TSL's Interview with Tracy Wilson
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- Опубликовано: 27 июл 2024
- Tracy Wilson has worn many hats in the sport of figure skating: competitor, commentator and coach. Alongside partner Rob McCall, Tracy was an Olympic bronze medalist and three-time World bronze medalist. As a commentator, she has consistently worked in Canadian and American television for more than 25 years. Most recently, she has served as a coach to Yuna Kim, Yuruzu Hanyu and Javier Fernandez. We caught up with Tracy Wilson about all of it during a very special Valentine's Day interview.
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She is a magnificent speaker!!! Loved this!!
Inasmuch as Tarasova is the posterchild for Russian skating diva, Tracy is the same for Canada. Each one practically embodies the stereotype of their country -- Tarasova, proud, in the fur coat and booming voice, Tracy the den mother. Love them or hate them, you simply HAVE to respect them. Anyone who doesn't just...doesn't...get it.
She was always one of my favorites as a skater and commentator. Rob McCall was a beautiful artist and skater.
Fantastic interview - I grew up watching Tracy Wilson and Rob McCall and listening to her - she is so intelligent, simultaneously open and diplomatic: and the two of you work so well interviewing together - thank you so much.
I met Tracy & Rob once and they were gracious, charming and treated me kindly. Good memory of a favorite team of skaters.
TSL, this is your best interview yet--which is saying something!
She's absolutely terrific. Thank you for this!
Tracy is such a wonderful human being. Love her!
Yuna, after Vancouver Olympic, expressed her gratitude for the supports she had received from the team-Brian, David, and many other people from the Cricket club. Now I understand what she meant.
What a beautiful interview. Thank you so much for posting it!
What an awesome interview. Thank you so much for it!
Great coup and great interview guys! Tracy Wilson is the best. I really love her broadcast speaking skills and her insight, especially in these days where we have Johnny and Tara who seem to have little-to-no training and no sense of professionalism. Interesting that they named all the Soviet competitors but no mention of Klimova/Ponomarenko who a lot of ice dance fans now think that they were held down by the judges and should have beaten Bestemianova/Bukin a few times in 1985-1988. I'm glad they asked her about Grishuk/Platov considering some people criticize Tracy for being very critical and biased against Grishuk/Platov. Interesting she said her support of Torvill/Dean in 1994 Olympics was to validate it as a sport while G/P actually did more technical difficulty, speed, and were a lot more athletic than T/D despite them skating further apart. G/P introduced more athleticism to the sport even if they sacrificed what was traditionally considered difficult in ice dance at the time (close and complex holds). Tracy obviously loves classical ice dance (British style) with close dance holds/positions and footwork, and was not a fan of the free-flowing lawlessness that was ice dance in the early 90s. However, I wish Jenny/Dave followed that up with asking what she thought of the Duschenays who were directed by Christopher Dean, who she thought was the torch bearer of that style, and did not have those qualities compared to Klimova/Ponomarenko, who were masters of it but were not fully appreciated for that and had to abandon those things somewhat in order to be more theatrical and loose to win over the Duschenays.
I absolutely loved her insight in Nagano and Tarasova quotes, BUT I wish she'd admit Bourne/Kraatz was scored generously in the compulsory dance and VERY generously in the OD considering where they should have placed. As for Krylova/Ovysianikov v. Grishuk/Platov's placements in the Golden Waltz, they were rightfully placed. Luckily Anissina/Peizerat didn't perform their OD the way they did at Worlds because they would have had a very real argument to place first there, and you know that wasn't going to happen. I also appreciate that Wilson is a loyal fan of Anissina/Peizerat as she said Bourne/Kraatz didn't deserve the bronze in the most diplomatic way possible even though I absolutely disagreed with her that the judges took that chance away with the Golden Waltz CD.
Also, as a Shibs fan, I'm happy she first mentioned them as one of the top teams in the World without being provoked to mention them. It shows how much she respects them and what they bring to the sport. She also hit the nail on the head with losing Nationals probably being the best thing for Chock/Bates when she said there's nothing worse than feeling like the community is backing another team but you are getting awarded and being accused of getting preferential treatment. I do think that inspired some undeserved negative feelings being directed at Chock/Bates.
Her stories about her and Rob McCall were also heartwarming. Her mom sounds absolutely awesome.
Wonderful interview with Tracy! Thank you for this.
+kansaiPJ Doing a second watch. Surprised and delighted with the detail that Tracy shares. You guys really know when to press and when to let her talk. Well done! :-)
I love this interview!! I'm gonna use some of the things she talked about and bring it to my training. Thank you! ☺️
P.S. Could you please interview Brian? I want Brian to be my coach one day (head coach, btw). It would be greatly appreciated! 😁
Always interesting watching these interviews again years after they first aired. This was such a lovely interview and I loved Tracy's insights. I thought her comments at the end were especially interesting, about speed and power not always getting recognised in women's skating - I think this has become even more apparent in recent years with people who hit nice positions but have eked out jumps and slow skating.
Tracy is such a lovely person. I could listen to her daily! Great interview.
Love Tracy. She’s a great commentator and she spoke so eloquently here. She was able to be fair and diplomatic without sounding like she was trying to be diplomatic. And such neat fun stories from her. Thank you for the good questions
I seriously love Traci Wilson, great interview.
Tracy is very bright and great to listen to. Professional and warm. It's a pleasure to listen to her tell us more about her. On a side not. You WILL notice that she did not drink anything not once and gave her full attention for the interview. The drinking left and right and the two fisted action with the pops and what not in my opinion is unprofessional and distracting. She spoke more than the two interviewers for over and hour and yet wasn't sucking on a big gulp. I think we can learn from her example.
What wonderful lady! Great job
Great interview.
Love Tracy and all that she has contributed to skating!! Having said that, her compulsory dances were truly subpar/technically weak and she and Rob were "gifted" their marks. Their free dances were on a different level and very well-deserved of 3rd place at Olympics. This was a wonderful interview.
bravoooooooooooo Tracy Wilson...supééééééééér ...jste skvělá trenérka ve skupině team Orser a děkuji za Evgenii,nebot jste s ní přijela v březnu 2019 do Ruska vy a jí se dařilo,jste velmi sympatická žena....you are a great coach in the team team Orser and thank you for Evgenia, because you came to Russia with her in March 2019 and you were successful, you are a very nice woman.
She has a great charisma..
Bourne and Kraatz didn't deserve the bronze over Marina and Gwendal. come on
Indeed. What's funny is that ISU Vice President (at that time in 98) Lawrence Demmy said that B&K made 3 clear errors in the golden waltz CD. If anything they should've placed lower as Viktor didn't skate some of the steps properly. B&K also made some errors in the Argentine Tango CD. For example he keeps his free foot on the ice just before his counter while her twizzle (which came off of a very flat foward outside edge) is done on 2 feet rather than the required 1 foot. And both their OD and FD were danced almost completely hand to hand and side by side. Someone like Tracy Wilson should've been able to see that.
I'm also a little surprised at what she says about G&P vs K&O in Nagano. K&O's Carmen had very very open choreography (like almost all skaters who train under Linichuk & Karponosov). They more or less stopped skating after the first section and started relying almost completely on mime-like body movements and insane facial expressions (likely to distract attention away from the mediocre content). Whereas G&P's Memorial Requiem not only kept moving seamlessly but they were almost always within close handholds.
In fact, Grishuk & Platov's programs in 1991, 1992, 1993, 1995, 1997, and 1998 demonstrate what Tracy loves like footwork, close dance holds, content, etc. It was only in 1994 that G&P seemed to go for completely for speed and energy in lieu of content. And their free dance in 1996 too (which was one hot mess). And IMO, it's no coincidence that their weakest material was while G&P were being coached by Linichuk & Karponosov.
Plus the basic fact they are from CANADA. Thinking someone from CANADA, the most overscored country in skating history, could ever be underscored or robbed is in itself laughable. One wouldnt even have to watch the event to know that given that it is Canada in figure skating.
+deacon conway. I would have to agree with you there. And I'm Canadian too. And I honestly think most of Bourne & Kraatz's placements throughout their career were very generous.
@@deaconconway5281 I also think this thoroughly proves that Tracy Wilson is either a thoroughly dishonest liar or she simply does not know as much as ice dance as she thinks she does.
Everyone can hear Wilson say g and p did not deserve Nagano gold and didnt even show up to Nagano prepared or trained.! She was brutal and I expected her to say their medals should be taken away!
Did Tracy truly say that about G&P? If so, she's truly whack. I remember Platov said that the work that went into Memorial Requiem was insane because the construction of the program was just unreal in terms of content. The way it kept building, the way they keep gliding over their running edges to carve out huge patterns on the ice and extending their free legs in unison with one another (and within very close handholds no less), and the way each move was done with very little set-up time. Memorial Requiem was not only beautifully dramatic but the content in that free dance was extremely high (yet seamlessly performed).
I find it interesting though that she was 'concerned' about stuff like content, close handholds, etc when so many of Grishuk & Platov's programs exemplified that to a T. Like their programs in 91, 92, 93, 95, 97, and 98. The only programs they skated that didn't exemplify that was their OD in 1994 and their FDs in 94 and 96 where they emphasized speed and energy over content. Most of Krylova & Ovsiannikov's programs on the other hand showcased what Tracy supposedly didn't like such as very open handholds and skating far apart. K&O's Carmen for example had a fairly good opening but after that, they relied almost completely on mime-like body movements and facial expressions (most likely used to distract attention away from the low content).
Something most likely happened away from the rink between Tracy and Pasha/Oksana nobody knows about. Also i know for a fact she is good friends with Maya Usova so she is probably pissed that Gritschuk: a)deprived Maya of her Olympic Gold in her last chance in 94, b)was part of breaking up Maya's marriage, even though in reality that was just doing her a favor as Zhulin is just a horndog who would have kept cheating on her until he was either caught or his dick fell off. She is also a huge fan of Torvill & Dean so G&P beating out both her real life close friend Maya Usova and her idols T&D for the 94 gold likely soured her on G&P forever to the point she smelt a foul odor if they were within 200 feet of her. Plus likely as I said something else that happened away from the rink probaby nobody knows about. Lets face it, Pasha as a person is a huge bitch and also more than a bit crazy, while Tracy is a nauseating fake nice and pretty full of it and combative herself, so it really could have been anything potentially. Lets face it though, every singe commentator, even the best ones, have their biases, and atleast 1 super favorite they are super overbiased to, and an atleast one they have a strong anti bias against. G&P were hers for the latter. Everyone has atleast one though, everyone.
+deacon conway. I too once heard that Wilson was good friends with Usova. But what's interesting is that Wilson never showed any bitter hatred towards Tatiana Navka. And Zhulin's relationship with Navka was IMO much more instrumental to Usova & Zhulin's marriage breaking up than his relationship with Grishuk did. From what I understand, when Natalia Dubova caught wind of Grishuk & Zhulin`s affair in 1992, she and her husband beat Grishuk up and kicked her out of their skating camp. Zhulin asked Grishuk to `wait` for her which she did until Usova caught him in a compromising position with the teenage Navka. Usova told Grishuk, Grishuk dumped Zhulin and she went back to her first coaches (Linichuk & Karponosov) and eventually managed to convince Platov to join her. Yet neither Zhulin nor Navka received any near the amount of hatred that Grishuk did. But like you mentioned, Oksana/Pasha was very clearly crazy and that probably made her an easy target for that kind of hatred (in addition to G&P committing the heinous crime of defeating T&D).
As for 1994, U&Z not winning the gold was probably their own fault (along with Natalia Dubova). Their strength was in their fire, passion, and intensity and that free dance demonstrated none of that. I will say that their 94 Nino Rota program did have a lot more content than usual for them but it was clearly too much as they looked like they were crawling over the ice during the final section of their program. It seemed to me that they could only skate with good flow when they were skating very little content (like in their previous free dances). Plus with their marital problems and him spending all of his spare time with his mistress Navka that season, it was bound not to end well for them.
I love how all this stuff is controversial, Adelina/Yuna, Ice Dance in 1998, etc. Until it happens to your country and then you think that Meryl and Charlie should have won and deserved to win. Very hypocritical.
+Adam Moms ? That was the thing though... they were asking Tracy what she thought about it, if it might have been rigged so that Davis/White automatically would be on top regardless. And Tracy gives her two cents. Which is to say that Virtue/Moir didn't do themselves any favors, had BEEN vulnerable by making mistakes to the buildup..Don't know where you're coming from..
+edap They made it sound like Tessa and Scott were the king and queen of messing up and giving lots of room after their performances for someone to swoop in there. Which they weren't doing Meryl and Charlie rarely skated smoothly or with any sort of connection. Let's be real the only reason Davis and White started getting the scores they did was because if the judges didn't inflate everything of theirs V/M would of had no competition.
Adam Moms I disagree:) Maybe you have that idea of Dave/Jenny to begin with and listen to this already being hyperaware of any cues. I did not feel like they made Virtue/Moir out to be the "king and queen of messing up." You obviously are biased, and that hardly is useful when trying to persuade people that a certain team was the objective gold medalist.
But you can't say it there's all the controversy in ice dance and then when the hometown team are a part of a controversy say there probably wasn't a controversy. That's a little ridiculous.
+Adam Moms Tracy Wilson, who is Canadian, said she didn't think there was one as well and talked about all the TES points they left on the table, which are facts if you read the protocols from the 2012-2013 to 2013-2014 seasons. 1998 was also a special case with hard evidence and an authenticated recorded phone conversation (though the whistleblower didn't blow the whistle until after the fact and she judged exactly to the agreement). The L'Equippe article was unsubstantiated anonymous opinions.