Olympic Figure Skating
Skating has been a very popular sport for years and it was invented in Europe as a quick and easy way to get around on frozen ponds and rivers. There are a couple different kinds of Olympic figure skating that take place during the winter Olympic events. Olympic figure skating is enjoyed around the world and has been a part of the Olympic tradition since 1908. The first style of Olympic figure skating competitions is the solo competition, where solo skaters have different routines they do of jumps, spins and twists. Their techniques are flawless and they spend hours upon hours of practice to even make it to the Olympics. Then they have a couples competition, which is similar to the solo competition but it is much more complex with two people. Some of the moves involve the guys throwing the girl in the air and into different aerial spins, all perfectly synchronized. The beauty and complexity is what makes figure skating such a popular sport.
Olympic figure skating also has a style of dancing on skates; the ice dancing is very similar to real ballroom dancing and with a lot of intricate footwork all perfectly timed with each other and with the music. The judges judge ice dancing by the footwork and timing, as well as closeness with your partner. Olympic figure skating takes an extreme amount of devotion and many of the figure skaters you see competing in the Olympic Games started out figure skating at very young ages. The International Skating Union was an organization that started out back in 1892 and they pushed until figure skating was an Olympic event in the early 1900’s. They still hold many ice skating competitions worldwide and are responsible for figure skating to become an Olympic Winter sport in the 1924 Winter Games in Chamonix, France.