Tonya Harding in 1986 Skate America | Golden Skate

Tonya Harding in 1986 Skate America

hydroradi

Rinkside
Joined
Mar 27, 2004
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Kathleen

Rinkside
Joined
Aug 18, 2003
2 things struck me as I watched that clip:

The first........that hair!!! OMG! LOL

The second thing was the energy level at the end of her program. Wow. I guess that was before she started smoking, etc......

She had such potential!!!
 

JonnyCoop

Record Breaker
Joined
Dec 28, 2003
Kathleen said:
The first........that hair!!! OMG! LOL

I know!! Even by mid-80s standards, that was GOD. AWFUL.
And frosted, no less, if I remember right. I lived in Oregon during the late 80s when Tonya was coming along and there would be newspaper profiles on her from time to time and I remember thinking even at the time how hideous that hair was.
 

Ptichka

Forum translator
Record Breaker
Joined
Jul 28, 2003
Kathleen said:
The second thing was the energy level at the end of her program. Wow. I guess that was before she started smoking, etc......
Artur Dmitriev smoked throughout his skating career, and that didn't stop him from earning 3 Olympic medals...
 

Kathleen

Rinkside
Joined
Aug 18, 2003
No, but he certainly wasn't known for his stamina either.

Not that it was just the smoking that did Tonya in.............
 

JonnyCoop

Record Breaker
Joined
Dec 28, 2003
Kathleen said:
Not that it was just the smoking that did Tonya in.............

Well, that might be open for question, given the fact we've never heard any actual verification of WHAT she was smoking at certain periods of her life.....:laugh: :laugh:
 

gio

Medalist
Joined
Jan 23, 2006
Kathleen said:
The first........that hair!!! OMG! LOL

Also Elizabeth Manley, Rosalynn Sumners, Elaine Zayak (to name a few) had that terrible hair. It was the style of the 80s.
 

76olympics

On the Ice
Joined
Mar 4, 2004
I don't think I had ever seen a clip of her as old as the 1986 one. The short hair was quite different. It was also weird to hear Judy Blumberg talking about "maturity" and "artistry" --but she was actually right about 15 year old Tonya. Unfortunately the maturity and artistry really didn't develop any further--but her jumps stayed stellar a long time until her inconsistent training habits, chaotic personal life, etc got the best of her.

It is not too hard to imagine what that raw talent might have become in someone who could handle life better than Tonya was able to do.
 

sk8addict

On the Ice
Joined
Oct 22, 2004
Many thanks

Thank you so much for this. It gave me chillbumps. What wonderful edges & a beaitiful Ina Baur. So sad she had to pay so much for what her husband did. Thanks for the memories.:clap: :clap: :clap:
 
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sk8addict

On the Ice
Joined
Oct 22, 2004
smokers

Ptichka said:
Artur Dmitriev smoked throughout his skating career, and that didn't stop him from earning 3 Olympic medals...
So did Dorothy. 2 packs of Marlboro a day!
 

MKFSfan

Medalist
Joined
Mar 15, 2006
Tonya was my favorite way back when. Such a shame, so much talent. I always loved her ina baur, layback and other spins, and the height she could get in her jumps! She did have a lot of energy in her programs and showed how athletic she was.

I forgot how BIG her hair was...ah, the '80's hair!
 

nubka

Final Flight
Joined
Aug 19, 2003
I think Tonya actually looked good in short hair. It really was puffy, but that's the 80's for you!

I was looking at another clip over at Youtube, where Tonya had short hair (but not so puffy) and it was really cute. For me, anything would be an improvement over the ponytail/puffy bangs look...
 

sheilagh

Rinkside
Joined
Jan 23, 2004
I remember seeing a documentary on Ms. Harding in the period shortly after the whole Tonya/Nancy thing. They played a clip of the 1986 program wherein she popped to a single in the first part of a combination .. and then cut to another clip of Tonya after the performance in which she discussed being reamed out by her mother for having missed the combination.

It is really unfortunate that such an innately talented individual had t grow up in the type of environment she did. I honestly think that was her undoing.



-- sheilgah
 

Eeyora

Final Flight
Joined
Aug 4, 2003
While the short haircut is kinda silly by today's standards. I actually perfare her with the pouffy bangs verrsus the no bangs look of the 94 olympics.
 

Mafke

Medalist
Joined
Mar 22, 2004
Eeyora said:
While the short haircut is kinda silly by today's standards. I actually perfare her with the pouffy bangs verrsus the no bangs look of the 94 olympics.

True, I personally like bangs and ponytails, together or separately (but especially together) and dislike poofy short hair.

I remember when Harding and Ito were my favorite female skaters (and Paul Wylie was my favorite male skater). Let the other ladies prance around like pixiebelle, I just loved was the clean spare power they demonstrated. Ito was (badly IMHO) advised to become more 'artistic' and began waving her arms around and trying to 'interpret' the music (who needs that when you can fly across the rink and soar like a falcon?) and Harding ... It's such a shame what happened to her. It's true that many people had worse home situations and didn't muck up their lives as thoroughly as she did, but it's still a shame.
 

hydroradi

Rinkside
Joined
Mar 27, 2004
The sad part about Tonya, regardless of her past personal problems is she had made it. She overcame the bad family situaion, the abusive mother, being dirt poor, USFSA not liking her skating style and life choices. She was National Champion in 1991, Second in the world championships in 1991, and beat Kristi Yamaguchi at Skate America in 1991...where it wasn't close at all. She was just so dominating in that compeition she easily would have won the gold medal if she had skated like that in Albertville.

But she stopped training hard and became lazy, came to Albertville jet-lagged, and blew her best chance at a gold medal. She was never the same after 1991.

People only remember the circus atmosphere of 1994 with the attack and all her bizarre behavior years later and forget how close she really came to winning it all in 1992. That's the biggest tragedy of the Tonya Harding story in my mind. Cause a win or a medal at Albertville would have set into motion a chain of events that would have resulted in a completely different life than the one she has now.
 
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