2008 U.S. Figure Skating Championships – part IV – pairs
I have more pairs pics. A lot of them are similar lifts and poses, but I am posting these partly for myself (you know, for posterity), so here they are. 
Caitlin Yankowskas & John Coughlin
Chloe Katz & Joseph Lynch
Chloe Katz & Joseph Lynch
Brooke Castille & Ben Okolski
Amanda Evora & Mark Ladwig
This is the start of the routine by Rena Inoue & John Baldwin. I love the energy of this pose. And it is also noticeable how much shorter she is than him; this is the case with almost all of the pairs. Can you imagine how hard it would be to match strides while skating with such differences in height? It just seems impossible.
Another pic of Inoue & Baldwin – note that they finished in second place.
I like this photo, because you can see how as the skaters get better at skating together, they skate really closely to each other. See how close their feet are on the ice?
At the end of their routine, before they took their bows, John Baldwin got down on one knee for an extended period of time. At first, no one really knew what was going on, and then, the crowd got hushed and expectant, because it sure looked like he was proposing. In the end, he was! And she said yes, and they hugged – at which point I got over my shock and actually took a photo. It was fun to witness a proposal for marriage in person. Have you ever seen one?
There was another time when we caught the aftermath of a proposal (the clapping), when HB and I were having our anniversary dinner out at a nice restaurant last year. There was someone he knew from work sitting at this special table overlooking a lighted cave, and that guy ended up proposing!
Well, that is all that I’m going to post of the pairs. More skating pics to come though. I hope you aren’t tired of them yet. But if you are, well, like I said, I’m doing this for me too.
squirl says:
Another set of very fine pictures. You and camera do a great job on the action shots. The proposal is so romantic. I’ve never been aroundd when any proposed in public. Or if I have it was kept kinda quiet.
Jenski says:
Wow! A skating show and a proposal. I was walking through the Public Gardens once and there was a man proposing and everyone clapped when he stood back up and they kissed.
Have these all been from the pairs? Did you say you were going to see ice dancing too?
Danielle says:
Yep, I’ve got ice dancing pics too. But I probably won’t get to them until this weekend.
The ice dancing doesn’t allow these kinds of lifts – they do modified (really odd) holds/lifts. And the woman doesn’t get thrown up in the air at all. I think there is a rule about how they have to keep in contact the whole time except for a couple of, well, exceptions.
Danielle says:
ugh. I keep posting as Jenski from that one time that I copied and pasted her note in an email into the comments. sorry for the confusion for anyone that saw it earlier before I changed it back.
Amber says:
I have been watching this on tv andI was impressed by a lot of the moves they were making. I missed the proposal, though. How cool!
I was pretty surprised with one couple group where the guy took the girl by the feet and swung her around, with her head too close for comfort to the ice. I can’t believe some of the stuff they do. They have to be really iin sync and trusting of each other. Impressive.