Defending ice dancing, the ISU and judging

[catorman]

--- In HPFGU-OTChatter at y..., "moongirlk" <moongirlk at y...> wrote:
> I so love whatever moderator came up with the idea for OT chatter - 
> how else would we get to discuss figure skating on an HP list?  YAY!
> 
> I have to leap to the defense of Ice Dancing as somebody (I 
honestly 
> meant to remember who so I could go back and find the quote) said 
> they thought it ought to be dropped from the olympics due to the 
> judging problems and that it's barely a sport, or something to that 
> effect.
> 
> I used to feel the same way.  Until I saw Torvil and Dean do their 
> stuff at Albertville - I think it was Albertville - is that when 
they 
> came out of retirement or whatever they call it?  I don't remember 
> much about T&D from before, other than a vague impression that they 
> wore a lot of purple, but when I watched them there I finally 
> appreciated having one branch of the sport that didn't revolve 
around 
> jumps.  Dude - have you ever seen their "Bolero" number?  Hubba 
hubba 
> wow!  Now they're not the sexiest looking couple of people in the 
> world, and off ice they seemed very sort of mundane, but when they 
> did Bolero... dear heavens - it was sex on ice!  I've never seen a 
> program, and hardly ever even a love scene in a movie, that was 
more 
> convincingly sexually charged, and yet at the same time it was 
> *definitely* a sport.  

I so agree with this!  All this ice dancing talk has brought back 
very bitter-sweet memories for me of watching Torville and 
Dean's "Lets Face the Music and Dance" routine, which I loved, and I 
was absolutely devasted when they didn't win the gold that year.  I 
watched it with friends and all of us were in floods of tears.  It 
has to be the only time ever I have been interested in the Olympics.

Catherine