Ice Dance Education

[ManyCairns]

I know so much less about ice dance than the other disciplines, not that I'm an expert there, either. However, I'd love GSers' help in learning more about what's important in the judges' eyes in ice dance.

Rather than naming generalities, would anyone be willing to critique some of the top couples regarding their strengths (and POSSIBLY their weaknesses, but please no bashing).

E.g., "Astaire/Rogers are known for their complicated steps and wonderful edging, and are particularly strong in the CDs because of their spot-on unison and evenness of stroking. You can see this as they hit the same spots in the rink for the same figures in each repetition of the dance pattern."

or "Kelly/Prowse are famous for their wonderful knee bend and stroking, and for a dramatic flair that they highlight in their FD."

Or whatever. A specific couple and their strengths/weaknesses, so I can watch their performances with more educated eyes.

TIA so much!!

 

[Medusa]

There was a great post by dorispulaski:

http://www.isu.org/vsite/vfile/page/...-0-file,00.pdf

Joe, The ice dance rules are on pages 127 and following of the above document.
Another good source is http://www.ice-dance.com/reference/

The easiest to understand competition, is, of course, the CD's, since all the teams are skating the same pattern. For the casual fan, here's some easy tips to watching.

1. Faster is better. If all teams are skating the same pattern, the faster couple will skate a bigger pattern.
2. Deep edges are very important (teams are leaning)
3. Flow is very important. And you should not hear excessive noise from the skaters' blades
4. Skating close together, with the feet close is important
5. 'Tidy feet' are important. Toes are to be turned out and pointed down. Leg lines match exactly. Two footed skating is a no no.
6. Both the man and the lady should have good posture (upright, with the head up, but not stiff).
7. If you're musical, timing is an important thing and easy to spot. Timing is strict, and is marked. The first step should be on beat 1 of the 9th measure.
8. Everything should look effortless-dance holds should be firm
9. Obvious stuff-positions should be held and not wobbly.
10. In a CD, or the OD, the character of the dance should be correct. You should be able to imagine that you would know the dance is a waltz or a tango just from the way it is performed, without the music. Each CD should have a unique flavor.

11. And yes, unison is important.

I have to admit that I don't even watch icedance because I don't understand it. I can't recognise the mistakes (except for a fall perhaps) and I didn't find real differences between the icedance competition at Junior Worlds and e.g at the GPF. And I am sure there are some.

It would be nice to know which pair is known for what qualitiy etc.

 

[jyshin]

7. If you're musical, timing is an important thing and easy to spot. Timing is strict, and is marked. The first step should be on beat 1 of the 9th measure.

From the great post by dorispulaski...according to Medusa... many many days ago

Can anybody elaborate this part for me?

The first step should be on beat 1 of the 9th measure.

I am wondering if this is for CD where it has clear rhythm pattern... or should it be applied to OD and FD as well...

 

[dorispulaski]

It's when we apply this to specific couples that the arguments begin! Obviously ice dance is an area where all fans feel competent to offer an opinion! Your opinion is as good as mine, but I'll offer mine anyway:

However, V&M strengths-deep quiet edges, good match on leg line. Stare into each other's eyes very well, better lifts this year due to Cirque Du Soleil training. Weakness-occasionally mess up their twizzles a little (nerves?), do not like the Yankee Polka and skate it fairly soullessly. Skate a great Argentine Tango. A great waltz couple, IMO they need to do something different next year, though. Good CD couple (could have a skated a bit closer together in the Argentine), and great in the FD. In the OD, not so much, compared to their CD & FD. Seem to have trouble getting the correct character of some dances-due to youth, I suspect.

K&N-best lifts in the business, both creative & interesting due to her extreme flexibility. Not quite up to snuff on step sequence elements. Sell a program like no one else. Their spins are quite interesting, I think. Great FD skaters. This year's OD was very good, but last year's was dreadful. Perhaps the range of moods/musics/dances they can express is a hair suspect.

D&W-Worlds' greatest twizzles. Good speed. He may have grown a little this year and their posture & legline have suffered a little, between that and working for more speed. Spiffing Yankee Polka and Good Golden Waltz. Did not like the easier Argentine Tango, and didn't work it as hard as they should have. Very good technical skaters, but are working on expressing more emotion towards each other. Charlie's leaps the best out there IMO. Generally at their best in the FD.

Belbin & Agosto-are always said to need work on legline matching & toe pointing. Typically skate a great OD, although not this year. Extraordinarily good on timing, I always thought. A little uncreative on lifts, getting better. Ben's partnering skills are great.

Delobel & Schonfelder-quite a size mismatch, but they cover it very well. Excellent CD skaters, best out there at this time. Their FD's are very creative, but their technical difficulty tends to be a hair lower than the youngsters who grew up on COP.

Domnina & Shabalin-great power, and due to their extreme height & excellent toe point & leg line, very commanding on the ice. Very precise CD's. Better in the waltz than in faster dances, like the Yankee Polka. They use the same spins and lifts more than I would like to see, especially between OD & FD in the same year's programs. Her presentation leaves me a bit cold.

Pechalat & Bourzat-have the great advantage of a great choreographer. When they skate they are very loud on the blade, like they are dragging a bag of cutlery behind them. You could hear the noise even over the FD Craziness music. Their OD this year was very flamenco in feel, but not so much in the music. Due to Bourzat's knee troubles, they were a hair undertrained physically and it showed in their FD's at Euros & Worlds.

Faiella & Scali, not as loud skaters as P&B but still quite loud. Improved a lot this year, so I don't feel qualified to discuss them so much. I find them a bit taste-challenged. Good timing, I think A bit prone to make mistakes, but had a great Worlds. Relate well to each other and the audience.

Kerrs-Very creative, but they need to show up at the beginning of the season in shape. Their programs never really come together till worlds, and they don't score as well as they should because of that. John has trouble with the twizzles sometimes. Their OD this year was really special.

 

[all that]

The first step should be on beat 1 of the 9th measure.

I am wondering if this is for CD where it has clear rhythm pattern... or should it be applied to OD and FD as well...

It's only applicable to the CD.

 

[Mafke]

"K&N-best lifts in the business"

I'm curious about the standards involved. For me their lifts remind me way too much of early T&M. This isn't necessarily good because T&M were in pairs.
But what they have in common (to me) is that there's an element of awkwardness and just taking too darn long in how they get in and out of the flexi-lift positions.

 

[dorispulaski]

I like the creativity of them--but you're probably right. I'm a bit too fangirly about them to be too critical yet.

 

[Tonichelle]

as Doris said, we all have our opinions, and she knew the 'danger' of that when she posted about some of the top names

I'm not an expert, I learned most of the little I do know by sitting and watching the practices and having someone who knew a bit about it (like a competitive ice dancer, or her mom lol) explain what I was seeing... I love the CDs because everyone's doing basically the same thing and you can really tell the difference.

 

[museksk8r]

I'm not an expert, I learned most of the little I do know by sitting and watching the practices and having someone who knew a bit about it (like a competitive ice dancer, or her mom lol) explain what I was seeing... I love the CDs because everyone's doing basically the same thing and you can really tell the difference.

You make a very good point. I think ice dancing has a tendency to be so confusing to the general public because the compulsory dances are never televised (speaking in the US) and that is the phase where one can get the best sense of a particular team's strengths and weaknesses compared to others. It would be great to have that portion televised along with analysis by Tracy Wilson or Susie Wynne to help the viewers at home better understand what the judges are looking for throughout the competition in how the teams compare/contrast to one another in doing the same routine. Sadly, I predict this will likely happen when pigs fly. Figure skating just isn't that big a deal in the US. We don't even get broadcasts of all of our skaters' performances, like Bebe's and Stephen's LPs this year.

 

[all that]

It definitely won't happen since CDs are being phased out anyway.

D&W-Worlds' greatest twizzles. Good speed. He may have grown a little this year and their posture & legline have suffered a little, between that and working for more speed. Spiffing Yankee Polka and Good Golden Waltz. Did not like the easier Argentine Tango, and didn't work it as hard as they should have. Very good technical skaters, but are working on expressing more emotion towards each other. Charlie's leaps the best out there IMO. Generally at their best in the FD.

You know, everyone says Meryl and Charlie have the best twizzles, but I'm not so sure. Sometimes they look a bit uncontrolled to me -- Charlie's either doing more rotations, or they start moving a bit apart when they do them, etc. They certainly do them better than most other teams, but sometimes I think B&A might be doing them better, or even V&M.

Did D&W actually say that they didn't like the AT?

D&W's YP -- definitely more fun than most, but the lack of matching free legs at the choctaw drove me crazy.

 

[dorispulaski]

Toni, That's why I like the CD's too-I hope they decide to keep them, although they are surely under fire...there are supposedly a lot of people who want to retain them in some form...

As to D&W's YP, different strokes. The YP should be light, bouncy, and effervescent, as though the dancers had a beer or two before skating. (In fact, that's a good character for any polka).

The dancers should not look vaguely embarrassed or as though they were enduring a ride to the dentist.

I liked D&W's second best this year, second only to Delobel & Schonfelders, leg line issues or not. But I hope they will work on legline issues this coming seasons.

 

[cassieandcheetah]

You know, everyone says Meryl and Charlie have the best twizzles, but I'm not so sure. Sometimes they look a bit uncontrolled to me -- Charlie's either doing more rotations, or they start moving a bit apart when they do them, etc. They certainly do them better than most other teams, but sometimes I think B&A might be doing them better, or even V&M.

Did D&W actually say that they didn't like the AT?

D&W's YP -- definitely more fun than most, but the lack of matching free legs at the choctaw drove me crazy.

I noticed the non matching legs too...I saw the icenetwork coverage of it, and it was kind of ironic, because the leg thing happend right after N. Kerrigan said that they would match, lol. But isn't it because of their height difference and hence just inevitable?

 

[all that]

I noticed the non matching legs too...I saw the icenetwork coverage of it, and it was kind of ironic, because the leg thing happend right after N. Kerrigan said that they would match, lol. But isn't it because of their height difference and hence just inevitable?

Don't think so, because DelShoes lines matched, and they have a significant height difference as well.

Agree with dorispulaski that DelShoes had the most fab YP of them all!!

 

[jyshin]

Um... I have more silly questions here...

1> How do the coaches help an ice-dance team to match their leg lines?
"raise/lower your legs", "match your leg lines with each other"... seem a little vague...
Maybe off-ice ballet training in front of the mirror, video-recording their rehearsals, etc...?

2> How does the use of prop affect the score? For instance, Perchalt&Bourzat were the ones to really got into their Flamenco costume and the little red fan. On the other hand, V/M decided not to use their scarf. I was a bit puzzled with the scoring system... allowing the props didn't seem to mean they 'encouraged' the used of props...hmm...

Nathalie Pechalat & Fabian Bourzat (France) "Spanish Flamenco"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6aEkyA5Y9QM

p.s.
Thanks, dorispulaski and all that for responding to my previous question!

 

[Tonichelle]

...It would be great to have that portion televised along with analysis by Tracy Wilson or Susie Wynne to help the viewers at home better understand what the judges are looking for throughout the competition in how the teams compare/contrast to one another in doing the same routine. Sadly, I predict this will likely happen when pigs fly. Figure skating just isn't that big a deal in the US. We don't even get broadcasts of all of our skaters' performances, like Bebe's and Stephen's LPs this year.

I don't think the CDs translate that well, they showed the US CDs during the last olympics... and it just doesn't come off the same way as it does live.

 

[dorispulaski]

The ABC coverage of the 1988 Olympic CD's was fairly good. CD's really need to be filmed at a greater distance from the ice so you can see the pattern on the ice

There are differences even in the way CD's are graded/taught country to country.

Two examples:
Bestemianova and Bukin 1988 Olympics (4 world gold medals, Olympic gold medal)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1E6S5x_5eOY

Here's what the person who posted this vid says about it:

While I insist on writing only "positive" things in my churlish chronicling, there are two Russian ice dancing couples that truly "try my patience"! While I spent a lifetime enduring countless coaches cramming my hips forward and insisting I dance in a most uncomfortable "tucked under" hip touching style, this girl managed to win World and Olympic titles presenting the antithesis of that theory of movement! In America, this is called "A-framing" and you wouldn't pass the 14-step with it; yet, here it is in the Olympics, accentuated with some of the most outlandish skirts ever attached to a female skater. Not to diminish their talent, they were strong skaters who never fell down! (isn't that the Prime Directive for Ice Dancing?), but it's like my mom used to say about broccoli.......eat it, and like it

Also:
In America and Canada, timing is worshipped. In Russia, extended leg line is worshipped.

Here we see a side by side of Grishuk & Platov and Bourne and Kraatz emphasizing what is valued where they come from, skating the Golden Waltz in the 1998 Olympics.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DO82xzg6GF8

 

[Tonichelle]

The ABC coverage of the 1988 Olympic CD's was fairly good. CD's really need to be filmed at a greater distance from the ice so you can see the pattern on the ice

agreed

however speed is a funny thing on TV... some skaters appear slower than they are, while others seem much faster... it's odd and frustrating!

 

[dorispulaski]

Yes, but it's easy on the CD's if they just film higher up. The bigger the pattern, the faster the team is skating.

 

[Tonichelle]

true, and I guess if you have someone explaining that people might get it

but no part of figure skating is quite teh same unless seen live... so I can get where CDs would be viewed like figures were by TV viewers - boring and pointless... (this is not MY opinion on such matters, but the reasoning behind TV not showing them which led to the reasoning behind doing away with Figures)

after so many times of the same 3 or 4 songs being played... well... I can kind of agree... though the Yankee Polka will never get old! LONG LIVE THE POLKA!

 

[dorispulaski]

The Yankee Polka

The chirpy music

The crazy costumes

The wacko colors

:swoon: