Your favorite and least favorite figure skating commentators

[SunnyCA]

Being a fan of Alina Zagitova, I have watched most of her programs as shown in different countries. For my money, the French trio spearheaded by Candeloro is the best, they are both knowledgeable and passionate, and often funny to boot. The Spanish TV also has some surprisingly knowledgeable and compassionate ladies in the booth. The NBC team is often trying too hard to upsell the greatness of various skaters. The Olympic Channel team is too reserved for my liking. The rest are more or less OK.

 

[WeakAnkles]

There will never be a greater commentator than Dick Button. Or a better Good Cop/Bad Cop duo than Dick and Peggy Flemming.

 

[griessel]

She skated a brilliant free program and he really spoiled the moment (again). I'm sorry Kaori does not have the body type he prefers.
I re-watched the program on German Eurosport and the commentary of Hendryk Schamberger and Sigi Heinrich was like day and night. They praised Kaori, said they enjoyed that at a lot, how she is the best fit for Benoit Richard's choreography, that she's probably the best ice skater (skating skills-wise), etc.

The Eurosport commentators were in tears of joy when Yuma Kagiyama skated. Later I wanted to rewatch his wonderful performance and opened the ARD / ZDF video and Weiss was complaining about Yuma's PCS for the most time. As expected

Very happy now that for the men's sp there is a woman commentating, didnt catch her name but she has a nice calm way and seems knowledgeable

 

[Zora]

Very happy now that for the men's sp there is a woman commentating, didnt catch her name but she has a nice calm way and seems knowledgeable

Petra Bindl, she sometimes worked for Eurosport. She is always very well prepared.

 

[rinkside_user]

Bindl so far is a substantial improvement over Weiss.

 

[viennaskater]

Boy, am I glad to have the old favourites Chris and Simon commentating together on Eurosport again! It really enhances my enjoyment of the skating. I am hoping Louise Walden was either sacked or only drafted in at the beginning because Simon couldn't make it then.

If worst came to worst, I can mute the commentary if she comes back - it's worth paying the subscription to have that function, as well as having replays available.

 

[Rikku]

I think it´s funny that there are so many posts about Daniel Weiss in this thread. We are making him famous

Not that he'll ever see it; he still asks viewers to send him questions during competitions via facebook.

The only thing I'll say for the guy is that he fought to keep skating being shown on free TV when no public station wanted to air it live. But that may just have been fighting for his job..

And, for the love of the saints, will he ever manage to pronounce the word 'pirouette' correctly?

(I'd love if Joti decided to go for a commentating gig and took over some day. He started out in singles, he has the tech knowledge)

 

[anonymoose_au]

A bit off topic, but I'm watching the medal ceremonies, I'm hoping I didn't miss the Team Event medal - and I'm amused that the commentator sounds like the lady who commentates on TicToc.

She's very informative though!

 

[rinkside_user]

Oh my gosh, I thought Simon was bad, but I just watched the team event ladies' SP on demand on our national broadcaster and the lady doing the commentary (no idea who she was) was unbearable. Apart from extremely shallow commentary and constant prattling during the skating some further low-lights include:
- Gubanova competed for Russia in rhythmic gymnastics until she got an invitation to figure skate for Georgia last year
- Calling Schizas's triple loop a triple lutz
- Valieva: just fifteen years old and already the reigning world champion

Not quite a straight example as it was an article rather than commentary but while I was super distraught after the SP, the headlines in a major news outlet rubbed it in, stating Nathan Chen unexpectedly () stormed to the lead with a record score after Hanyu made a mistake in the free skate (). Later, they corrected the FS to SP but explained Hanyu's scores with a fall (). Sounds about right.

 

[CrazyKittenLady]

Our legendary Ingrid Wendl! I grew up listening to her precious commentary.
She had a mighty fine scratch spin and won Olympic bronze at 15. Don't judge her too harshly, she's an old lady and loves the sport!
https://youtu.be/syH0mKlS3Rw

After reading your post I felt quite bad for having a go at an Austrian figure skating legend, but then I realized that Ingrid Wendl must be over 80 years old already, and the lady doing the commentary on ORF definitely did not sound that old. Also I couldn't believe that a professional figure skater could miscall so many jumps. So I did some digging and it turns out that the commentator on ORF for figure skating is Mrs. Gabi Jahn, a professional journalist whose main connection to sport is apparently that she studied to become a high school sports teacher. I wish she would either do better research for the events she's commentating or just keep her commentary to a minimum.

 

[solani]

After reading your post I felt quite bad for having a go at an Austrian figure skating legend, but then I realized that Ingrid Wendl must be over 80 years old already, and the lady doing the commentary on ORF definitely did not sound that old. Also I couldn't believe that a professional figure skater could miscall so many jumps. So I did some digging and it turns out that the commentator on ORF for figure skating is Mrs. Gabi Jahn, a professional journalist whose main connection to sport is apparently that she studied to become a high school sports teacher. I wish she would either do better research for the events she's commentating or just keep her commentary to a minimum.

Really? I swear she sounds exactly like Ingrid. I didn't want to make you feel bad ... I also thought her voice sounded remarkably young. Then - no excuses! The lady should definitely do her homework!
My excuse is that I watch Eurosport most of the time ... please accept my apologies!

 

[CrazyKittenLady]

Really? I swear she sounds exactly like Ingrid. I didn't want to make you feel bad ... I also thought her voice sounded remarkably young. Then - no excuses! The lady should definitely do her homework!
My excuse is that I watch Eurosport most of the time ... please accept my apologies!

Oh dear, no apologies needed. On the contrary, thanks so much for sharing that vintage video of Ingrid and her spins! It's always nice to think of old times when Austria was a powerhouse in figure skating!

 

[longtimefan]

I enjoy Johnny Weir's commentary. But I loathe Tara's. It's a tough choice between wanting to hear the music and not wanting to hear her.

 

[Anna K.]

I don't know if Diana is checking on this tread but just in case she does: it wasn't that bad! Everybody can occasionally say "Austria" instead of "Australia" once or twice in their life. You just need to calm down a little!

For those who are not familiar with the context: Diana Nikitina (who famously skated in a black catsuit in Pyeong Chang) is now back as one of figure skating commentators for Latvian State TV. Overall, she does a good job compensating the shortcomings of the score box and being positive and passionate about figure skating. This morning though, she was left all alone to commentate Men's free skate (because this is Latvia and everybody's watching ice hockey) and was a little nervous.

 

[crazydreamer]

She’s not doing live commentary, but I think Ashley Wagner is doing very well on the Olympic Ice show on Peacock.

 

[viennaskater]

Oh my gosh, I thought Simon was bad, but I just watched the team event ladies' SP on demand on our national broadcaster and the lady doing the commentary (no idea who she was) was unbearable. Apart from extremely shallow commentary and constant prattling during the skating some further low-lights include:
- Gubanova competed for Russia in rhythmic gymnastics until she got an invitation to figure skate for Georgia last year
- Calling Schizas's triple loop a triple lutz
- Valieva: just fifteen years old and already the reigning world champion

!!! Where on earth did she dig that one up?? Was it a German-speaking commentator?

Weird!

 

[viennaskater]

RoundedBackCamel wrote (three pages back): "I also don’t like that she (Tara) didn’t continue to skate after her Worlds and OGM and just took the money and ran".

This has always bothered me, too. It seemed to send the message that after one somewhat controversial win, she was afraid to compete any further.

I also didn't like it when Oksana Baiul immediately turned professional after winning Olys in 1994. She had so much talent to offer the sport.

 

[LiamForeman]

Among the Dutch commentators, I quite like to listen to Jeroen Prins and Haya Lennarts (not sure that's the right spelling) because they're pretty knowledgable. I used to love to listen to Joan Haanappel as well, but that was a long, long time ago.

Jeroen Prins is a name from the past for sure. He was on the early skating internet boards 27 years ago with me in the mid90s and always offered his expertise in a kind and intelligent manner. I was just learning about the details of skating and didn't even know the difference between a flutz and a lutz, just that Dick Button would call out Nicole Bobek's egregious flutz... and some of my comments were so ignorant I might still cringe. (Or hopefully laugh! God I was so dumb back then!! lol) I thought he was training to be a judge back then though. Does anyone know if he became an international judge? Or decided commentary was more to his skills and talent for communicating to a wide viewership? I'm happy to see him still involved in the sport in any manner because he was such an intelligent and quality person, which would be an asset as a judge. And he would have made an EXCELLENT judge. (Hi Jeroen if you are out there in the NetVerse!!)

 

[ladyjane]

Jeroen Prins is a name from the past for sure. He was on the early skating internet boards 27 years ago with me in the mid90s and always offered his expertise in a kind and intelligent manner. I was just learning about the details of skating and didn't even know the difference between a flutz and a lutz, just that Dick Button would call out Nicole Bobek's egregious flutz... and some of my comments were so ignorant I might still cringe. (Or hopefully laugh! God I was so dumb back then!! lol) I thought he was training to be a judge back then though. Does anyone know if he became an international judge? Or decided commentary was more to his skills and talent for communicating to a wide viewership? I'm happy to see him still involved in the sport in any manner because he was such an intelligent and quality person, which would be an asset as a judge. And he would have made an EXCELLENT judge. (Hi Jeroen if you are out there in the NetVerse!!)

Jeroen is currently at the OG - judging. Team event pairs and women, and he's to have another turn during the individual pairs event. He's also in demand as a TC or TS/ATS at quite a few international competitions.

 

[LiamForeman]

Wow, so he's a big time judge!! Quality usually rises to the top quickly, so I'm not surprised. Good for him.