While commenting on another thread today I analysed my favourite Strictly celebs over the years and realised that I tended to favour men over women. This isn't the result of ovary-voting though but is rather due to my tendency to appreciate people doing something out of their comfort zone and pulling off something we never thought they could do. I get more pleasure in seeing the likes of Colin Jackson, Ben, Gavin, Austin or Ramps diving into the deep end than I do seeing the likes of Denise Van Outen, Pamela or Natalie tweaking their day job.

When it comes to recruiting the younger female celebs do the producers need to start using more imagination and start going for sportswomen, comedians etc. who can go on a journey, rather than glamorous, yet perhaps boring, actresses, singers and presenters? I'm trying hard to think of a female celeb on Strictly who has managed to do a Ramps or a Gough.

(PS - I do not want this to be a Natalie-bashing thread. I'm just asking why the females who go far on Strictly always seem to be professional performers, is this why they fail to capture the public's imagination, and do the producers need to do something about it to give us female 'journey' contestants).

Matina Hingis?

Actually pre show she was my favourite and one of the few I had heard of.

I know there have been sportswomen etc. on Strictly over the years but I have been watching a few old routines on YouTube this afternoon (Austin, Ramps, Louis) and am wondering why it is extremely rare for a completely amateur female celeb to pull off that kind of performance. Maybe as viewers we have less patience with the likes of Martina Hingis in the early stages and are more forgiving of Ben and Ramps types who then get the chance to loosen up. Do we see the charm of Ben giving it his all but sneer at Rachel Riley for not being accomplished from the get-go? I really want to see a female, truly amateur celeb do a Ramps. As viewers I think we like sportsmen who 'come out and give it a go' and not actresses/singers who are good but not on a journey. It would be good if they could recruit younger female celebs with the potential for a more exciting story.

High heels?

Yup.I fear so..

I feel you have missed a few poeple out.

There are other sports females other than Martina. Victoria was also a sports girl (not great), but then there was Jade Johnson and Denise Lewis (both much better and lasted longer). .

And we have got behind male performers before, even if they've not won. Tom Chambers won, he was an actor. And Matt Di Angelo and Ricky Whittle got to the final as actors, so they too were of a peformance related just like Natalie and Kara.

And Zoe (a TV presenter) was better than Darren Gough (imo) in that series, and he won because he was particularly liked as a person and improved from where he started to were he ended up, though where he ended up was still not the best dancer by the end of the series. And how Chris Hollins won, I don't know.

Natasha won and was a presenter too, and she, when you look back now was average, if you compare her to how good celebs can be nowadays.
If you look at Alesha, she was competant, but compare her to Kara and Natalie and she would have come behind them imo if they had shared a series
So I'm not sure where your argument is going.

Denise Lewis (runner up), Jade Johnson (out through injury). Both would have been very good winners.

I liked Jade Johnson and felt she has a chance of winning before her injury.

Denise Lewis was a beautiful dancer, just unfortunate that she was a competitor in a year where there were quite a few exceptionally good dancers and those with a "good journey".

Rumba
Samba
Quickstep (absolutely fab-u-lous)
Tango
Jive
Waltz
Paso Doble
Cha Cha
Freestyle

I doubt it. She had huge charisma, could dance, if not technically perfect, she exuded joy. I think she might have had a battle with Kara but I'm pretty certain she would have beaten Natalie hands down with many viewers.

But to answer the OP. I quite like the mix as it is, I think presenters maybe have it harder than actors, dependant on past experience of course. It was a shame Martina went out so fast, I'd been looking forward to her being there.

I would imagine the obvious answer to why they don't hire more sportswomen is that there aren't enough famous ones, given the focus of sports coverage. There are no female team sports with a high enough profile to recruit from, and in the only other sports discipline that's produced a high standard male dancer, Beth Tweddle was snapped up by Dancing On Ice. To be honest, even picking up Jade Johnson was a bit of a dip in the bargain bucket (as much as I loved her). A male sports personality with as low a profile as that would never have been signed up.

I think there is a still a widespread perception that muscled women are not beautiful. Fitness is admired but the muscles required by elite sportswomen go beyond that. Powerful shoulders and strong waist muscles don't match an hourglass figure. These women can still look great in beautiful dress, but they might not get public votes when they are exposed on a dance floor trying to make classic dance shapes.

Denise Lewis was very good from the start, so there was no sporting journey to be had there and Victoria Pendleton crumbled as soon as the going got tough,

Becky Adlington could be an interesting one (she has very low self esteem, or so it appears on IAC) but I guess we'll never know.

I'd like to see Nicola Adams take part as a sporty women- and plenty of scope for a journey there.

I'd love to see Jessica Ennis on SCD !

I can see her doing Strictly, once she has retired from athletics.

And I would like England cricketer, James Anderson, to take part.