~When Michelle Kwan and Todd Eldredge won gold medals at the 1996 figure skating World Championships, it marked the first time that both the women's and men's champions were from the United States since 1986. That year, Debi Thomas and Brain Boitano brought home the gold. At age 15, Michelle Kwan was the youngest Amercan and the third youngest woman to win a world title. Sonia Henie was just 14 when she won in 1927, and Oksana Baiul was 15, but a few months younger than Kwan, when she was victorious in 1993.
~The fastest spin is called a corkscrew. It turns at a speed of approximately 10 revolutions/second and 100km/h (60 m.p.h.).
~Ice dances, such as Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean, base their routines on ballroom dances. They have to follow strict rules about the type of jumps and lifts allowed in their routines. Another rule says that dances aren't allowed to separate more than five times during their program.
~Baiul often talks to her skates before she competes. Sometimes you can also see her bow her head to say a prayer in memory of her mother, who died when Baiul was just 13.
~Torvill and Dean are very superstitious. Dean must step on the ice with his left foot first, and Torvill has worn the same earrings-little skates-in every competition since she was 16.
~Boitano persuaded the International Skating Union (ISU) to let professional skaters compete at the 1994 Olympics with the amateurs. This change became known as the "Boitano Rule."
~Before Peggy Fleming's Olympic skate, she pinned to her dress a lucky charm-a green gum wrapper!
~Before skating in the finals the World Championships in 1989, Kurt Browning told his coach that he had already accomplished a personal goal: he hadn't had a haircut for the entire season!
In 1988, at the Worlds in Budapest, Kurt Browning tried a quad and HE felt he landed it cleanly (which would have made him the first person to have landed on in international competition) but the judges, upon review of the tape after the
competition, didn't think it was a clean quad. On that same day, Brian Boitano landed a quad cleanly, making
him the first person to accomplish the feat in international
competition!
~Klimova and Ponomarenko are the only skaters in ice dance history to win every colour of medal at the Olympics: bronze in 1984, silver in 1988 and gold in 1992.
~The World Championships were unisex for the first seven years??? Then a woman won silver in 1902, and the mens's and ladies' events were split!
~Most skaters jump and spin counterclockwise. Todd Eldredge, Jeff Langdon, Rudy Galindo, and Denise Biellmann are some of the well know skaters who spin clockwise!
Jayne Torvill and Christopher dean were undefeated for fourteen years!! They were unseated by Oksana Grishuk and Evgeny Platov at the 1994 Olympics.
In 1896, Olympic Stamps were one way money was raised for the first 'Modern Olympics'.
"Civilization has put more men on the moon than guys who can do the things [Elvis] does." - Doug Leigh
Kristi Yamaguchi and Rudy Galindo where a pairs team. They won the Junior Worlds in 1988, and in 1989 and 1990 they won the US pairs title.
Rudy Galindo is openly gay. (I am shocked (sarcastically)- duh!)
Brian Orser is gay too! (THAT, I am truly shocked!)