Last night’s Original Dance was an outstanding skating event pure and simple with many teams pulling out all the stops including the new leaders from Canada Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir.
Best for first for a change. Virtue and Moir were the second last skaters and looked a litttle tentative as they took their opening position. Once their music started though; all that seemed to melt away and they created what I like to call an “Olympic” moment where time stood still for the duration of their program. Confident and strong and oozing the kind of sensuality that you would expect from a Flamenco they easily moved into the lead.
The American team of Meryl Davis and Charlie White skated to Indian folk music and were fantastic in their accurate interpretation of the music. Their costuming, timing and youthful energy all worked in creating their “Bollywood” OD which correctly moved them into second place.
Words fail me in describing the “Aboriginal Dance” from defending world champions Oksana Domnina and Maxim Shabalin from the Russian Federation. The cartoon-like costuming and choreography was almost painful to watch it was so embarassing and inappropriate. Even more embarassing is the lack of understanding on the part of the skaters and seemingly their coaches of their cultural faux pas. They slipped from 1st to third.
Other standout performances stood along the way top to bottm in the event. Italian ice dancers Federica Faiella and Massimo Scali were superb in their Italian folk dance and, in my opinion, ouskated the Russians but stayed in fifth.
A young team from Great Britain, Penny Coomes and Nicholas Buckland were also terrific with an Irish Folk Dance as were the youjng Russian team of Ekaterina Bobrova and Dmitri Soloviev who were costumed like a pair of Russian sailors. The Japanese brother and sister team Cathy and Chris Reed skated a memorable Japanese folk dance and were just a few of the many entertaining Original Dance programs from last night.
The writing is on the wall as the free dance takes place tonight. As much as I believe that the Italians deserve to be the Bronze medallists, I think I am going to have to change my prediction:
Pj’s Prudent Podium Picks:
GOLD: Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir CAN
SILVER: Meryl Davis and Charlie White USA
BRONZE: Oksana Domnina and Maxim Shabalin RUS