I think that's true. Abbey will look gangly and messy (as always) but the judges seem to love her. I think they want to create the illusion that Natalie has competition, even though she doesn't. Her main flaw is Artem's choreography and bad music choices.

Not exactly representative (because they had acrobatic R'n'R backgrounds), but if you want high swing aerials, Yuval and Natalie were the ones to watch...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5mVFlVMIoe4

Definitely illustrates the point that there are no height restrictions!

When was this, late 90's? They have a very smooth WCS ish style that is firmly out of fashion now

Acrobatic Rock and Roll is pure bonkers

Lindy hop type lifts suit more compact people than those with longer limbs who can look gangly.

So Abbey & Sophie in particular will have to control their arms & legs.

However who know what the judges will do

Monkseal says the swingathon scores have never made much difference before.

Just glad poor Mark doesn't have to do it.

Oh my giddy aunt, that was brilliant! I felt I was watching an optical illusion at 2:18, my brain wouldn't compute what my eyes were seeing

Thanks so much for posting this Dave.

Hate the swing-a-thon! The cameras only show the TV viewers tiny snippets of each couple. We cannot judge properly who we really think is best couple. This gives the judges even more control than normal by being able to award top marks to their favourites. Could benefit less popular dancers if the judges like them. Hard for the male celebs who need lots of stamina to do all the lifting. The swing-a-thon is a pretty good indicator of final finishing order of the competition.

I wonder if people are underestimating the effect that the swingathon points can have. They will be allocated from 1 to 6. Last week the main scores, disregarding Mark who has gone, went from 33 to 40, so essentially this is equivalent to 1 to 8 . It is only a two point wider range than the swingathon. The whole thing could virtually be reduced to a tie.

In some respects I hope it does. Then we will know it's public vote putting them through. Craig said on ITT that the public would have to choose well we can't really unless they are all on the same score. Not likely to happen though.

I doubt there will be more than one tie, if any.

I'll be interested at least to see if the Swingathon results correlate with overall standings. Series 8's Swingathon order was pretty much a direct match to the remaining contestants' finishing places. Swap Jason with Alex in 9 and you get a good overall match there too.

Possibly:

1.Natalie
2.Sophie
3.Abbey
4.Patrick
5.Ashley
6.Susanna

But I could be so wrong, it could be any order really

At the end of the show, the Swingathon points are added to the main dance scores but then they are translated, as usual, to 1-6 points so all it does is reinforce leaderboard placing ready for the viewers' votes, also translated as 1-6 points.
I don't think there is any more chance of a tie than normal.

I think:

6 points - Natalie
5 points - Abbey
4 points - Susanna
3 points - Ashley
2 points - Sophie
1 point - Patrick

As is being said, it could go any way (it probably depend on who gets it right on the night and who will falter on the pressure).

Based on technique only, the outcome probably should come down to:

1. Natalie
2. Sophie
3. Ashley
4. Abbey
5. Patrick
6. Susanna

It is difficult to tell though, but I really can't imagine Susanna (even with her stamina) lasting very long.

If Sophie's lifts work (nice picture of that....uhmmm derriere, by the way), then she could end up in the top 3 of the swingathon (however, if the lifts look clumsy, she might be out very soon).

How do you know when we haven't seen their techniques yet?

I am not saying there will be a tie, I am saying there could be. If the judges so chose, they can use those 1-6 points to produce almost any outcome they like, including almost everyone on the same score. 1-6 sounds very little but given that there is usually very little difference between the scores it could be very significant. Or, of course, the judges may just use them to reinforce the existing order.

Both previous swingathons made a difference to the leaderboard but I doubt they had much impact on the actual result.

Series 8 : The swingathon result brings Scott down from a clear 3rd to joint 3rd with Matt but based on how the public vote fell, it wouldn't have made any difference if he had stayed above him - he lost to Matt and Pamela in the public vote, and that would have done for him either way.

Series 9 : The swingathon brought Chelsee from 3rd to 2nd, above Jason, but I doubt being below him would have made any difference to the ultimate result for the week, given what the public vote in subsequent weeks told us about the strength of her vote relative to both him and Holly.

It also pulled Anita down from 5th (above Alex) to 6th (below her). It's possible that Anita having 1 more point might have saved her, and dumped Robbie into the bottom 2 against Holly, where he almost certainly would have gone home a week earlier. I would imagine Anita, who was running on fumes by that point, would have gone the following week anyway, just swapping the final order minorly. (There's also a very very small chance she could have overhauled Jason, leading to a Holly vs Jason bottom 2 where Holly would have gone home, but it doesn't really seem likely).

Edited : because I realised there was no dance-off in series 9, and all the better it was for it

(Fan girl moment, I really dig your historical perspective on situations, thanks for posting!)

I'm interested in the revelation that this time round the first section of the Swingathon is going to be choreographed. I'm wondering if it has been put together by Ryan and Jenny (might go stalk their Facebook in a bit) it will be good to see them all in context (I presume that the choreographed bit is at least in part for the camera angles, so hopefully we will see them all at least a bit? This is probably one of my Pollyanna moments!)

Training footage on last nights ITT didn't show much for this dance, the bit of Artem and Natalie looked very Jive influenced, and as there were no aerials in the clip, maybe they are going for a more subtle less crowd pleasing tactic.

I'm still thinking that Patrick and Anya could end up quite high in this, as long as they don't run out of energy.

Do the couples have to do the swingathon immediately after the last person has finished their first dance? If so I wonder whether the order in which the couples dance will affect their performance in the swingathon.

Well the last couple has to change so I expect there will be some kind of filler. Perhaps a pro dance or a demo of the swingathon won't be able to be immediate.

I think they will record the swingathon

I was under the impression the Swingathon was first.

The swinghaton is always last. After all the couples performed their individual dances.

Susanna jive was not too shabby in week ONE her jive action was ok think she will not be bottom

and dont think Nat will top it prob be Abbey

a bit indifferent to the swingathon so nearly didn't come in the thread, but so glad i did to see that amazing dance. thanks for posting it.

Thank you.