Barbara Underhill and Paul Martini

www.youtube.com/watch?v=2VMunS-yKDg

Here is a link (I hope!) to the 1984 World championship long program skated by Canadians Barbara Underhill and Paul Martini that won them the title in front of their home crowd in Ottawa. :yay:

Underhill and Martini have been longtime favorites of mine - I just love their power, passion, and precision. Although as an American I was thrilled to see Kitty and Peter Carruthers win the silver medal at the 1984 Olympics, I was heartbroken to see Barbara and Paul hook their blades on their short program sit spin, crash, and take themselves out of medal position. They most definitely should have been on the Olympic podium. It is to their great credit that they pulled themselves up, "dusted off their skates" and won the World title the following month.

They won the World Professional Pairs title several years with great performances. Their "Unchained Melody" routine was one of the best ever skated by a pair team, IMHO.

Here it is (Unchained Melody):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VHPQTlOOH9o&feature=related

Thank you for this thread. I'm one without much knowledge of skating history and this was a revelation. They're spectacular, with their speed, the distance on their throw jumps, the gorgeous overhead lifts, and breathtaking death spirals. It's easy to imagine them competing under COP because they're so brilliant technically. Also in UM especially, the unity between them is remarkable: their body lines are so enlaced, and her eye is always on his face (even as she smiles all the way through the program). He doesn't seem to project as much but he's pretty easy on the eyes. : )

Thanks for the "Unchained Melody" link, SpunSilver!

One thing often overlooked today since pro skating comps are dead is the fact that U/M were very strong rivals of G&G during their first stint as pros. They were really the first pro pairs team to keep up many of their amateur level technical skills for years after retiring. They were really on par with the kind of consistency that Yamaguchi showed as a pro.

Here is one of their wins over G&G.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hKKKrOpN3QY

jcoates said:

One thing often overlooked today since pro skating comps are dead is the fact that U/M were very strong rivals of G&G during their first stint as pros. They were really the first pro pairs team to keep up many of their amateur level technical skills for years after retiring. They were really on par with the kind of consistency that Yamaguchi showed as a pro.

Here is one of their wins over G&G.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hKKKrOpN3QY

Click to expand...

Agree, jcoates! Underhill and Martini truly retained their athleticism and artistry years after turning pro, and their competitive performances were clearly at the top of the game. I, for one, think that had they chosen to compete through 1988, they would have been close rivals of Gordeeva/Grinkov, and quite possibly Barbara and Paul would have won several World titles and the 1988 Olympic gold medal. They were absolutely fantastic, IMHO.

Underhill & Martina would not have won the 88 Olympic Gold since by then no way a team with a double flip as their hardest solo jump could ever win. If they mastered the side by side double axels then maybe, but that seems unlikely. Pro competition is totally different than amateur, and you can get away without the harder side by side jumps which arent as important.

Spun Silver said:

Here it is (Unchained Melody):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VHPQTlOOH9o&feature=related

Thank you for this thread. I'm one without much knowledge of skating history and this was a revelation. They're spectacular, with their speed, the distance on their throw jumps, the gorgeous overhead lifts, and breathtaking death spirals. It's easy to imagine them competing under COP because they're so brilliant technically. Also in UM especially, the unity between them is remarkable: their body lines are so enlaced, and her eye is always on his face (even as she smiles all the way through the program). He doesn't seem to project as much but he's pretty easy on the eyes. : )

Click to expand...

They're one of my favorite pairs teams also. I think they pretty much put professional pairs on the map with their breathtaking performances at Landover and other venues. "Unchained Melody" is possibly their best, and definitely one of my favorites too. Their body lines and unison are all the more remarkable because of the height difference. Barbara is one of those rare skaters (Rodnina is another) who is petite but not a sprite. She's capable of projecting adult emotion and therefore of creating an electrical connection with her partner. It was always an event when Underhill and Martini debuted their year's program. When Olympic gold medalists showed up as pros to compete at Landover, many of them looked lackluster next to the charismatic Canadian pair.

They were always world class. Canada's best two pair teams, M&U, S&P!

pangtongfan said:

Underhill & Martina would not have won the 88 Olympic Gold since by then no way a team with a double flip as their hardest solo jump could ever win. If they mastered the side by side double axels then maybe, but that seems unlikely. Pro competition is totally different than amateur, and you can get away without the harder side by side jumps which arent as important.

Click to expand...

Yeah, because they never beat a team with more difficult sbs jumps when they were competing as amateurs. Oh wait...Ottawa 1984. Yes V&V made errors, but on their best day, U/M were better at pairs skills than the Russians. I think they could certainly have upgraded their sbs jumps to 2As. Plenty of teams/skaters from the 1984 cycle were still around in 1988 and had upped their jumping difficulty. After all, lots of pairs from the 2A era added 3Ts in the 90s.

jcoates said:

Yeah, because they never beat a team with more difficult sbs jumps when they were competing as amateurs. Oh wait...Ottawa 1984. Yes V&V made errors, but on their best day, U/M were better at pairs skills than the Russians. I think they could certainly have upgraded their sbs jumps to 2As. Plenty of teams/skaters from the 1984 cycle were still around in 1988 and had upped their jumping difficulty. After all, lots of pairs from the 2A era added 3Ts in the 90s.

Click to expand...

Amen! It amuses me to read posters who state that so-and-so would never have won at a later competition, as they did not perform more difficult jumps when they did compete. In the case of Underhill and Martini, folks, I am positive they would have upgraded their side-by-side jumps, had they opted to remain eligible through the 1988 season.

Just as Dorothy Hamill won without performing triple jumps - she was the best technical skater of her era - and that's what mattered. Had she been competing at a later era, I'm sure she would have a full arsenal of triples and/or whatever moves were being performed by the skaters of that era.

jcoates said:

Yeah, because they never beat a team with more difficult sbs jumps when they were competing as amateurs. Oh wait...Ottawa 1984. Yes V&V made errors, but on their best day, U/M were better at pairs skills than the Russians. I think they could certainly have upgraded their sbs jumps to 2As. Plenty of teams/skaters from the 1984 cycle were still around in 1988 and had upped their jumping difficulty. After all, lots of pairs from the 2A era added 3Ts in the 90s.

Click to expand...

Valova & Vasiliev made 3 significant errors (or atleast downgrades) in their LP at the 84 Worlds and still took votes off a squeeky perfect Underhill & Martini. That was even with superior pair elements to V&V and being superior in most areas, and U&M having the home court advantage to boot. At the 83 Worlds Valova & Vasiliev with 1 significant error won and a perfect Underhill & Martini were only 3rd, all due to the vast gulf in jump difficulty. The defending World Champion East Germans at those 83 Worlds, who atleast had significantly more jump difficulty than Underhill & Martini, and skated perfectly as well, with much superior pair elements and speed to the Russians, also lost to Valova & Vasiliev who had a missed throw, since their jump content while good was still below the Russians even more clearly emphasizing the huge value given to jumps around then. The Carruthers at the 84 Games skated the free skate of their lives, and were still marked about .3 per judge below the winners (again the same Soviet pair who again made a major error), and barely held off another Russian pair and German pair who both had several errors. Meanwhile Gordeeva & Grinkov in their primes are MUCH better than Valova & Vasiliev even on their best day, the two teams arent even in the same league. So your example in no way refutes my claim that the jumps are far more emphasized in amateur scoring than in pro competitions, let alone being able to be competitive with a team like the great Gordeeva & Grinkov (who as already noted are so much better than the very good but rather blah Valova & Vasiliev which is how Ekaterina at only 16 was easily able to sweep past V&V and become the #1 Russian pair instantly) in amateur competition with only double flips.

Dont get me wrong I like Underhill & Martini alot. However they retired when they did for a reason. Their chance for Olympic Glory was not in 88, but in 84, and unfortunately it didnt pan out for them. I was happy to see them end their successful amateur career in style, and then achieve amazing success in pros. Barb imparticular was never that strong a jumper (she even admited so to me in a conversation on her old website, lol) so saying they likely would have upgraded their jumps had they continued is fantasy thinking. Had then been true they would have continued, do you honestly think with no Olympic medal and the 88 Games in Calgary they would have retired if they thought they could upgrade their jumps, of course not. They were already in their primes for several years when they ended their amateur careers and harder jumps would have helped them greatly before then, so if they were capable of upgrading the jumps they would have already done so.

jcoates said:

One thing often overlooked today since pro skating comps are dead is the fact that U/M were very strong rivals of G&G during their first stint as pros. They were really the first pro pairs team to keep up many of their amateur level technical skills for years after retiring. They were really on par with the kind of consistency that Yamaguchi showed as a pro.

Here is one of their wins over G&G.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hKKKrOpN3QY

Click to expand...

My point exactly. Had Underhill/Martini remained eligible, they would have upgraded the ante. Obviously, they would have been aware of what the other pairs teams were doing, and they would have upgraded their technical content appropriately.

Pangtongfan, your point about Gordeyeva and Grinkov being just about unbeatable in 1988 is well taken, though I'm not sure that would have been in the thinking of Underhill and Martini as early as 1984 or even 1985. I think G & G became the world's best team in 1986? She was about fifteen at the time--amazing. And just two years later, there was that unforgettable long program at Calgary.

I agree with you that U/M's greatest achievements lay in their pro years. Their technique was just good enough to give them substance, but what they were best at was what pro skating most needs: a connection with each other and with the music, and thereby with the audience. A lot of the Soviet/Russian pairs teams that turned pro later (with better amateur credentials and better jumps) seemed formal, even sterile next to U/M. (By contrast, Soviet/Russian ice dancers generally had chemistry to burn.) I'm not sure anyone really expected pairs skaters to summon up the emotional heat that ice dancers were able to convey. They were mostly expected to provide thrilling lifts. But Underhill and Martini raised the ante. Even Gordeyeva and Grinkov owe them a debt in terms of the vocabulary of emotion that they contributed.