She wore the pants. And on today, she was the one one.
In a dramatic black one-piece that felt like traditional Audrey Hepburn — white accents and rhinestones, excessive bun, smoky eyes — Swedish determine skater Josefina Taljegård stood out Tuesday as the one athlete in a discipline of 30 who wore pants for the brief program on the primary day of the Beijing Olympics‘ marquee girls’s determine skating competitors.
“I selected it as a result of it suits the musicand in addition as a result of I really feel very robust and assured in this sort of garments,” Taljegård mentioned.
Though girls within the singles and pairs contests have for years been free to don trousers of their performances, few really go for pants on the most high-stakes competitions such because the Olympics,
Here, the ballerina aesthetic of flowy skirts, pastel colours, sparkles and glitter continues to dominate alongside the classical music that’s synonymous with the normal appear and feel of girls’s determine skating.
“Even a rule change may not necessarily change the cultural expectations if it’s a central part of the scoring,” mentioned Cheryl Cooky, an creator and Purdue University professor who research gender and sports activities. “People here – judges specifically – know what they find aesthetically pleasing is kind of wrapped up in a feminine image.”
While there’s been a step towards edgier and extra offbeat music on the Capital Indoor Stadium throughout these Olympicsthe inventive decisions within the girls’s competitors have to date proved much less progressive in each music and costume.
That stands in distinction to the ladies in ice dance — one in every of 4 determine skating disciplines on the Beijing Games — the place there was a essential mass of girls carrying pants after a change in efficiency guidelines. On the primary day of that competitors final week, six out of 23 girls – greater than 1 / 4 of them — wore pants for his or her rhythm dances.
They all returned to extra normal attire two days later, for the free dance that decided the medals.
Russian ice dancer Victoria Sinitsina wore an all-black outfit that includes a glittery, one-shouldered, midriff-baring prime with hip-hugging trousered bottoms that gave ’90s New York supermodel vibes. And it match with the efficiency that she did with accomplice Nikita Katsalapov to “Brick House” by American funk and soul band The Commodores,
“It brings something different because usually girls wear dresses, skirts,” Katsalapov mentioned. “The music for this yr’s rhythm dance, it allow us to do costumes like that, with pants for the women. And it appears to be like attractive and delightful, too.”
In addition to consolation, practicality and a classy look, skaters in pants mentioned they noticed it as a method to match their male companions, in addition to align with the music for this season. The International Skating Union selected “Street Dance Rhythms,” with fashion choices together with hip hop, disco, swing, krump, popping, funk, jazz, reggae, reggaeton and blues.
Canadian ice dancer Piper Gilles wore an orangesicle-colored, carnivalesque, Elton John-inspired one-piece for the ice dance competitors, although she beforehand wore a skirt model of it for the medley group occasion the primary week of the Games.
“I was actually kind of nervous about wearing pants this year. That was something that I’d never done before,” Gilles mentioned. “We’ve always been told to wear skirts so it’s kind of fun to be able to break out of that.”
While few figures skaters put on pants in competitors, almost all accomplish that throughout observe classes.
“You don’t have the weight of the skirt, like when you turn and stuff, and it feels more like practice because in practice, I just wear pants. So I find it, I think, (it is) more comfortable,” said Marjorie Lajoie, a Canadian ice dancer who wore a black unitard accented by a teal-colored, sash-like ruffle in a nod to Hollywood red carpet glamor in her “Funkytown” rhythm dance efficiency. “You shouldn’t be forced to wear a skirt.”
Cooky mentioned there are parallels between determine skating, golf and tennis — all sports activities the place girls are historically seen competing in skirts, skorts or attire. The outfits within the girls’s competitions turn out to be culturally-enforced gender markers as a result of the sports activities themselves are identically carried out by their male counterparts.
“There is still sort of cultural anxiety around women’s athleticism and women’s physicality despite the tremendous progress we’ve made in that space,” Cooky mentioned. “Sports today is kind of the last cultural site where that (gender) difference is both accepted and celebrated.”
The parameters amongst these sports activities diverge, nevertheless, when contemplating the subjectivity of determine skating. Half of the scoring is predicated on how judges view their efficiency — the music, the costume, the circulation and the general really feel.
That could also be why there is no push towards uniform equality in determine skating as there was final yr for the Norwegian feminine seaside handball group. Those girls refused to put on the required bikini bottoms on the European Beach Handball Championships in Bulgaria and as an alternative outlined the principles by — and have been punished for — carrying shorts just like the male gamers.
Back on the girls’s singles competitors Tuesday evening, Taljegård mentioned she’s not morally against skirts and incorporates all costume types into her different performances. A skirt that may ripple by the air can present a hanging factor in determine skating that pants simply cannot fairly match.
Still, the 26-year-old from Sweden hasn’t worn a skirt to observe since she was 12 years outdated.
“It’s because it’s more comfortable. Sometimes if you want to go to the restroom, it’s easier,” Taljegård mentioned. “Where I skate in Sweden, we now have lots of chilly rinks. If I skate with only a skirt and stockings or tights you’ve got beneath the skirt, it is often fairly skinny. So for me, it is positively nicer to have pants.”
And whereas her Olympic showcase featured lightning quick spins and music from The Fugees, Taljegård did not advance to the free skate Thursday evening. But there is no doubt that she stays assured as ever within the pores and skin — and pants — she’s in.
“I’m a mature woman,” Taljegård mentioned. “And I think I look great.”
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With inputs from TheIndianEXPRESS
