As a long-time lurker on this forum I often see celebs and professionals criticised for ambition and 'wanting it' (the Glitterball). Now, the consequences of ambition can be bad, e.g.paying someone to whack your rival on the legs with an iron bar (as happened a few years ago in the figure skating world), but why is it wrong to want to win?

This criticism doesn't seem to be sexist, male pros are lashed as much as female ones, although IMHO female celebs get in the neck more than male ones. Is it that as a nation we still prefer the gifted amateur, rather than the person who toils away for years and years before breaking through? We prefer people for whom taking part is more important rather than winning?

I ask this not to 'get at' forum members, celebs or pros, I'm genuinely interested in why it is. On my part, one of the joys of SCD is seeing celebs (talented or not) fall in love with dance, and that doesn't always seem to correlate with (from what we are shown on the VTs) an ambition to win.

Absolutely nothing.

As long as you are gracious rather than arrogant and don't try to manipulate people/viewers.

Ambition is good.

Exactly! Attitude is so important. I'm all for someone achieving their dreams, but not if they're nasty or deceptive in going about it.

Can't speak for anyone as a nation, but I think that, in the celeb sense, Strictly is more the place for the gifted amateur dancer than for the trained dancer.


I think that is sometimes used as an excuse.

Personally, I think there is nothing wrong with an ambition to win. In fact it is a good thing. But from the SCD producers' point of view, the show is about much more than ambition - hence the (sometimes deliberately misleading) VTs.

Thanks for the replies. I guess we should be thankful that we don't have 'sledging' in SCD

It is very split because a celeb training for long hours tends to be admired and held up to show they deserve to stay in and people being lost in the Strictly 'bubble' and 'superfans' also tends to be said as a good thing. Pros 'phoning it in' are not approved of. Certainly no celeb is supposed to imply that they don't mind if they go home or they are not bothered if people voted for them or not - they're meant to be desperate to stay in and tearfully grateful the public saved them. Some people will judge celebs on whether they mouthed 'thank you' at the camera when they were saved. So I don't think it's as straight forward as people who 'want it' - bad, people who don't show that they 'want it' - good.

I want to see people fall in love with dancing and/or having a brilliant relationship with their pro. I am less engaged with people who seem to be on Strictly for their profile and it could be dancing or cooking or running or tiddlywinks and it would be just the same, it's just about demonstrating their popularity. That's fair enough but it has no romance for me. And while I want the celebs and pros to love the show and care about it, I think they should always be prepared to be in the b2 - acting like they were entitled to go through will wind me up very quickly.

One of the things I like about Strictly is that their careers aren't in the balance. It is only a glitterball. It's become compulsory on X Factor to cry constantly to prove you 'want it' more than life itself. I like that on Strictly they aren't meant to cry and say how it's everything they've worked for and it would mean the world to their nan and all that and I'd hate that to change. It is meant to be a bit of fun.

There is nothing wrong with ambition, all the celebs must have it somewhere or they wouldn't be successful in their day jobs.

However, a burning ambition to win Strictly is a bit silly - it doesn't actually *mean* anything. Except you were better at pretending to dance/more popular than 11 other famous people.

Unless you are the pro part of the couple, then there is some professional pride at stake!

I think the celebs who go furthest in the contest are the ones who show they've really fallen in love with the dancing. Once we get to this stage every year, that really shines through.

I think the VTs can be really tricky to negotiate. For viewers who don't watch ITT, and don't get to hear the partnerships talking about their experience in more depth, they can sometimes gloss over some of the finer points of their training and personal involvement.

Welcome to the forum MissT . Nothing wrong with ambition as long as you don't trample on others or put yourself out of commission in the process.

Natalie seems to be the most ambitious but nearly put herself out of action by striving too hard . I think Susanna is the next most ambitious but she seems to have the balance right, of course aided by a good teacher .
The rest seem just to be enjoying the experience and I love Abbey's happy approach to her SCD experience .

The thing about Strictly is that it's not really like most competitions where evenly (or at least fairly) matched people compete against each other. There's always such a broad range of age, physical fitness, natural ability and past experience amongst Strictly contestants that there would just be no point in the majority of them taking part if the only end goal was to win. And let's face it, what do you get even if you do win? A bit of plastic tat? Public approval? A temporary boost to your profile? I can only really think of Alesha Dixon and maybe Louis Smith as past Strictly winners who have benefited from it.

I tend to think that a more useful attitude for Strictly contestants to have is a desire to learn to dance to the best of their ability rather than a steely eyed determination to get their hands on the glitterball(/piece of plastic tat).

The professionals are the true ambitious half of the partnerships rather than the celebrities despite appearances to the contrary.

What happens is the celebrities want to stay because they love or fall in love with dancing. Winning is often an accidental by product of that enthusiasm for dancing. In some cases you can see where the love affair with dancing has lost out to the sheer hard grind of the competition.

I totally agree with you. Ambition is fine as long as it doesn't become the be all and all of your world. I am reminded of that famous saying about "be careful how you treat people on your way up as one day you'll be waving them on your way down" (something like that)

Natalie has her mad moments but never seems to have fun in training it must be just like another job for Artem

Susanna has loads of fun but she drives me mad with her fakeness and disingenuousness. As somebody else said she would trample on her own granny to win the glitter ball.

Abbey takes her training seriously but still has loads of fun and basically just wants to give her best each time she performs to make herself and her teacher Aljaz proud.

The negativity surrounding Natalie combined with her collapse has knocked any ambition out of her. Now it just seems she is enjoying the journey as can be seen by her less polished routines the last couple of shows.

Most women don't mind ambitious men but can't abide the same trait in women for some reason. Women are much harder on other women than men usually are.

SO true, and I wonder if this thread is a thinly veiled attempt for folks to continue in this vein?

The women in SCD get SO much stick for ambition. I wonder if Ben was graciously ambitious as he made his way to play for England?

I am a woman so are you saying I'm jealous of the women I mention?

As I said ambition is not a bad thing per se but just how you use it and how it affects other people to achieve your goal.

I didn't mention jealousy but your comments about Susanna are based on what?

No you didn't mention jealousy I'm sorry for mentioning it but that's what people usually say if a woman has a go at another woman.


Well I did say that somebody else mentioned her trampling over her granny to win the glitter ball. It was only a joke but what I see is someone who is very media savvy very in your face always says the right thing and she strikes me as very insincere. When she says she doesn't think she is a 10 (regarding judges scoring) I just don't believe her. She is no shrinking wallflower.

How can you trample over anyone to win Strictly? You work at your dance during the week and perform it on the night. The others perform their dances. The judges and public choose their favourite based on a mix of personality and dance skill. No one is putting trip wires on the dance floor to destabilise other celebs or tranquillisers in their water or chalk in their fake tan!

Many things have been said about a number of the celebs, mostly based on opinion. I just find it sad that details seem to have been concocted to reinforce an unkind opinion.

You have said you don't believe her, That's fine. I happen to believe her and that's fine too. It's the, 'She's obviously thinking this or that or doing this or that' which irritate me. If those points were true they would be known by her nearest and dearest only, not someone on a forum.

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I'm sorry I never meant to be unkind or nasty honestly.

I'm not aware that you have, ever. I was generalising on the negative comments-sorry, I should have been more specific.

No worries, I am sometimes quite slow in understanding things properly plus your name Dragonlady frightens me somewhat but you're ok.

My user name is a hangover from my days as a full time secondary school teacher. The kids invented it and I did overhear one youngster tell a new kid in the class that he had it on good authority that I could breathe fire.

There's no need to be afraid-I'm not half the dragon I used to be!!!!!!