Torvill and Dean announce farewell tour as they confirm retirement from ice skating
14.02.2024 - 08:21
/ manchestereveningnews.co.uk
British ice skating legends Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean have announced they will retire from skating together in 2025. The news marks the 40th anniversary of their Olympic gold win.
The pair made British sporting history with their routine to Ravel's Bolero at the 1984 Winter Games in Sarajevo. Returning to Bosnia and Herzegovina 40 years after their Valentine's Day performance, they confirmed plans for a final UK tour next year.
Dean told PA news agency: "That was really a launching pad of then going off to do other things. Touring around the world, skating in front of hundreds of thousands of people and then Dancing On Ice starting up because of winning the Olympics."
Their Olympic triumph followed a string of successes at the World, European and British Championships in the early 1980s. During their iconic 1984 Winter Games performance, they didn't skate for the first 20 seconds of their routine to comply with Olympic rules before springing into action.
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The finale was unforgettable, with the skaters ending up lying still on the ice together, earning a huge round of applause and perfect scores of 6.0 from the 12 judges. Recalling the day, Torvill, 66, revealed they had not had many opportunities to practise the routine in the arena before the final but were given a 6am slot on the day which no other competitors in their training group turned up for due to the performance being that evening.
Dean, 65, remembers hearing clapping from the cleaners high up in the arena after their routine, a special memory for him. He said: "When you think about the whole day, nobody was there, and then as the day goes on, people start to fill the building