Chicks Dig the Long Program

There’s a reason why NBC makes sure to include figure skating with each evening’s broadcast of the XXII Winter Olympic Games.

It sells.

Us guys may ooh and ah over an olympic hockey game that goes into overtime. We may be wowed by snowboarding and halfpipe and ski jumping. But, when it comes to some ladies and their olympic viewing habits, it’s plain to see: Chicks Dig the Long Program.

• And the short program.
• And ice dancing.
• And…well…you get the picture.

It’s a far cry from the original reference, trust me!

Lisa has become quite a decent sports fan over the years. She enjoys baseball. She’ll tolerate a certain amount of the other major sports with good humor. But, when she hears the maestro crank up the quintessential skaters’ music – some instrumental love song or a classical piece – and she’ll transition from laser-like focus on grading papers or reading a book to devoting immediate interest toward whatever skating competition NBC is featuring that evening. 

And whereas she might generally be able to tell you what teams played in last year’s World Series or Super Bowl, when it comes to skating she can start rattling off names of skaters from years-gone-by; Olympians from the 80’s, 90’s or 2000s.

I can only feign a rudimentary knowledge of those athletes, she can name them all. Russians. Germans. Canadians. It doesn’t matter the nationality. Of course, she can also give you a pretty good run-down of us Yanks as well.

Thing is…her interest is not isolated. I hear similar conversations among strangers in the grocery store, in the narthex at church, at the water cooler at work. Many women seem to love figure skating. Guys shrug and say ‘meh.’

I’d have a hard time telling you the difference between a ‘twizzle’ and a ‘triple axel’ (or is is axle?).

When it comes to ice time, I prefer watching the kind with pucks and sticks.

I’d much rather be watching tomorrow’s semifinal Olympic hockey game between the U.S. and Canada (or, shoot, I’d even watch Finland vs. Sweden).

But you can bet as we come down the home stretch of these games – and even as we start to think ahead to the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, South Korea, we’ll see much more glitter than goals.

JG

Originally posted 2/20/2014