how to evaluate this element.
There is no single version of why somersaults are banned, but many experts insist on the danger of the trick. A fall from a somersault, especially on ice, can cost a skater not only their health, but also their life.
Anatoly Slastin
Ice acrobat
“If you fall from a somersault on the ground, then you have some chance of survival. It will be difficult to do this on the ice, because there is speed and it is still ice, the fall cannot be mitigated in any way.
Suriya Bonaly is the only one who dared to do somersaults after the ban
After the ban on somersaults, only one person dared to perform this trick in competitions – this is Surya Bonaly. The French figure skater unsuccessfully skated the short program at the Nagano Olympics, and at the beginning of the free skating made a fall. Suriya realized that he had no chance of a pedestal, so he decided to impress the audience with somersaults. The judges, of course, did not forgive the skater for such audacity, removing 0.2 points from both evaluations (then there was a six-point scoring system. – Approx. “Championship”). As a result, Bonaly ranked only 10th. But it wasn’t just desperation over impending defeat that led the Frenchwoman to take risks. There was also a protest part at the Surya rally:
“When you’re black, you have to be way above any white opponent. And I was not only a black skater, but also a black woman. If a man did such a thing, everyone would say, “He acted like a real man.” I went down in history as an athlete who, having lost her mind, took an unreasonable risk. I hope that one day my act will be appreciated, as a contribution to the development of figure skating.
Unfortunately or fortunately, Bonaly’s antics did not force the ISU to revise the rules and lift the ban on somersaults. But she brought great fame to the figure skater. Even now, 25 years after the Nagano Olympics, a video of Bonaly’s bold leap is going viral online.
Despite the popularity of the somersault brought to the brave Frenchwoman, after her no one dared to go against the rules. Perhaps the fact that the loss of points due to an element prohibited under the new rating system really plays a role. Not only will the skater be fined two points, but the element during which the somersault was performed (e.g. the step track) will be identified as an element of the basic level. Consequently, the athlete will lose much more than just two points. So no one wants to take risks. In addition, for everything forbidden there is a place for the gala and in the show.
Related Articles
Somersaults of protest. Why a Black Figure Skater Caused a Scandal at the Olympics
Which of the skaters makes lard?
Only the beautiful skating and jumps of several turns in the demonstration performances will not surprise anyone, so some skaters try to delight the audience only with somersaults. This trick was shown in his numbers by Keegan Messing and Javier Fernandez, and Nathan Chen performed a cascade of quad jumps and somersaults.
In Russia, the jump with a somersault in the air in different variations is performed by ice acrobats Grigory Zabello and Anatoly Slastin. And Semyon Rogozhnikov does somersaults in the show on the boat.
Mastering this element, according to skaters, is not so difficult. You must first learn it on the floor, then test it on the ice with insurance, and only then can you enter the jump yourself. The main thing is not to be afraid.
Gregorio Zabello
Ice acrobat
“The first rule when you learn acrobatics is that you should never change your mind. If you go to the element, then it should already be done, because if you change your mind, then the consequences can be very bad. We had a moment, a man somersaulted with a machine cable, we secured it, and he changed his mind halfway, lowered his head and almost reached the top of his head. We kept it, we gave it back, but you can never do that at all. If you change your mind, consider yourself already crashed on the ice.
As for the somersault, I can say that it is much more difficult to do it on the ground than on the ice. On ice, it’s easier for you because of the speed of movement: you push and jump from the pick. And on the floor, you just jump out of your seat. It’s much more energy-intensive.”
Semyon Rogozhnikov began to learn somersaults immediately on the ice, and was disappointed by the lack of understanding of the technique of performing the element. The first attempt without insurance (captured in the video below) almost cost the skater a serious injury. The second time it was morally difficult to enter the element on his own, but Semyon did not give up and still finished the somersault in the first training session. In total, it took him 45 minutes to master the trick.
Semyon Rogozhnikov
Figure skater on the boat
“I dreamed of jumping somersaults, I watched a lot of videos, before going to bed I imagined how I ran and took off on the ice. In general, everyone begins to learn somersaults on the ground, and only then transfers them to the ice. But they hit me on the head: I decided I would jump immediately on the ice. I took a belt, put it on my stomach, I had ropes on the sides, two people held them and secured me. I tried five times with the insurance, and then decided to enter the element myself.
I was very scared, many thoughts were spinning in my head. I drove for about 15-20 minutes, ran and went through the element. But then I recovered, I thought, “I wasn’t!” I accelerated, flew, started rolling and opened early, when my legs were on top. And it fell on the ice in a layer. My legs trembled with fear and shock, and I asked the boys a few more times to secure me. So I decided to try again myself, and I did!
In our circle, no one did somersaults and couldn’t even think of such an element, and then I learned such a crazy thing in 45 minutes.
It is difficult to compare the development of somersaults with the study of any jump in figure skating, because the element is performed on a completely different plane.
“When jumping, the rotation takes place around its axis to the left or right, and in somersaults, the other way around. A slightly different feeling, you can’t compare it at all,” explains Anatoly Slastin.
“Somersaults are a complete sensation.Different from flying, at first you don’t understand what’s going on at all. A person who at first only made jumps will be very unusual, at least for the first time. This is a completely different understanding of jumping, flying, turning, everything is different,” adds Grigory Zabello.
However, if you still master the somersault, then it may be easier for the skater than any other jump.
“A somersault is easier than a toe lasso, for example, because you still need to land on one foot in a sheepskin coat. For me, the somersault now, like a flip, in principle, I don’t apply special energy costs to do it,” says Slastin.
However, unlike jumps, somersaults are not performed on various turns on the ice.
“No one has ever done a double somersault on ice. In theory, it is possible, but in practice … We know a man who came in, but he didn’t like it. And he didn’t do anything else,” Zabello said.
The most dangerous variation of somersaults on ice.
But there are other no less spectacular variations of somersaults on ice. Perhaps the riskiest way to show this trick is to jump on a person. To do this, you must have as much confidence as possible in yourself and your element, because a somersault through a person is, without exaggeration, a deadly trick.
“It can be scary to do somersaults through a person. It depends on how much the person is dear to me (smiles). The first time I did somersaults was through my girlfriend Lisa. Of course, he was worried. And she also survives, but she trusted me. And I jumped. At first I tried it through a jacket, I saw that there was such a distance that you could go down to three people. But it’s still scary to do somersaults through a person: you can stick a skate directly into a person. All kinds of thoughts creep into my head, but I throw them away, I don’t think about the bad. I just take it and do it,” admits Semyon Rogozhnikov.
“For me, the most important thing is not to kill a person who somersaults. But in general, how I drive: I pick up speed, accelerate, look at where the person lies and measure the approximate time, the distance in my head, where I need to put my foot, push. I will hardly be able to land on a person, because my legs are so far away from the person lying down. If I didn’t feel anything soft under me when I pushed, then everything is fine,” says Anatoly Slastin.
What does the person who is jumping during this trick feel? Gregory Zabello responds:
“When they do somersaults through me, I don’t think about anything at all, I just lie and see Tolya fly over me. When we perform in a show, I usually look at the audience. It’s a fleeting moment, you’re lying there and nothing is going through your head.”
Anatoly Slastin and Grigory Zabello
Photo: Dmitry Golubovich, “Championship”
How traumatic is a somersault? And should it be allowed back into figure skating?
Judging by the stories of our experts, somersaults are not a very difficult element to learn that can be learned in a short time. Another question is: how dangerous is it? Figure skating is generally not a health sport. Athletes break arms, legs, backs in jumps. There are cases when, after falling from the emissions, children ended up in intensive care, lost sight, smell and hearing. So can somersaults make figure skating even more dangerous? All-Russian category judge Vladislav Mirzoev thinks so.
Vladislav Mirzoev
All-Russian category judge
“It’s hard to believe, but after all, somersaults are actually much more traumatic than quad jumps and throws. Still, in somersaults, rotation takes place around the horizontal axis, and in jumps and ejections, around vertically.
In fact, the main trick of somersaults is to learn how to do this element qualitatively. If this can be done, then the probability of injury will be small. Anatoly Slastin has been performing somersaults for four years, and during this period he has never been injured by it:
“I never, on the ground or on the ice, had anything. Somehow, so far, she does it without him. The only thing is that I landed on my face once with a somersault, but this is due to my own stupidity.
Gregory Zabello was a little less fortunate:
“I had an injury due to somersaults. I landed badly, my shoes broke and I hurt my foot,I saw a crack.”
Anatoly Slastin and Grigory Zabello
Photo: Dmitry Golubovich, “Championship”
Semyon Rogozhnikov, in the process of studying and improving the element, more than once found bugs that led to damage. The skater has an impressive list of injuries due to somersaults:
“I fell well on my tailbone a couple of times. He turned the somersault, landed on his heels, and then on the tailbone. On the boat, I usually crashed into the side, as there is not enough space. Recently I wanted to relearn somersaults, improve and jump with my legs straight in the air. Well, I landed again in a layer, because I didn’t twist it. I landed so that my arm was turned upside down. My shoulder hurts now, it takes a long time to heal.”
But I’m glad our heroes have never found themselves in situations where a somersault could endanger their lives. And in open sources there is no information that this jump on the ice was disastrous for anyone. And this still allows us to ask the question: isn’t it worth allowing somersaults in figure skating again? We asked our heroes about this, and they turned out to be categorical.
“I don’t think somersaults should be allowed. Most likely, it would have started as with quadruple jumps: children would have started teaching it, and this is very traumatic, and not all, probably, could have done it. As Grisha said, this is a completely different understanding of skating,” says Anatoly Slastin.
“Also, figure skating has more to do with aesthetics. And the somersault doesn’t look so aesthetically pleasing, it doesn’t really fit into figure skating. Still, figure skating is more like a ballet, and somersaults don’t really fit its image,” adds Grigory Zabello.
I agree with the ice acrobats and Semyon Rogozhnikov:
“Is it worth allowing somersaults in figure skating? And why? Somersaults are a spectacular trick, and the tricks have to be done in a show.
What can surprise skaters if not somersaults?
However, if skaters still want to add to their PRogram spectacular stunts, they can turn to the wheel. In recent years, this element has just gained great popularity. The wheel was used in Evgeny Medvedev’s “Cirque du Soleil” program – it was an important semantic element of his production. This trick was also shown by Rika Kihira on the show “Fire Within”. Dancers Maria Kazakova and Georgy Revia surprised the audience with a synchronous interpretation of the wheel with support in one hand, and Frenchman Kevin Aymoz ended the performance with an element more akin to a somersault: he made the wheel with the help of a sharp jump.
Evgenia Medvedeva
Photo: RIA Novosti
The wheel is a much safer element for execution on ice, so the rules do not prohibit it. In addition, it does not spoil the aesthetics of figure skating: in all these cases, this trick made the programs more spectacular and diverse. But this does not mean that the wheel should now be introduced into productions everywhere. Vladislav Mirzoev believes that only virtuoso skaters can perform it.
“The wheel is definitely a less traumatic element, there is a support at the time of its execution, respectively, there is no way to avoid a serious fall, especially in the head. Although, of course, there are unpleasant situations here. I can say with certainty that even the wheel should be performed only by those skaters who rely on sliding skills and who have well-developed coordination skills,” Mirzoev said.
Previous issues of the special project:
