Here's some info from Olympic judge Ole-Kristian Strom about the judging that went down: (yea, I sound like I dick. I fully never expected anyone other than the regulars here to read it or reply to it.)
It's in the comments to the article about the Steele Spence interview, but it's a complete mess. So here are the bits that might be interesting to read (I didn't include the me being a dick bits before hand that add nothing to this).
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Me:
While you're here, can you explain to me why Alex Bellemare got a 64.2 on his first run in qualification?
sw4 to sw
sw 1 on hip
4 to sw
sw 2 pretz 4
rodeo 7
left dub 10
right dub 12
sw left 12
All clean, all stomped, not off early on any rail. Then watch a ton of other runs (like Magnusson and Buratti) who all made serious mistakes coming off rails early and missing grabs and not as tech tricks and still scored higher.
How does that even happen?
His run was very clearly better than people who scored in the 80's. Would he have scored that much better if he had done that same run later in the comp?
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OleKr:
On the sw 1 he completely misses the grab, Backseat landing on the Rodeo 7 and the two first jumps is slightly under rotated... We had to hammer mistakes hard on this course and did our best. Its hard to sit back home in front of the Tv watching a comp and look at it the same was at the judges who are looking for those small mistakes that can affect the final score. With those mistakes you affect two out of 5 criterias. As Steele said in the podcast those scores is for the ranking. Its not about those points. Its the final ranking wich is the main point. Its not given what is an 70´s, 80´s or 90´s run. Its the judges tool to fit al athletes in the right position.
Things goes fast and as an judge you dont have a lot of time to review everything trough a run or evaluate each run for 5 min so you have to go trough what you see, look trough the criteria and compare with other runs in 30-60 sec time.
Check out where you can take a judging clinic and be a part og the sport as an judge! That way you can help out improve judging, judging systems and help pushing the sport in the direction you and the athletes want to see it!
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Me:
I mean, the closest score to Bellemare is Henshaw who got a 64 with a revert on a landing.
Bellemare had just as technical (way better rails) and no massive mistakes like that.
CBC puts an ad over Magnussons first run so I can't see it to compare but I remember being outraged at that one.
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OleKr:
No dubt Bellemares run was really technical and definitely on the rails! We dont disagree on that at all!
Im not at home and dont have my stenos here and haven't had time to review the comp after the olympics yet since I'm on a busy schedule so its hard to answer all questions! (Did look trough mens Pipe finals on my way home) Hopefully i get time to review all of the olympics and go trough my stenos one more time to double check everything! But i feel confident that the right 12 got in to finals and that the final ranking was right after our discussions after the competitions while we where in Korea! Some super tight calls for sure that could have gone either ways, but in the end it feels right.
Its a sport without set points for tricks or how a run or trick should look like who makes our sport unique compared to other judged sports and also keeps our sport Progress and move in new directions! A judged sport will alway make discussions and people will alway sit back home with questions about how they judged the competition why this skier didn't score as high as this skier.... Its always important to remember that the judges that are picked out to do that job most likely looks a little different on the runs that you do from home and sees smal details that you dont recognize.
We do this because we love the sport and have a huge passion for it! Not because we get famous or paid well. The payment is shitty and we often get shit but we keep on doing this to try to help the sport in the right direction. The athletes spends all their time trying their best to improve, to be the best skiers and to progress the sport! They deserve fair judging and all judges around the world that are part of the World Cup, X-Games, Dew Tour,other big events and even on all the local event around the world always work hard to do their best and to judge as fair as possible even if you guys siting back home not always agrees with us!
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Me:
Thanks for the clarifications. I can't reply to what I want to here so this is a very disorganized conversation.
So I totally agree the correct top 12 got in, but the massive inconsistencies in the scores still just don't make sense. Like ok, so you justify why Bellemare got 64. Using that justification, how is it possible that Magnassun and Buratti got better scores with way less tech runs and far more and larger mistakes? How does Henshaw do a revert (that kills a run totally) as well as other mistakes and also gets a similar score? Like as much as you justify Bellemare's score, the same just doesn't make sense for the others. It's the inconsistency that really gets me.
I fully appreciate that scores are all relative and you don't want to throw in a big score right away. Which btw, is totally contradicted by Shaun White's scoring:
x-games a couple years ago: we don't want to give Scotty James higher than 98 since there's still one competitor left so we want to give room in case it's a better run.
Olympics: Gives Shaun White a 98.5 with 14 competitors left (in qualifiers).
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Me:
Also I think everyone would love to hear the reasoning behind Ferdinand's score.
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OleKr:
Ferdinan´s score is pretty easy. It was an insane run who would have been up there in the podium discussion for sure he, could have gone all the way to the top but early of a rail and totally missing the tail on his switch right dub 14. It might look like he has it but he never gets the grab, but has his hand close to the tail all the way trough the rotation. Thats why... When we spoke with him after the comp he seemed fine with that. Again His run and a couple of other runs that peopler have been "screaming" about got robbed in the forums has those missed grabs and close to crash landings that it seems like people home dont see... if we had sucked at our judging rewarding those runs making them get podiums or close to podiums we would definitely got yelled at both from athletes, coaches and on the forums... And i guess since we see those mistakes we are getting these jobs and keeps on doing this after the Olympics even if we are the worst judges ever...