Ice-skater
the late 2000s – the best British ice dancers since Torvill and Dean – often stayed under the radar as far as obsessive fans were concerned, arguably because the fact they were siblings meant the focus was on their technical skating rather than their private lives.
“We avoid routines that are overly romantic,” the West Lothian pair told The Scotsman in 2009, while they were still competing. “There are a lot of themes out there. You don’t necessarily need to do a dance about romantic love between a man and a woman. We try to dance in a completely different way, and that gives us a different look as well, which makes us stand out a bit from the other couples.”
They must be relieved that the nature of their partnership meant they could avoid such attention. Torvill and Dean were also lucky. The peak of the interest in them and their personal lives came at a simpler time when they could literally duck out of the spotlight in between competitions. Skating fans might meet each other for a cup of tea and speculate about their love lives over a dunked biscuit in the Nottingham Ice Rink cafe before the British championships, but it rarely went further than that.
For the new generation of skaters, however, the level of interest is, quite frankly, terrifying, with the internet a resource for the crazies to indulge their ice dance fantasies.
Pyeongchang gold medallists Scott Moir and Tessa Virtue are the Torvill and Dean of Canada, only shinier, slicker, more publicity friendly than their British counterparts in that way that only North Americans can be. Torvill and Dean were, as young athletes, shy and reticent, preferring to avoid the limelight. Virtue and Moir, on the other hand, are ready-made media personalities. They are both ridiculously good-looking and flirtatiously charming, as well as outstanding skaters to boot, favouring intimate, bordering-on-x-rated routines.
There are endless blogs speculating over such wild theories as the couple having married and had a secret child together – Virtue was claimed to be pregnant during their two-year career break away from the ice after the last Olympics in Sochi, despite many public appearances around that time which suggested otherwise.
Worryingly, there is even a library of fan fiction, which for the unititiated is a creative story written by (you’ve guessed it) fans, but using either characters created by someone else – EL James’s 50 Shades novels, which themselves started as fan fiction tales, have a strong fan fiction following – or in this case, real people, in a fictional scenario. This Virtue-moir “fan fic” (please, for your own sanity, do not Google it, I’ve taken the hit for the team) is full of fantasy scenarios involving the unfortunate Tessa and Scott, usually charting the consummation of their fictional love in more than a few disturbing incarnations.
Even Virtue admitted that social media had transformed this year’s Games for them – and it’s not clear whether she meant it in a good way.
“It’s a different Games because of that,” she told a press conference after the ice dance final. “The last two Olympics, we didn’t have social media like this. It’s a whole new world for us.”
Meanwhile, Moir, who was snapped, beer in hand, cheering on the Canadian women’s ice hockey team after his own medal win, stopped attending events as a spectator as he felt that his presence was generating more media coverage than the sports themselves.
Of course, Virtue and Moir are not blameless – they know how to wind up the publicity machine. They even made a fly-on-the-wall documentary series about their preparation for the last Olympic Games, complete with oblique references to their “unique relationship” and lingering shots of hugs, kisses and puppydog-eyed glances.
Yet, there is publicity and there is stalking – and I know which category a lot of their online attention falls under. With Virtue and Moir retiring this season, it is perhaps a chance for the sport to move away from the off-ice drama and focus on the skating. It’s actually very good.