Lucky you! Be nice to see those pics


Very excited about the Worlds. Do you know where they're being held this time and when?


I thought Elena's programme looked that little bit more sophisticated. I'm glad she won bronze.

The Worlds are being held in Nice, France between March 26th and April 1st!

I hope we get BBC Red button coverage, it may not be as good as Eurosport but for those who don't have it it gave us the chance to see the Europeans!

Yes, I agree about the Finnish girl, I find her a bit boring as I do all the Finnish girls, she got massive points for presentation etc that is what keeps her high up.

My favourite 3 too, I was so happy for Elene, I have a bit of a soft spot for her

I agree, Elena deserved her medal, the judging was right on this occasion.

Sadly coverage of the Gala got bumped from Eurosport following the epic tennis match. There are highlights on tomorrow morning at 11:50 though.

It's ridiculous, they have 2 channels now and still can't fit in the ice-skating. Yesterday, they replayed the Murray match, why could they not show the ice-skating?

That seems to be pairs and mens, there's the men's free in the afternoon too - but the gala seems to be on Tuesday at 3.30pm according to my sky planner.

I agree, Plushenko was a privilege to watch. The other highlight (apart from Costa's catsuit) was Polina Korobeynikova's routines. If that's what she's like at 15, what is sh going to be like in a few years? Her burlesque routing was good as well, although i raised eyebrows at a 15 year old doing burlesque.

So agree. Came home early to watch and then they over-ran the tennis and went in to Bowls of all things. What is it with ice skating?

Viewing figures most probably. They used to show it all until the past year or so, even when they only had the one channel.

I really enjoyed the Europeans, I didn't watch the Ladies or the Pairs but I did enjoy the Ice Dance and the Men. I am so glad the French couple won as I loved their FD, and Plushenko was great even though he was injured. He seemed to be enjoying himself a little more this year than previous years. I agree about the ladies, the Russians are going to be a force to reckon with at Sochi.

Perhaps its just me, but I thought Gachinski was not that happy on the podium, I think it was because his marks were rather low.
Overall it was an enjoyable competition, am looking forward to seeing Worlds now

Really enjoyed the Europeans but was very dissapointed with Eurosports coverage so was reduced to watching most of it via live streaming.

My favourite discipline was definitely the Pairs, liked all the 3 Russian couples was hoping to the Italians would push for the bronze but they were a bit of it. Really impressed with Plushenko, was never his biggest fan but his performances this week were brilliant, he was the performer of the week for me.

In the Ladies would have had Polina K on the podium at the expense of Korpi. Kostner is lovely to watch but her technical content is not at the top level. Hard to call the Ice Dance but I liked the French couple and the 3 Russians, was also impressed with the couple from Azerbaijan.

I really enjoyed watching the red button coverage of the Europeans. I managed to catch most of the Ice Dance, Mens and Ladies, but missed the Pairs.

A quick question for those in the know - what is the difference between Ice Dance and Pairs? Is Pairs just a couple performing the same moves as the individual Mens and Ladies?

It used to be pretty clear cut, i.e. in pair skating you had more separate skating from the partners, non-assisted jumps and higher lifts. Nowadays it's getting more blurred, especially with all the mandatory twizzles and pair-spins in the so called "free" dance!

The pair spins that the top dance couples do now are of a really high quality but still easy to distinguish between pairs & Dance. As well as the overhead lifts you also have elements like throw jumps, side by side jumps & spins, death spirals etc. that you don't get in Dance.

I was exaggerating a bit TR, and I do know that there are plenty of clear distinctions between dance and pairs still. I just have never got used to the inclusion of pair-spins, twizzles and that bit more separate skating which now features in dance compared to T&D's winning days. I'm just old fashioned, I guess.

Nothing wrong with that. I do have some misgivings about the scoring system though I appreciate they had to revamp it after the judging scandals. And I guess when they did this they had no choice but to introduce more technical elements for Dance.

I must admit that for all T&D were ground (ice?) breakers, the amount of licence taken by some couples in subsequent years with the rules did get a bit out of hand. That said, without those trends I suspect there are some fabulous couples and routines that we never would have seen in the late 80s and 90s in particular

To flip this round a bit, in terms of pairs producing almost dance-like routines in terms of performance (but still within pairs rules in terms of technique etc) possibly my favourite pairs routine of all time is this one:

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

And around the same era as the above link... (1 year later)

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

Cheers Caro...flippin' heck...Sean with hair!

Be interesting to dig out some more performances from pros who were involved in international comps (I know some have pretty much always been show skaters).

Brooke's programme form when she won the US Champs with her partner Ben Okolski

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7bAgZ4L504Q

Also a clip of Mark & his former partner Christina Chotwood from the Worlds a couple of years ago

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xm3LjsEQBSY

I have some photos I took at the championships up on FLickr if anyone is interested

Ladies Short

http://www.flickr.com/photos/7561307...7629116214475/

Free Dance

http://www.flickr.com/photos/7561307...7629117200003/

Had a great time, we were sitting right behind the tech controllers which gave us a brilliant insight into how they check levels etc. It was fascinating

Cheers for all that stuff guys. You know the other thing that old-fashioned me cannot get her head around is the use of songs with lyrics in competition...it smacks too much of "gala" to me.

Have only just found this thread and thanks for the lovely photos - I'm even in one. You certainly must have had a good seat and very good camera!

I was at the Championships all week and was very impressed with the way Sheffield hosted it. I've read back on this thread and something has been made of a week's ticket costing £160. I can tell you that is VERY reasonable. In recent years you could have expected to pay 2-3 times that amount. I was pleased Sheffield priced the event as it did and that was probably one factor in it being well attended. Hopefully the success of the event will encourage Sheffield to bid for Worlds, as is rumoured.

Highlight of the week for me was Plushenko. Brilliant skating and it obviously meant so much to him.

Interesting to see in your pics quite a few of Kolbe & Caruso. They were an interesting new find for me and I think they could do well, if they stay together. Stefano in particular has got that someting special on the ice. His favourite skater is listed as Maxim Stavisky and I can see an influence there.

You got some good shots of the medal ceremony too. Isn't Elena Ilinykh just the most stunning young lady. I hardly notice her partner when she is on the ice!