"The real Carmen wore Gold!"
.
Today's post has nothing to do with the celebration of the African-Americans or does it... Indeed it does cause a couple of years ago there was the fight between Katarina Witt still from DDR at the time and Debbie Thomas from USA for the Gold at the Winter Olympics in Calgary 1988. Debbie was the first African-American skater who made it big in figure skating. In fact she was the only one who could keep Katarina Witt from winning her second gold medal at Olympics at least that's what everybody thought! Nobody counted on Elisabeth Manley from Canada who was a very good free skater just like Debbie Thomas. Katarina was the more elegant skater with nice programs and was already an "established" name in Figure skating. Rumors have been going around now for years that Katarina had slept with some judges to get the better marks and the medal! This has never been proven by the one's that say so. I guess it's just one of those "things" you hear about all the time. Men make it to the top by hard work while women sleep their way to the top. Anyway, that night in Calgary the heat was on between Debbie Thomas and Katarina Witt and not only for their performance! Accidentally they both picked the same piece of music for their long program; "Carmen" from Georges Bizet. Debbie wore this nice black out fit with lots of shiny, sparkling things on it. Very American! Katarina had this red dress which transformed her into "Carmen". However, both knew that no matter what color of dress they were wearing... that night the real Carmen would wear Gold!
Here's a link which let you re-live those exciting moments in figure skating and which also tributes to one of the best African-American skaters so far! Enjoy:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YeFUGHWo8FA
The link to the winning program:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k-rMfIyX4rM
.
Today's post has nothing to do with the celebration of the African-Americans or does it... Indeed it does cause a couple of years ago there was the fight between Katarina Witt still from DDR at the time and Debbie Thomas from USA for the Gold at the Winter Olympics in Calgary 1988. Debbie was the first African-American skater who made it big in figure skating. In fact she was the only one who could keep Katarina Witt from winning her second gold medal at Olympics at least that's what everybody thought! Nobody counted on Elisabeth Manley from Canada who was a very good free skater just like Debbie Thomas. Katarina was the more elegant skater with nice programs and was already an "established" name in Figure skating. Rumors have been going around now for years that Katarina had slept with some judges to get the better marks and the medal! This has never been proven by the one's that say so. I guess it's just one of those "things" you hear about all the time. Men make it to the top by hard work while women sleep their way to the top. Anyway, that night in Calgary the heat was on between Debbie Thomas and Katarina Witt and not only for their performance! Accidentally they both picked the same piece of music for their long program; "Carmen" from Georges Bizet. Debbie wore this nice black out fit with lots of shiny, sparkling things on it. Very American! Katarina had this red dress which transformed her into "Carmen". However, both knew that no matter what color of dress they were wearing... that night the real Carmen would wear Gold!
Here's a link which let you re-live those exciting moments in figure skating and which also tributes to one of the best African-American skaters so far! Enjoy:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YeFUGHWo8FA
The link to the winning program:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k-rMfIyX4rM
.
posted by Patrick at Friday, December 29, 2006
<< Home