Gabriella Papadakis & Guillaume Cizeron | Page 249 | Golden Skate

Gabriella Papadakis & Guillaume Cizeron

Hello ! It's funny it took me a bit of time to finally write on this FF because i've been fan of Gabby and Guillaume since Mozart... but i've been lurking for a while ! (it was hard to write here after the Olympics but this FF gave me a lot of very much needed emotional support)
I just wanted to post because I saw them yesterday at the french tour, they looked amazing and I had goosebumps during both of their performances (build a home and Ed Sheeran). They got a standing ovation, and they looked really happy to be there, and it seemed that there was a nice vibe within the french team, especially with Romain and Marie-Jade
Now I hope they can take some very well-deserved holidays :)

Hi Aglae ! :hap10:
How lucky are you to have seen them live, I haven't had that luck yet. This is great, I've seen numerous feedback on G&G, that they looked great and performed really well, a testament to their incredible preparation for this season. Polished as never before and forever having those skills !

But yes, holidays are in order... this off-season has just started and I'm on a figure skatin withdrawal, not sure I'll hold on until next September/October (or later :eeking:)
 
How lucky are you to have seen them live, I haven't had that luck yet.

Yes I also saw them at Worlds in Milano for the free dance :luv17: the good thing with the french tour is that the tickets were quite cheap and we were really close (since french people are not the biggest fans of FS and the rink was quite small) so I could really see how fast and smooth their skating is :love: I hope to see them at french GP next year too (now i'm hooked, it's really different to see them live !!!)
I hope you get to see them too !!! :)
 
I love that the straightline lean-away lift in their FD this season is the only one among the top teams where both skaters look directly into each other's eyes, and hold that gaze for the entire time. There's an aesthetic and emotional thought behind the move, a rich "inwardness" suited to the mood of the music, rather than acrobatic showing-off or or the woman being hurled around like a prop, or the woman seducing the judges while the man provides physical support.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AAsBLTl1wqM

And this fancam from Worlds is pretty great. You really see their floating quality clearly. How quiet their edges are.
 
I love that the straightline lean-away lift in their FD this season is the only one among the top teams where both skaters look directly into each other's eyes, and hold that gaze for the entire time.

More than one commentator has talked about how perfect their eye-lines are, and how much it adds to the impact of their programs. Not to mention, Gabi in particular has fantastic plastique - and that lift really shows off her ability to both find and maintain a statue-like pose (body) without rigidity and integrate slow, controlled movement (arms) in a way that has a ton of impact.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AAsBLTl1wqM

And this fancam from Worlds is pretty great. You really see their floating quality clearly. How quiet their edges are.

I hadn't seen that one before - thank you! It's great. I love it when you can hear the sound of the blades like that.
 
More than one commentator has talked about how perfect their eye-lines are, and how much it adds to the impact of their programs. Not to mention, Gabi in particular has fantastic plastique - and that lift really shows off her ability to both find and maintain a statue-like pose (body) without rigidity and integrate slow, controlled movement (arms) in a way that has a ton of impact.

I love that you used the word Plastique. It requires a very steady center and controlled freedom from that center outwards. Her upper body articulation has become the most nuanced of any lady skater today. It wasn't quite at this level back in 2014-15 but the infinite shadings she achieved with the FD this season has been amazing (and remain underrated). It's during the opening pose, the twizzles, the lifts, and small moments like the second before she fell into Guillaume's arms in the step sequence, the way she threw her head back while tracing gentle, fluid curves with both of her arms.
 
Music Predictions for Papadakis/Cizeron

They were brilliant with their Moonlight Sonata FD last year (although I wasn't a huge fan of their SD it was still well received). Is the SD pattern out yet and have Papadakis and Cizeron made selects for next season and what do you think they will choose? Where do they go from this past season?
 
This is my first post here but this idea that GP can’t skate has caught my interest because I can’t understand it. It seems to me that even if this belief were widespread, it would matter by whom such an opinion is held. All beliefs are not equal in that there’s a huge difference between a pronouncement made by those with the professional expertise to make such a judgment and those fans who are more in the “I know what I like” category. I have no professional expertise whatsoever when it comes to ice dancing but I have been watching the trajectory of this pair with great interest and I am forced to wonder how it is that so many medals are won (and so many world records broken) by someone who can’t skate. Are you really suggesting that all these accolades are being awarded to Guillaume Cizeron in spite of his skating partner? This seems pretty implausible to me.

(Sorry late reply)

The judges and those well versed in the technical elements know that this idea is nonsensical, Guillaume didn't get them there all by himself. Some casual fans however were being spoon fed by commentators and pundits, sometimes subtly, sometimes not so much, and from very early on, that he was the superior skater of the team, by far. As if Gabi had no room to improve. Same sort of things was said of Charlie White, IIRC. Unfortunately initial impressions are hard to brush away, I've been following the games on a different board (not related to skating whatsoever) and... well, it has to be said, mostly from Canadians casual viewers (once every 4 years), they totally bought that narrative. If "X" serious commentator instils that idea little by little, at some point it sticks, not to mention what's happening with the federation/judges behind the scene.

(TBF, that kind of belief is still happening because of things of the past, for example the technical gap between the Duchesnays was real. Set a precedent. Not singling them out btw, they're the first I'm thinking of that's all)

edit: re-sorry, I don't think I made it clear in this post but I absolutely don't subscribe to that opinion (that Gabi isn't on the same level as other skaters/Guillaume), but then even British eurosport commentators said he "overshadows her" (or used to) @world, which is just a highly subjective opinion
 
I have a serious case of figure skating withdrawal... so I watched their past programs in chronological order :laugh:
I was thinking that it's already a "legacy"... in a few years, some new figure skating fans, young skaters, they will search for their names online, and that's what they'll find. It really is a treat. Beyond the technical, blabla,...

Repeating myself : I cannot stress how short their FDs are. It's 4 minutes and feel like 1. :mad:
I often praise Build a Home because of the effect it had on me at Europeans 2016, that gorgeous FD out of nowhere, but today, I just don't know which one of their 4 last FDs is my favourite. So I'm picking all four !

For the SDs, it's the same, but I have a softer soft for the Latin and the Waltz... I rewatch the Swing sometimes because unlike a lot of people I LOVED it (it's one of the SDs where their skating quality is showing a lot, it's a treat for the eyes), and I love the Paso intensity, it was such a great program.

I need more programs from them because one quad is not enough :laugh:
 
This is such an odd yet interesting TV coverage of their Olympic FD performance. The camera angle is panoramic allowing you to view the entire ice rink. It is also fish-eye-ish with the visual distortion. Almost spy-like given where the cameras are positioned. Does anyone know which coverage this is from? Commentator accents are American and Australian, if I am not mistaken.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_uhdybN3KpI
 
This is such an odd yet interesting TV coverage of their Olympic FD performance. The camera angle is panoramic allowing you to view the entire ice rink. It is also fish-eye-ish with the visual distortion. Almost spy-like given where the cameras are positioned. Does anyone know which coverage this is from? Commentator accents are American and Australian, if I am not mistaken.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_uhdybN3KpI

Those people were doing commentary for NBC I believe, but they weren't the main NBC people. I don't remember exactly what the arrangement was. I don't know where the video came from but there was a version of V/M's too. Someone said that this footage was never a version meant to be aired.
 
Those people were doing commentary for NBC I believe, but they weren't the main NBC people.

The woman is Belinda Noonan, who did the commentary for Australian TV and the livestream. So the man is her 'layman' offsider whose name I can't remember - I think he was a Jim something?
 
This is such an odd yet interesting TV coverage of their Olympic FD performance. The camera angle is panoramic allowing you to view the entire ice rink. It is also fish-eye-ish with the visual distortion. Almost spy-like given where the cameras are positioned. Does anyone know which coverage this is from? Commentator accents are American and Australian, if I am not mistaken.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_uhdybN3KpI

Fluid, deep curves during the step sequences are a joy to the eye.
 
The woman is Belinda Noonan, who did the commentary for Australian TV and the livestream. So the man is her 'layman' offsider whose name I can't remember - I think he was a Jim something?

Noonan also did Sochi commentary with a British guy I think? I don't know for which broadcaster but the official Olympic channel uploaded videos with her commenting.
 
I don't know who she worked with at Sochi, I'm afraid; i wasn't paying attention to commentators back then and haven't seen any of the videos with her commentary since. :)
 
Back
Top