Had a look to see if anyone has raised it already, but can't see anything.

I thought there was the unwritten rule that if Dancer 1 made mistakes in the dance off, then they lost if Dancer 2 made no mistakes, even if Dancer 2 was a "worse" dancer?

Because Mark made a number of mistakes in his dance but still went through.

Or was that "rule" changed? Didn't see ITT last night so don't know if it was raised(?).

I was half watching ITT last night and I think Zoe mentioned something about Mark making mistakes to Craig and why he was saved and Craig said something like "we saved the better dancer" or words to that effect

I always understood that the dancers were judged purely on what they did in the dance off and the "cleaner" of the 2 dancers were saved...........

I think the rules change depending upon who in actually in the dance off - Mark made more mistakes than Tim BUT he is the better dancer therefore the judges saved him, despite the mistakes he made

Why go through the charade? They could just point at someone and say 'I like you better'. Perhaps it's different if the two in the DO are closer in ability. But still... I agree with the OP's implicit point

There is no rule that any dancer who makes a mistake in the dance off is automatically out. The rule is that the judges save the dancer who gives the best performance in the dance off.

A very bad dancer who performs a very simple routine, probably badly, but without mistakes is not going to beat a good dancer who performs a complicated routine, probably well, with a couple of minor mistakes in it.

Agree in principle, though I couldn't see that Mark's "run a few laps" routine was so much more complicated than Tim's cape swishing to overcome the mistakes he made when trying the few steps included.

I don't think there are any rules. I've seen people saved for less mistakes, for more potential, for dancing a harder dance, for improving more in the dance off or no explanation at all. They can save who they like, for any reason.

So far it's been straight-forward for them this year. But I think we are very close to some very difficult dance-off decisions, where half the audience would save one and half the other. I think this could be a year where the judges will wish there was no dance-off and they could just blame the public.

(Personally I think - on the whole - you get fairer results with no dance-off. People don't expect the better ones to be saved by the judges.)

no idea! OP asked a question, just trying to answer it

That encapsulates my understanding of how the Dance Off works.

Good Question actually,

So if Scott were in the dance off with say Simon, Scott danced his normal poor level of dancing and Simon fell over and was unable to finish the dance.
In those instances would Scott go through otherwise why would Scott even bother dancing in the first place?

There is no question Simon is the better over all dancer, but I must admit I think I have heard the judges say, " based on this performance only " ,

It is bad enough that there is a dance off but if the judges are just going to always save the better overall dancers, why would the worse dancer even have to dance?

Then it depends of the hubby of one of them is booked to appear as the Star Turn the next week

I think the judges pay lip service to the idea of it being soley on the dance off so the one who all but knows they are going home - so far Gregg, Jennifer and Tim have virtually done their 'thanks for having me' speech before they've danced again - has the illusion, at least, that what they do can make a difference.

It would be interesting to know how many times when the decision comes down to casting vote of head judge Len that it actually tallies with the public vote.

There is no consistency in the decision as to who leaves in the dance off - the judges have saved people for various reasons - and its very annoying when they keep moving the goalposts and saving because

X was better than Y in the dance off
X has more potential to go further than Y
X has been consistently the better dancer in the series
X really upped their game in the dance off and is saved even though they scored less than y on the main show.
X made fewer mistakes than y in the dance off.

Rather than just saving the one who performed best in the dance off - why make them do it again if what happens during the dance off performance is irrelevant?

But in all of the dance offs there have only been three that I really disagreed with....

Cherie vs Lisa Snowdon, and Austin vs Lisa Snowdon in their series - the judges were determined to get Lisa to the final at all costs that year and anyone against her in the dance off was toast no matter what happened

Most unjust eviction of all - Gaby logan going out to the Penny Lancaster just because Rod Stewart ws booked to perform the next week. IIRC, both of them danced the Samba that week - and Gaby outdanced and outperformed Penny in both the main show and the dance off but was still evicted.

I hate the dance off - the judges have already had one say in the result and it should be the lowest scoring couple who go. There are always shock exits in these type of shows but as the public actually pay to vote, their opinion should carry more weight than the judges.

That said - this series the decisions on who should go out of the bottom 2 on the night have been correct

Correct, and as it should be.

Gabby was technically the better dancer but she was dull and joyless in her determination to do it perfectly. I remember rooting for Len to put Penny through even though she wasn't as good a dancer - and given there wasn't really a better basis for doing it if we look at other precedents, perhaps personal preference regardless of technique came into it.

That said, I also remember Len looking cross, so perhaps the Rod Stewart explanation's the right one after all. But I just wanted to speak up and say that for all it might have been unfair on paper, it sure as hell felt like the right thing to do in my living room

Back on topic, this is why my husband complains about sports with an 'artistic' component, because he says anything you can win/lose on someone else's preference isn't a fair game. You only have to spend 3 minutes on here to see that people like different dancers for different reasons. Why pretend the judges are any different? I say let them get on with sending whoever they like home, and thank our stars that most of the time it works as a method of getting rid of the dross.

In the horticultural world, the judges start with full marks of, say, 10 which would be the equivalent of a perfect specimen and then deduct points for deviation from the agreed definition of perfect.

The following will perhaps give you some insight into what makes a perfect gladiolus spike...
http://www.gladworld.org/Chapter%20Ten.pdf

It's pretty complex but I guess dancing comps might well be judged in a similar way. You hear Craig talking about deducting points for an illegal lift, etc.

Mark may have made more mistakes, but his overall standard would still come out higher as the bits he did right were still way better than Tim's.

That's how the revised marking in gymnastics (and, I think, figure skating) works as well; you have a difficulty mark for the moves you say you'll do, then you have an execution mark, which starts at 10 and then marks are taken away for lack of precision, falling over, stepping outside boundaries etc. There's then a calculation made between the two scores so that people get credit for the difficulty of their moves as well as how well they did them.

Where this deviates from Strictly a bit is that young competitors who have perfect execution can often get themselves quite high up leaderboards when others with greater technical skill mess up their performances. Tom Daley made his name by executing simple dives well as a very young competitor. Claudia Fragapane, the Commonwealth gold medallist in gymnastics, is similar; she made two World Champs apparatus finals and the top ten in the all-around by performing relatively simple routines with a high degree of skill and flair.

By those criteria, I think Mark would still have gone through as his difficulty rating must be way higher than Tim's and Tim didn't exactly perform with loads of flair. But it's definitely a good way of giving credit for not mucking things up

I don't remember Cherie v Lisa

I do remember Austin v Lisa - IMO the judges called this one right although I accept that Lisa was lucky to have had the waltz that week.

Penny v Gabby - this should never have happened but that is down to the public rather than the judges. Personally I feel very strongly that I would have saved Gabby (as did Craig) but I wouldn't say that necessarily means that Len was incorrect in his casting vote, just that his opinion was influenced by different things to mine.

If that were the unwritten rule it would be a remarkably stupid one.

My understanding is that the judges are supposed to base the decision on the overall quality of the two DO performances (of which 'mistakes' are just one of a range of aspects). There's also the issue of what constitutes a 'mistake'.

Colin Salmon was voted off against Richard Arnold in the dance-off, despite there being about 9 or 10 points difference between the two.

Well in that case Richard noticably forgot the routine when he did it the first time and didn't the second.

I think all of the judges probably have their own criteria regarding what matters in terms of saving people. Len got the howling fantoids last year over Dave and Ashley's eliminations due to "mistakes" that Mark and Patrick had supposedly made which the other three judges had ignored, whereas on another occasion Craig quite happily voted to save Ben over Mark for a routine in which the former was crashing round like a dying hippo.

I think Mark made many glaring errors in the dance off last week but even if the judges had been giving scores he would have been scoring 4-6 instead of Tim's 3-5. Mark would probably have gone out against a well danced routine by Alison, Steve, or Sunetra.

It was this that I was focussing on. And I know that Craig and others have also openly stated the reason for eliminating a contestant is because they made mistakes in the Dance Off. Not saying I agree with it, nor that it isn't a stupid logic. I am just annoyed that they change their argument according to who they want to stay.

I was assuming they were applying the logic of "no mistakes" and so as soon as Mark started I feared for him because his original dance was the first time he'd got it right ever, so there was always the risk he would go wrong - which he did.

I fail to see why you could make mistakes when you just walk around with very few dance steps included in your routine - which is what I saw Tim do.

Watch Scott and find out!

If a celeb is obviously poorer than another one, the dance off is pointless. It's obvious who will go through, and the celebs know that too. No amount of advice from the judges telling them to "get out there and give it some welly" will make any difference. When Scott finally gets into the bottom two everyone will know the other celeb is through. The Dance Off is just a last dance for the poorer celeb.
It's only in the later stages of the competition that the dance off takes on any significance.