U.S. pairs skaters Rena Inoue and John Baldwin made history by landing the first throw triple axel in Olympic history. Read about the American's jump at http://www.usatoday.com/sports/olympics/torino/figureskating/2006-02-11-pairs-skating_x.htm. Midori Ito in 1989 was the first woman to land a triple axel in a major ice skating championship (the Worlds). See http://www.mountaindragon.com/midori/mistats.htm. So what are triple jumps and what is a triple axel? "The Axel is a jump in figure skating, named after the Norwegian skater Axel Paulsen (1855-1938) who was the first to perform it in 1882. "A single Axel consists of 1 1/2 rotations in the air. For a jump with counterclockwise rotation, it has a takeoff from the left forward outside edge and a landing on the right back outside edge; this can be reversed for a clockwise jump. "The Axel can also be done as a double jump with 2 1/2 rotations, or as a triple with 3 1/2 rotations." See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axel_jump. The above article states, "No skater has yet accomplished a quadruple Axel." To read a fun article on figure skating go to http://www.slate.com/id/2136701/fr/rss/. Even the best skaters take there turn (for the worse) on the ice. Sasha Cohen is the only woman skater in the current Winter Olympics who can do a quadruple jump. She did not attempt it last night. She didn't need to. But she may give it ago. Keep watching. Read about Sasha at http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/olympics/260243_olyfig21.html. A number of men have performed quads in these Olympics. Here are some hints for watching women ice skating at the Winter Olympics (Don't watch men skating. They make the jumps look too easy,): 1.Dig those old skates out of that box of junk in the garage. Put them on. Stumble into the room where you have a television set and plop yourself down. Now, don't you feel better all ready? 2.Before you put your skats on, turn the thermostat down to 50 degrees Fahrenheit. To make it more authentic for the Olympics, make that 10 degrees Centigrade. Have some heavy quilts ready. 3.Have your spouse brew up a big pot of hot chocolate. Don't go stumbling out there in the kitchen by yourself on those ice skates. You might get scalded. 4.While your spouse is out in the kitchen anyway, have her (or possibly, him) fry up a bunch of scones. A scone is fried bread dough. Just pic up the dough at the grocery store and plop sections of dough into the grease. Biscuit dough is fine. The scones should be served with butter and honey. (If you must run down to the store to get the honey, for gosh sakes take off the ice skates. You'll look pretty funny wrapped up in a steering wheel.) 5.While you are watching the ice skating, suck the honey off your fingers. Don't try to wash honey off with cocoa. You might burn yourself. Well, you can wait until the cocoa cools a bit like I do. Then you have some yummy sucking to do. 6.Here are some words you will need for ice skate competition watching: Ohhhhh! Use this when a jump goes awry and the skater lands on her poduka with a thump. The bigger the thump, the bigger the OHHHHH! Yeah! Scream this at the top of your lungs when a scatter performs a trivial move effortlessly. Wow! Say this when a scatter makes a routine triple jump. Holy Cow! Yell this when a triple axel is made and the skater makes a good landing. If the jumper falls on her paduka with a thud, say Holy S- My wife cut me off there. Now that you know the elements of watching women's Olympic ice skating, do as Red Green says, "Keep your stick on the ice!" Oh, Nuts! My wife says that only applies to ice hockey. Well, keep your paduka off the ice! On reflection I looked up the word paduka in the Hindu dictionary (see http://www.experiencefestival.com/a/Ri_paduka/id/62126). It means sandals of the venerated leader. When I say "lands on her paduka," I'm not talking about sandals. The End Ice skating, triple, quadruple, lux, axel, Olympics, Torino, Winter Olympics, paduka, Hindu, Midori Ito, Sasha Cohen |
