The swingathon was quite clearly a dancing marathon and as judges pointed out 'stamina' won the day

If that's the case Matt was robbed - again!

Matt had just finished his main dance just before he had to do the swingathon and yet Kara was the first to do their main dance so they had hours to rest up - not suprising who won that then

I actually want Kara to win the competition but feel sorry for Matt because it all seems to be against him

Matt was disadvantaged, but not robbed. He lost stamina due to the fact he has no recovery time after that salsa. But it's clear Kara was the best in the swingathon. No complaints there.

Just to correct, it was Pam who did the first main dance.

No she wasn't, it was Pam and James who were on first.

I wonder if someone who was in the audience can confirm that the swingathon was actually danced so soon after the main routines. Matt had well got his breath back and looked extremely joyful during the Swingathon, so I do wonder if those suggesting it was taped at a different point in the show, may be right.

You say "disadvataged" - i say "robbed"


Fair cop - just meant Kara had, lets say 'plenty' of time to rest and Matt had No time before the dance of pure stamina

in other words - given level playing field he would trounced her

Level playing field would be that Matt is given a better pro partner. Enough said.

It was clear swingathon was live. The celebs and pros were changed into the swingathon costumes one by one after their dance, and Tess quite clear asked Matt and Aliona to run to the changing room before the VT.

Matt looked cheerful but he was clearly panting in the end, and he was already looking like he was sweating at the beginning of the dance.

Also my dad's bigger than your dad and my team's better than your team?

Fan wars make me larrrrrrf

It's possible the first part of the programme, i.e. the 5 individual dances were recorded at about 8 o'clock and the swingathon was live, allowing a period of rest between.Thcouples changing costume and being hurried away to get changed were simply tools to fool everyone into thinking it was all live.

Well, yes, I guess there is this possibility.

I did love Matt in the swingathon - incidentally this is where they did pure jive/lindy hop/rock and roll as opposed to the Austin Powers routine,- and he clearly has stamina. Perhaps they should have shown the recap of the main dances in between to give them some recovery time? They are usually really good at fillers!

Gosh, I thought we were watching dancing and not football Wuz robbed? Que?

I'm just waiting for someone to post, 'the boy dun well', except of course that he didn't. The salsa was no salsa and the whole thing was a shambles.

I blame Aliona for not having a clue what she is doing (and just showing off (herself) every week) and Matt for not noticing he's dancing with a giant ego and consequently picking up a lot of very bad dance habits from a dippy pro.

Both of them should at least have learnt the basic salsa step. I don't think it's too much to ask.

Yup, even I could see they were too 'generous' with their basic forward and backwards salsa step. If the other pros who are not familiar with salsa could do some decent salsa, I really can't imagine why Aliona can't and couldn't teach Matt to do so. Shambles. Incompetence. Couldn't care less. These are terms that come mind.

Except I'm supporting Kara to win the competition - but here I say Matt should won swingathon

Some of us can be objective and say each dance as they see it without prejudice

Matt can NEVER win the swingathon! He's male and in the swingathon the females can be 'enabled' with lifts and lifts, but the males actually have to DO the lifts. So coming second is the best Matt could do, no more. Nothing about robbing.

he couldn't trounce her anyway - he's too stiff, needs to loosen up and then let's talk

he's still better than scott, gavbot or pammie though

'Trounced'? 'Robbed'? He would have got one point more and Kara one less.

What's your recovery time after exercise anyway? He's a young, really fit guy - I hardly think 1.5 minutes dancing is going to inconvenience him with 5 minutes break before another dance.

as it happens, from what I saw I think they were the best in the Swing anyway!

And another thing Matt seems to be under the impression that "giving it your all" is all that's required. Someone* needs to disabuse him. It's "how", not "how much", and sometimes less is more.

*And guess who that should be?

Definitely NOT Aliona, of course not! No, she's there because 'she's worth it'.

Actually it was a game of two halves wasn't it?

Much as I admire Kara I have to say that I agree with this. She worked hard in that swingathon but to my untrained eye it seemed like it was Artem who won that for them, he was amazing.

I do think that having the male as the pro dancer is an advantage in that sort of competition. Still, I suppose that that particular advantage didn't work for Pamela and James so much, even though they were third I thought they were lucky to get that, so maybe I'm wrong.

It did for Pam, she had the advantage over Scott. Scott's rapidly losing weight and his wits in the competition, and he just couldn't keep up despite having rest time after his main dance. It goes to show that James managed to keep Pam safe until she's the third to be eliminated, kudos to James.

That is so true.......Aliona needs to learn less is more sometimes......unfortunately in training she said their Tango was 'full on' which seems to be her favourite expression.

I don't know whether I'm over the moon or sick as a parrot reading this thread

They, in actual fact, had a little over 26 minutes more rest than Matt and Aliona. Not a huge amount and certainly not "hours".

Really, it's swings and roundabouts. One couple had to come last, so whoever that was would have been at a slight disadvantage. To counter-act that though, the final couple also had the so-called "pimp" slot.