Ice Dance History

Ice dance has a strong tradition in the United Kingdom. Many of the compulsory dances which are still competed today were developed by British dancers in the 1930's, and 12 of the first 16 World Championships in ice dance were won by British couples. The British team of Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean famously won the Olympic gold medal in Sarajevo in 1984 with a dramatic free skate to Ravel's Bolero which earned unanimous 6.0s for presentation.

Beginning in the 1970's, dance began to be dominated more by teams from the Soviet Union and Russia. The Russian style of ice dance typically emphasizes speed and power at the expense of precision. For example, in the compulsory dances, the skaters have been known to make slight alterations in the pattern and timing of the steps that are not strictly correct according to the rulebook, but which make the dance flow better or have more speed over the ice, and hence appear more impressive. Russian ice dancers are also known for theatrical and sometimes bizarre costuming and expression in their dances.

In the 1990's, the International Skating Union began to try to restrain the excessive theatricality in ice dancing, first by attempting to return it to its ballroom roots by adding more restrictions on music and dance holds. Later, amid complaints that ice dance had become too boring, these restrictions were removed and replaced with requirements that dancers include specified technical elements in the original dance and free dance. The effect is that there is now more emphasis on technique and athleticism in the judging, and less on dramatics. While the requirement that dancers skate to music with a definite beat remains, ice dancing is currently the only discipline of figure skating which allows vocal music with lyrics in competition.

Today ice dance remains more popular in Europe than in North America, where it has the reputation among many skating fans of being plagued by judging that is at best incomprehensible and at worst completely corrupt. The Code of Points system that recently replaced the old 6.0 scoring system is alleged by some to eliminate much of the corruption that has plagued the sport in the past, as judges now must score based upon more specific guidelines and categories, while others believe that the anonymity of the system simply further encourages judges to manipulate the results and that the restrictiveness of the new rules have additionally reduced creativity in dance.