Bolero opened up the world for us
Ice dance legends Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean talk to RICHARD BARBER on the 40th anniversary of their greatest victory, as they announce a final tour
IT’S a day Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean still celebrate 40 years after making history at the Sarajevo Winter Olympics.
The Nottingham duo took gold with their 1984 Valentine’s Day performance of Bolero which earned 12 perfect 6.0s and six 5.9s, making them the highestscoring figure skaters of all time for a single programme.
Four decades later, Jayne, 66, and Christopher, 65, returned to the scene of their greatest victory to announce their retirement with a final tour.
Here they recall that famous day and how it changed their lives.
Tell us how it feels returning to Sarajevo where you enjoyed your ‘Bolero Moment’ 40 years ago this week?
JT: It was lovely, because it takes you right back almost 60 years to when we started out.
CD: I said to [my younger son] Sam that Jayne and I were coming to Sarajevo to celebrate the 40th anniversary of our win and he suddenly said: ‘I’m proud of you, Dad.’ I don’t mind admitting it brought a lump to my throat.
JT: We last came back 10 years ago, and you do get a tingle when you go back to the site of where it all happened.
What do you remember about that day in 1984?
CD: It was six o’clock in the morning and we were the only people practising on the rink. We danced our full routine, as we always did. When we finished, there was a sudden ripple of applause from around the arena, way up in the gods. Unbeknown to us, the cleaners had downed tools to watch.
JT: And that was a special moment which gave a hint of what was to come. So, when we came to do it in front of the judges, dancing it the
best we’d ever done, there was a roar as the arena erupted and we knew we’d done it. We used to practise to the full 18-minute version of the Bolero as a warm-up in training. Someone – Chris says it’s him, I say it’s me! – suddenly came up with the idea of condensing it into four minutes. But to be honest, we’d trained and practised so hard that, even on a bad day, we knew we were pretty good.
You don’t say Happy Valentine’s Day, do you? Tell us why.
JT: February 14th was the day we won the medal.
CD: So we don’t say happy Valentines Day, we say happy Bolero Day to each other every year.
Is it an exaggeration to say that gold medal changed your lives?
CD: Absolutely not. The world opened up for us. I remember the moment all the sixes came and I knew we’d done it. We weren’t the last pair to dance but I couldn’t see how anyone could overtake us.
JT: It was here in Sarajevo that our life changed for ever.
CD: It was the most intense four minutes of our lives and the most important. It changed everything. 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.
Is there a favourite moment from the past four decades?
CD: I don’t think I can place it down to one moment, there have been so many moments, winning the Olympics, putting our own show together and touring together.
JT: Then the success of Dancing On Ice and still doing this together all these years later, nearly 50 years is a really big thing for us!
The 2025 tour will be your last. Is it a difficult decision to hang up your skates?
JT: The 2025 tour felt like the right time for us to retire, we feel like 50 years is a significant number. CD: It’s also almost full circle for us in life and felt like the right time.
How are you feeling about it?
JT: We feel a certain amount of pride that we can still go out there and do what we do. There’ll be a bit of anxiety involved but that’s only because we’ll be taking it seriously. CD: We’re not spring chickens any
more but we’re still able to do it to a certain degree that we feel good about it but that will go.
So I think this is the right time for us to be able to do that and go and skate and do some of the old routines, be very nostalgic, but then do some new fun, upbeat (dances) with friends of ours from the skating world and from Dancing On Ice. We’re looking at it as a celebration.
A clue, please, as to what we can expect to see on the farewell tour
It was the most intense four minutes of our lives and the most important Christopher Dean
CD: I’m pretty certain there’ll be a Mack and Mabel routine and something that evokes Barnum.
JT: And plenty of new stuff, too.
CD: The final routine we’ll start working on after Dancing On Ice next season but we are in the development stage. I think we’ll get reflective and look at it not in a sad way but in a happy way.
JT: There will also be few surprises from familiar faces including celebrities and professionals from the series over the years.
What about Bolero?
CD: How could we not?
JT: We’d be lynched if we left it out!
You’re not retiring altogether though, are you? You’ll still be on Dancing On Ice?
CD: We regard it as our baby.
JT: We’re certainly not retiring from Dancing On Ice. We want to keep doing it for as long as they want us.
Torvill & Dean: Our Last Dance, will come to Resorts World Arena, the NEC, on April 25, 26 and 27.