No Grand Prix Final leaves competitive questions unanswered - and some uncertainty about upcoming competitions

Nathan Chen after winning the 2019 Grand Prix Final with a total score that remains the highest ever. Chen would have been after a fourth straight title in the figure skating event this week in Osaka, Japan had it not been cancelled for Covid-related reasons. (ISU photo)

I love figure skating’s Grand Prix Final.  It has six elite entries in each senior discipline, based on qualifying from results on the six-event Grand Prix circuit.  No competition session lasting more than an hour, unlike the three-plus-hour sessions at the Olympics and World Championships.  And over the years, many stunning performances and record scores.

So, like all those who are interested in the sport, I was disappointed by the Covid-related cancellation of the event scheduled to begin Thursday in Osaka, Japan.

It is the second straight year the global pandemic has led to the Grand Prix Final being cancelled. Last season, the entire series was changed to domestic-only events.

This one would have let us see whether Nathan Chen, invincible from the 2018 Olympics until finishing third at Skate America in October, could win a fourth straight GPF title and reestablish himself as the clear favorite for the upcoming Beijing Olympics.  And whether the latest Russian female phenom, Kamila Valieva, could continue her record-setting dominance.  And whether the evergreen Chinese pair, Sui Wenjing and Han Cong, could hold off the top Russians.  And whether French ice dancers Gabriella Papadakis and Guillaume Cizeron would gain a winning edge over their top rivals before Beijing.

Those questions will go unanswered for the time being. And that leaves questions about competitions to come.

The Japanese government reacted to the new Omicron variant by erring on the side of caution in imposing tougher entry restrictions to the country, and those restrictions are among the complications that compelled the Japanese Skating Federation to say it no longer could host the Grand Prix Final.  The International Skating Union said it would evaluate having it at the end of the season, but few believe there will be any incentive to do after a season with both an Olympics and World Championships.

Whether Japan may have overreacted or acted too hastily is irrelevant.  Its government decided, in good faith and with common sense, that protecting the health of its entire citizenry was just a little more important than ensuring a figure skating event could go on as planned.  As a fully vaccinated and boosted person of a certain age who remains on edge about Covid, I certainly appreciate and agree with Japan’s concern.

Some critics have said the International Skating Union should have had a backup plan for such a cancellation, but there was no reason to expect one would be needed – and even knowing that Covid remains a problem for all sports events, it is impossible to have a backup plan for everything.

After all, the NHK Trophy Grand Prix event took place without issues in Tokyo less than a month ago.  And Omicron, with all the uncertainties about its virulence, transmissibility and potential resistance to current vaccines, was not on anyone’s radar until 10 days before the first scheduled practice in Osaka.  At that point, there were too many moving parts to shift the event to another country on such short notice.

The timing was similar to that of the original Covid outbreak, which forced cancellation of the 2020 World Championships in Montreal.

Perhaps we will know in a few weeks that Omicron has not changed the Covid picture substantially.  Or perhaps the worst-case scenarios about it will come true.

But don’t be surprised if there are more cancellations before having those answers, because earlier forms of the virus are causing surges of cases in parts of Europe and North America.

The ISU announced Tuesday that the German Skating Association no longer could be host (in Dresden) of the European Short Track Skating Championships Jan. 14-16 because of the “complicated epidemic situation.”  The Dutch federation offered to take over the event (in Dordrecht) but “the sanitary restrictions made this relocation impossible.”

The European Figure Skating Championships and Four Continents Figure Skating Championships (moved from China) are to take place in Tallinn, Estonia in successive January weeks (Jan. 10-16 and 18-23).  Daily Covid cases in Estonia have declined substantially in the month since a Nov. 3 peak - but the drop was before Omicron became a factor, and they ticked up by some 80 percent between Monday and Tuesday.

The Chinese Skating Association announced last week an indefinite postponement of its figure skating national championships to “effectively protect the health of athletes, coaches, referees, staff and the people, according to the latest requirements for epidemic prevention and control.”  China previously had given up its host roles for a 2021 Grand Prix event and the 2022 Four Continents event for similar reasons.

The Beijing Olympics now are less than two months away.  It is hard to imagine them being cancelled or postponed, given China’s chest puffing over being host of the Winter Games, but who would have thought the 2020 Tokyo Summer Games would be postponed to 2021 only 24 days after the organizing committee had emphatically said in early March 2020 that preparations were continuing as planned?

Yet the International Olympic Committee, showing its characteristic hubris, simply rejected the possibility the 2022 Winter Games could be postponed because of the impact of the new Covid variant.  Juan Antonio Samaranch, head of the IOC commission overseeing preparations, said “the answer is no” to a question about postponement during a Tuesday press conference.

The IOC should know better than anyone that global events simply can overtake even the biggest global sporting events.