I applaud the Canadian ice dancing pair for taking over 1st place heading into the final round, but I have to say that I can't stand ice dancing. While I am not a natural figure skating fan, I appreciate the difficulty of throwing your partner spinning into the air and landing the trick. That you can't jump in ice dancing ruins it for me. It is comparable to creating a sport that is basketball, except with the rule that you can't jump. You'd get a bunch of white guys passing the ball around without the excitement of slamming and jamming.
Despite my hockey roots, playing it my entire life and my father playing it professionally, I can watch figure skating. Many of those tricks are breathtaking in their difficulty and I respect the skill required to land them. Ice dancing is just two people screwing with clothes and skates on, without the extreme difficulty of figure skating. I watch a quadruple sow cow in awe. I watch ice dancing and think, these are just the figure skaters who can't land jumps. Why not have ski racing for skiers that can't go fast? Let's have contact and non-contact hockey. Why can't we add bobsled without the running start? Why not take any sport that we love, gut what makes it challenging, and create a new less difficult sport?
To me, that's ice dancing.
Why not take any sport that we love, gut what makes it challenging, and create a new less difficult sport?
ReplyDeleteSort of like figure skating in general. Despite the criticism for saying it, Elvis Stoyko was right on the money with how the new judging rules for figure skating are taking the athleticism out of it. It's now basically solo ice dancing. Bring back the quads!
A yes the Harrison Bergeron hockey team. all skaters must be chained to a rock. There's a few sports like that in the summer Olympics, equestrian comes to mind; I mean shouldn't the horses get the medals they are doing all the work.
ReplyDeleteCoffee_guy
Except the best figure skaters would probably suck at ice dance. Because they're completelly different sports. One isn't more or less difficult, just different.
ReplyDeleteIts basically the difference between gymnastics and dancing.
Figure skating = gymnastics with skates.
Ice dance = dancing with skates.
Nobody goes up to somebody doing the tango and says "wow that's impressive but where's the backflips ??"
Shadow above said it best. I would not want to see jumps in ice dancing. Ice dancing is all about grace and beauty and co-ordination.
ReplyDeleteI think my mother is mildly upset at me for dumping on her favourite Olympic sport. But sometimes you have to defy your parents and speak your mind. Ice dancing sucks, in my opinion. I will not demand its removal from the Olympics because a lot of people do enjoy it, but you can't tell me they are of comparable difficulty. Jumping way up in the air, spinning, then landing is much tougher than grinding your pelvis on your partner's thigh.
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