Tuesday, January 28, 2014

Figure Skating


Every generation has its premier female figure-skater.  You can tell someone's age by who that skater is.  For example, I'm the same age as Dorothy Hamill.  People older than me watched Peggy Fleming and folks younger than me watched (in descending order) Katarina Witt, Kristi Yamaguchi, Nancy Kerrigan, Oksana Baiul, Tara Lipinski or Michelle Kwan.  I just read a fun article which tells us what these women have been doing since their days of glory.

The Winter Olympics are almost here and figure-skating is my favorite sport.  It marries grace with athleticism.  And the outfits!  I love the costumes the skaters wear.

Do you have a favorite skater?  Someone you cheered for?

And can you skate?  I can skate but I don't know how to stop, so I head for something stationary (like a wall) to break my momentum.  And hopefully not my leg.

23 comments:

  1. This is probably the only thing I will watch during the Olympics. Winter is women's figure skating, summer is women's gymnastics. Because it's the most artistic and the least sporty.

    I can skate a little bit, but I'm not very good, and I also cannot stop. All I have to say to that is, "toe pick".

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  2. Elizabeth Manley is my all time favourite skater 1988 Olympics

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  3. I've nominated you for a little bloggy award a couple of days back. I want you to know because I want to read your list of random things about Ally : )

    bisous
    Suzanne

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    1. Thanks Suzanne! I saw it and am planning a post.

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  4. I can't skate at all! I should probably learn how to, though :) I tried many times and I was just horrible at it...and embarrassed lol.

    I used to love watching Figure Skating when I was in elementary school. I remember a lot of these amazing and talented women. They're so graceful. And I always enjoy seeing what they wear!

    I read that article you posted a link to. They all look so good! It's nice to see some of them on TV again :)

    xo Azu

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  5. I love the ice skating - I've often dreamt of having the grace and strength of the female figure skaters. They are amazing. I'm looking forward to seeing them compete in Sochi in a couple of weeks.

    Over here we still celebrate Torvill and Dean :) Doesn't matter what generation you are...!

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  6. I am not a huge fan of figure skating. In the elementary school sports class girls had to do figure skating and boys got to play ice hockey. I wanted to play ice hockey but i had to figure skate :c !
    Yes, I can skate but I much prefer speed skating or ice hockey :)
    I like the costumes of the figure skaters tho :D

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    1. I had the same problem -- in reverse. I wanted to figure-skate with the girls.

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  7. I'm not a fan of figure skating although I like the dancing couples a lot. I can skate but generally it's about me standing and moving slowly forward.

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  8. Oh Katarina Witt, I love you! she skated to Michael Jackson in a leather jacket, magnificent, and Torville and Dean - I love figure skating and the outfits too x x x I used to 'skate' around the edge, great way to talk to people x x x

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  9. I LOVED figure skating when I was a kid. It was a very rare treat (especially as a kid in the South), and I always adored watching the Olympics. I was never savvy enough to have a favorite, because in my eyes they were all magical dancers.

    I'm actually a pretty decent ice skater because I favored inline skates instead of the traditional ones. I did a LOT of inline skating in my tweens/teens. It's one of the reasons I have so much wrist damage, I did a lot of falling in the beginning days.

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  10. I remember Tara Lipinski! I didn't really follow her, but a lot of my friends did. I actually took an ice skating class in college...though all I have to show for it is the ability to skate, stop, and turn a crooked circle. Sometimes I can spin in place for about 180 or 270 degrees :)

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    1. Oh and backwards! I can do a really slow, really awkward backwards skate!

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  11. Thanks so much for your comment, it means a lot!
    My mum used to do figure skating when she was a little girl, so I have a soft spot for that sport!

    Have a great day,
    -Kati

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  12. Oh, wow, this post brought back so many memories, I used to watch figure skating with my family all of the time. I was always captivated by unique outfits, when it reflected their personality. I did like Katarina Witt, and Kristi Yamaguchi. :)

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  13. I am one of those seemingly rare people who is completely disinterested in olympic sports and also in television. Put those to qualities together and that means I don't watch figure skating-lol. I would watch if if we were hanging out together and you wanted to watch it, but I don't go out of my way to watch it. I recognise all of the figure skating names you mentioned, and I was around 12 years old I think when the Dorothy Hamill haircut was a big sensation. I'm Canadian so I have Canadian figure skating names in my head too. I think I could be labelled of the Elvis Stoyko generation. I'm not sure how to spell that. Does that make me a bad Canadian?

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  14. of cause - katarina witt. we are from the same corner of the world.
    can´t skate because had no skates as a child. find it to dangerous to learn it as an adult. i´m fine with skis, when you fall in to the snow its soft :-)

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  15. Awesome! lol, my mom told me that my haircut was a Dorothy Hamill haircut! :P I was always a fan of Michelle Kwan.

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  16. Ally, you made my day! We had booked off some time in February for a trip, and the trip plans fell through so I'm looking at a week alone by myself. I thought "At least it's during the Olympics" but that wasn't much consolation... it is the Winter Olympics after all... until I read this and remembered FIGURE SKATING!!!!

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  17. I love figure skating but have never had anyone that I have been cheering for. I will also be watching Curling at the Winter Olympics.

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  18. I was huge into figure skating as a little girl, and while I never entertained Olympic dreams or anything near that magnitude, I did enjoy taking lessons for a couple of years and skating all throughout my childhood. When it came to the Olympics, I tended to cheer for the (fellow) Canadians like Kurt Browning and Elvis Stojko.

    ♥ Jessica

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  19. i cannot skate at all! i met sarah hughes two weekends ago! she won gold at salt lake. it's my fave Olympic sport.

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