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virtutenonaliter · 6 years

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Thank You Ilderton - Media Scrum (transcription)

Transcription of the Thank You Ilderton media scrum below the cut

(with help from @buriedinthesky )

Interviewer: I guess first of all, Scott, the crowd, I mean when you’re driving down there, what was the vibe like there?

SM: It’s pretty fun, especially seeing the young kids, seeing how excited they are, and obviously... nothing can prepare you for a moment like that, I don’t think, it’s pretty special, and I love this community so it’s nice to be able to go down and feel that support and see the faces of people who have been behind you for 21 years.

I: Expecting such a large crowd?

SM: I don’t know - I don’t know, we’re not very good at knowing how many people are there but I didn’t expect that many people, that’s for sure.

TV: It’s still alarming to us that anyone would take time out of their long weekend in August to come and celebrate today, but it’s not even about us today, it’s really about the community and it’s so neat to look around and take note of those who are hopefully enjoying the day and, uh, having a fun summer.

I: Tessa, as the crowd got bigger as you got closer to the arena, the fans started getting a little more vibrant and jumping around the street.

SM: (laughing) There was a couple rambunctious areas for sure, I think that -

I: What was it like to see, as the fans started to get more interactive with you, obviously it looked pretty exciting to see the girls especially running up?

TV: I mean, it’s so heartwarming, I’ve been on the other end of that, and on the other side, in a lawn chair watching the Ilderton Parade go by or on a float with the mini jets or something, so it’s fun to sort of take in that atmosphere and we’re so appreciative of all the support we’ve received - it’s just, it’s heartwarming, I mean, this community has embraced and adopted me from the very beginning and for that I’m so grateful.

I: Scott, why did you guys wanna do this?

SM: Sorry?

I: Why did you wanna do this thing?

SM: Well, it’s just, it’s exactly, it’s in the name, it’s just to thank everybody for the support that they’ve given Tess and I our whole careers and, uh, we always like to tell people that, you know, it takes a village, and it’s true in our case, we had so much support - both from London and Ilderton - and we just wanted to throw an event that gave people a chance to come out and have some fun. It’s summertime - we won’t be skating today (Tessa laughs), but there will be a lot of fun, so we’re pretty excited about that.

Interviewer 2: Some people are saying out there, I was talking to some of the children that come here - and I know you guys like to do stuff for the kids specifically - and one of the things that they told me was, the fact that you guys did what you did means that they can live up to their dreams, even if they’re from a small town. What do you guys think of that?

SM: Yeah.

TV: I mean, that’s the best, if we can inspire anyone to chase their dreams or to believe in themselves or to just instill a sense of limitlessness, I think that’s incredible and how fortunate are we that we have that platform and that ability to connect with so many people, and the fact that our programs and our performances resonated with kids is really meaningful, and more than that, hopefully it’s what we will continue to try and do off the ice.

I: The party’s just getting started, right, just kind of talk about tonight, after the sun goes or just before the sun goes down...?

SM: Absolutely. (TV: After the media wraps up.) Yeah, as soon as we’re done with this media scrum the fun really gets going. No, I’m just kidding. But it’s a family day, we’re really excited about that, and we can’t wait to just hang out with our people from Ilderton, with this community and the skating club and, uh, it’s gonna be a lot of fun, but it’s not anywhere near close to being done yet, that’s for sure.

I: Can you give us - finally give us the bandlist, or playlist...?

SM: You’ll see it when it comes on the stage, but I will say that we’re very proud of the people that we have because most of them are from the community; uh, you know, when we were looking for kind of our first little breakthrough and to skate in front of a big crowd at the then JLC, it was huge for us, and the fact that we can have, hopefully seven or eight thousand people here for some of these young artists, it’s great.

I: What do you wanna tell the town? That they all came out here to see you, is there anything that you wanna tell them or...?

SM: Thank you. There’s not much else to say. Thanks for everything.

TV: Every time that we took the ice, no matter where we were in the world, we always felt the support of Ilderton and, we knew that we represented Canada but that also meant representing Ontario and Southwestern Ontario and the Ilderton Skating Club, and we were very cognizant of that every time we laced up our skates, and the support we’ve received has just been unwavering and steadfast throughout the two decades and it’s remarkable that everyone isn’t sick of us (maybe they are but) they really stood by us and it really, truly means a lot to us.

I: Throughout your entire storied career has there been one memorable moment that stands out above all of the others?

SM: Not really, I mean, I think we’re pretty fortunate that we have different memories along our career, I mean, we’ve had twenty-one years together and, uh, I don’t think there’s one that stands out specifically but I - I can remember coming home, especially ‘cause a day like today, you remember coming home and one moment I’ll remember from our career is being in the London airport on the way home from Pyeongchang, and seeing the thousand people that decided to wait for our flight to come in. It’s that kind of support that we wanna give something back like this for, I mean, we’re fortunate that we had the career we had, we had a great sporting experience and it’s, I think, kind of our duty and responsibility to kind of pay it forward and inspire some young people to be, not just be athletes, be artists, to chase their dreams and uh, hopefully we could do a little bit of that today.

I: After your final skate, Tessa, you had - you’re being interviewed - you had one trickle of a tear coming out, was it a tear of joy, or a tear of happiness...?

TV: Sweat. (laughter)

I: Could be sweat, yeah.

TV: No, it was, uh... it surprised me, there haven’t been many moments in our career when we’ve been celebrating that we felt that, um, sort of emotional... pull and, I mean... I think it was just an acknowledgement of the team that got us there, of that comeback process, of investing everything into the work to get us to that one moment, and to have executed the programs we did together and... honestly just being so proud of Scott. (SM: Yeah.) Sometimes it’s easier to recognize our success when I see him as an athlete, just so proud of him, and so excited for him.

SM: And I think of that moment, it’s really quite a personal one - I know that’s kind of crazy, we shared it with all the canadians - but it was really for us and about our journey, and I know that’s Tessa’s reaction, the one tear, but I mean, that was for us, I mean, that’s why it’s cool doing a day like today where we can not be under such intense pressure and be so worried about delivering for our team and for each other and just share a great day, a summer day with our community that’s always been there for us.

I: What is (???) going in the Canadian Hall of Fame (???) ...folks?

TV: I mean, that’s the highest honour imaginable.

I: Was it a complete surprise?

TV: It was... (SM: Yeah.) definitely a surprise to receive that email, and especially to see such esteemed names, you know, we’ve admired so many of those others for so many years, and I’m not quite sure it’s sunk in yet but what a thrill that will be come December.

I: One last question for me; is there one lesson that you’ve learned through your entire career that you wanna share with kids that have goals and aspirations much like you did, back when you first started figure skating, one lesson you take away?

SM: Well, there are a lot of things that have to go right in your career, but we always say, it’s not a very complicated solution, there are no shortcuts and uh, dream big, and commit yourself to those dreams. I mean, that, it sounds really cliché, you’ve heard that from everybody, but we believe in that, there are no shortcuts, hard work will get you where you wanna go, and that’s what we try and relay to kids.

I: On behalf of the Ilderton community, everybody around Canada, thanks for everything you guys have done and brought attention through the sport, and you’ve done Canada proud. (SM: Thank you.)

TV: Thank you. You’re gonna bring back another tear (laughs).

Interviewer 4: When you walk into this building, you’ve been coming here for twenty, twenty-one years (TV: a lot), what’s your emotion, or what do you feel..?

SM: I don’t feel much in the curling rink, in the skating rink I do (laughter). But this is our community, we’re here all the time. I mean, it is kind of funny to walk back in, I play beer-league over there, to remember kind of the first time we ever skated together and, you know, we talk about inspiring kids but what we try and inspire kids to do is sports for pleasure, and that’s all it was for us, we weren’t skating to win the Olympics when we were skating in this building. I think there’s so much that has to go back into putting pleasure back into sport, that’s what we think about; I think about not being able to hold Tessa’s hand or talk to Tessa or being so shy that -those are the memories that come in -rushing back and pretty much when we were skating all we were worried about was if we could go up and get ice cream afterwards or not, wasn’t very thoughtful. (laughter and unintelligible jokes)

I: How often do your families get together nowadays? Or maybe...

SM: How often do our families see us, I think is the better question. I mean, I think my mom, or our moms, forgot what we look like when we came home, we were in Japan until July 12th, so uh, it’s been a busy ride, we wanted it to be, we knew it would be, but our families do get together, that’s what they really missed. Coming back, these last couple of years it’s been fun to travel together again and I think our families feel that, especially our moms being able to share so many experiences over twenty-one years, I mean, that was every family vacation was to a skating competition, so it’s a special bond. We were always lucky, I mean, we see a lot of young dance teams, we always felt like we hit the jackpot with the Virtues, I mean I don’t know how Tessa feels about us.

TV: We just had that conversation, too,…(SM: it was more of a friendship), our families were paired up for twenty-one years, and how lucky are we that everyone just adores one another and really cherished that time but just, you know, got such support from the Moirs and uh, yeah, I mean, they’re family, they’re my family too.

I: Yeah, and you know, I think your dad said that when you make friends with a Moir you got a friend for life.

SM: ‘till you cross me, Ryan. (laughter) That’s the motto of the whole community here, I mean it’s nice that we get to put our name on this but at the same time, we don’t make this happen, there’s a committee, and the volunteers, very similar people - same people actually - that put together the 2010 celebration had a lot of work in this and what a special day it is for us to just be able to be here and kind of have the platform that we have.

I: You have a black eye?

SM: I missed the ball. Slow pitch, missed the ball.

I: What were you playing, what position?

SM: I don’t wanna talk about it. (I: Were you pitching?) No, I was out, I was in the outfield, I was running in for one of the guys and…

I: (overlapped jokes) Did you dive for it?

SM: No, I missed it completely, it was bad, but (TV: the sun was in his eyes) I caught about seven or eight in the other game so I’m good.

I: What’s next for you two? What’s the next goal?

SM: Well we have a tour coming up, the Thank You Canada Tour.

I: After that

SM: which is exciting… well that’s a big part of it for us because it’s, we’re part of the production team for that tour and I think what happens after that will depend on how this tour goes.

I: it goes until the end of November

SM: And we’re really excited to go into - yeah October November - and it’s going into a whole bunch of different markets in this country that many of which we have never played before and we’re really excited about that. So we’re pumped about that project and its gonna take us awhile to kind of, to catch our breath, probably will be after that. So then we’ll have to reevaluate. Tessa and I, both have a lot of goals that we want to get done but - in skating and not in skating - but it’s a short life and we’ve got to plan out these next eighty years.

I: One day at a time.

(distant shouting): EIGHTY?

Interviewer 5: What can fans expect from the Thank You Canada Tour?

SM: What can’t they expect?

TV: Yeah, I mean, it’s such a neat time for us to step into the co-producer roles, I think it’s the right moment for us, we dreamed of taking the reins and putting our own stamp on a tour and I think it just feels right, we have a good team of people around us, uh, after competing and winning with the team in Pyeongchang, we know the cast couldn’t be better and we wanna shake things up a little bit, and hopefully showcase skating in the entertainment realm a little bit differently, we’ve been brainstorming a lot with our creative team, we can’t wait to get to Montreal to build the tour, we’ll be working really hard on that over the next couple months.

I: Do you guys, are you gonna train for that, or when you go back to Montreal?

TV: Yes, we’ll head there (SM: September), next month, the beginning of next month, we’ll meet the team and get all the pieces in place and we wanna go into that sharp and healthy and trained, ready to go, and we wanna put our best foot forward. It’ll feel nice, I mean, that structure and that goal will be great for us to work towards.

SM: We really wanna push ourselves with this tour, like Tessa said. The reason why we wanted to do a project like this is because we missed the competitiveness of amateur skating, it’s why we went back, we wanna find something that kind of pushes us like that, I think that’s this tour, this Thank You Canada Tour.

I: Thanks, man.

TV: Thank you so much.

#tyi #tyi18 #thank you ilderton #media scrum #press #transcription

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saucylittlesmile · 6 years

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Anonymous said:

Can you describe how different VM are now than before? For us new fans? Is it a huge discrepancy? from what I’ve heard, it is...

I’m trying to think about how to describe this. Because it's me, this is long, and kind of train-of-thought, so sorry if anything doesn't quite flow, LOL. Plus, it's basically just how I remember things from four years later, rather than me going back and looking for references, and a bit of speculation too. So... grain of salt, okay?

So, you have to remember, that while people can now say, “oh, this is so different from Sochi, how could you ever compare them??", is that at the time, Sochi was different.

We’d been through VM being with significant others, we were in the midst of having a crisis with their skating and the judging (and reeling from realizing that despite being the better skaters, they were not going to win gold, barring a miracle). But there were rumours he wasn’t with C anymore and there were hugs like the backstage one (where he’s rubbing her shoulders) and on-ice practice kisses and a deliberate choice in hand hold and pics of them hanging out off ice at different events and rumours from random Russian sources saying they were hanging out and people interpreting them as dating and just this ‘we lost but we won’ solidarity...

And they came home, and we got what was, at the time, a nice amount of interviews and cute touring moments and it all just seemed like... he's single, she's single, they're probably retiring so why wouldn't they finally try out a relationship, because if their careers were what was holding them back, or that they were bad timing because of other relationships... they're in the clear now!

Except then of course, there was the KL visit to Ilderton (he can have female friends! we said) and Scott leaving the end of the CSOI tour right at T's bday and rumours of his drinking and partying... there was the cute weekend at the Olympics parade but new KL stuff too... and then in what was a very noticeable moment for me a series of events via other people's social media that had T being in France being noted by a friend of RS at the same time RS was there, and KL being referred to as Scott's gf, and other Calgary Stampede stuff and eventually T doing public events with RS... and it was just very clear that the word was out: VM were seeing other people and taking new, very individual routes in life.

Now, I make this all sound very down, but it's not as though there wasn't anything to enjoy. It was disheartening to realize that they weren't involved, but for someone like me, I had made the choice a long time before that I was there for their skating and their cuteness and that their personal lives, while I had my own wishes for them, was not going to be the reason that I followed them or not. And it wasn't as though we weren't still getting adorable VM content - they did a tour in China, they did their golf charity event, they both got social media and had some cute interactions and it was a whole new world for T being on SM. That was different in itself - before, we only learned about their lives when someone else posted about them, or they made enough of a newsflash that if you googled their names something popped up. But they had seemed very close in Sochi, and hopes had been high, and the late spring/summer just dashed any hopes of a romantic relationship... and VM were finding out how to be individuals and how to have lives beyond competitive skating and they just seemed farther apart than ever. Of course, we have no idea how much time they spent together, because as always, we only had glimpses into their actual lives. But in a literal sense, not having any competition to prepare for, they just had no "reason'' to be together - I never had any doubts they were still close, would still stay in touch, see each other - but naturally, it wasn't the same as before. (And this isn't even getting into the later fall and winter and following spring.)

I think that for them, the time post-Sochi was important, because it let them see what their lives could be like, and I think, appreciate each other in a new way. It let them see that they missed their skating lives. And for me, I can mark the time period that something - I don't know what it was - changed, in 2015. (For me, the feeling changed about the time they went to the beach volleyball at Pan Am and did the One Voice charity event with Mike Babcock, though I more often reference the Wall of China photo as a turning point, for more obvious reasons.)

Actually, this made me curious and I went and looked at @balletfever89's always helpful timeline, and I've realized that really, those events were all very close together, time-wise. Interesting.

Anyway, the journey pre-official comeback and all the way through the comeback - it has been different. They were of course, not happy 100% of the time, and we still only get glimpses - but the glimpses we've gotten have made me feel like overall, they were just so flippin' happy. With life, with each other, with their choices. And while we haven't had a post-comeback yet without touring (I don't really count the time between Olympics and touring, because that has to be the most enthralling yet exhausting part of it - coming down off what was a huge Olympic high, to regular life), the touring itself has been... different. On ice, I tend to discount, because no matter how sexy or how flirty or how much they're interpreting the choreography themselves - they know very, very much (and perhaps never so much as this year after the crazy hype of PyeongChang) they are in everyone's sightlines and getting filmed, photographed, discussed when they are on the ice. No matter how much I think their on ice interactions have increased since the comeback, I always keep that in mind (and no, I don't equate them knowing that with it being fake). But the knowledge that they are spending as much time off the ice together as they are (through T and through other sources) and some of the choices that T is making in showing us their off-ice time (and some of her on ice choices too) - extremely different, in content and in frequency. And still so happy. :)

#sorry for the long post #opinion #YMMV #memory lane

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dreamofawonderfullife · 6 years

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Virtue and Moir's post-Olympic party still going strong

Eight years ago, Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir's first Olympic gold medal was celebrated with a parade through Ilderton.

This time, the ice dance stars are flipping the script.

“It’s our turn to say thank you to everyone,” Virtue said this week from Halifax, where the cross-Canada Stars on Ice tour launches Friday.

The skaters are going to throw a bash for fans. The early target is the August long weekend in Ilderton, by the arena, right near the Moir clan’s backyard.

“Alma and Joe’s house, it’s a pretty good green room for a party,” Scott said, referring to his parents’ place. “I want to get some good people in there, some bands, and we want to give back and raise some money for charity. We’ve been so blessed. The London and Ilderton community has always given us such great support.”

They have been in demand these past two months since their PyeongChang return. Their winning appeal — and the fascination over their relationship status — landed them on Ellen’s talk show, giving the Canadians some well-earned publicity in the massive, yet hard-to-crack, American market.

“It was a lot of fun. There was so much energy, and we can always frame that in the context of what it means to the sport,” the 29-year-old Virtue said. “It’s good for ice dance and figure skating any time we have the chance to broaden that audience. We’re thrilled to do that. By no means was that ever a goal of ours. We just wanted to win the Olympics. The added benefits of whatever happened afterward, that’s just icing on the cake.”

Lately, the questions naturally have turned toward their future. What’s next?

Virtue is becoming a budding businessperson. She is the face of Nivea’s skin care line in Canada and has a keen eye for endorsement opportunities. When she’s not taking over TV networks for a day, she’s on the cover of another magazine.

She works hard to build strong relationships with companies and media partners.

Moir, who comes from a highly-regarded family of figure skating coaches, is helping out at the Ilderton club. It wouldn’t be surprising to see him eventually reach Brian Orser-like status, overseeing some of the best skaters in the world.

“I think the neat thing about our partnership is we’re so connected in what we do and the majority of our career has been intertwined,” Virtue said. “That’s been so incredibly special and we’ve talked at length about what that means to us. We’re also such different people pursuing such different things off the ice and it’s been nice to dive into various business opportunities while watching Scott passionately delve into the sport and setting up a competitive school. I’m so proud of him, much the same way I get support from him.”

“We still have that touchstone together always with skating. That will and always be the No. 1 priority.”

The tour — which arrives in London Sunday, May 6 — is booming. Ticket sale are “pretty insane”, according to Moir, and they’re preparing to perform in front of packed houses.

The skater, who famously skipped mandatory practice for the Olympic closing gala, couldn’t wait to start working on their show programs (which include Michael Jackson’s You Rock My World and, of course, the full four-minute Moulin Rouge free dance that clinched gold in South Korea).

“I was excited to come on tour. I never felt that way my whole career, and I love to skate,” the 30-year-old Moir said. “It usually kicks in a couple of days later, once you get rolling, but something stirred with us. It’s the cast we have here. There’s a great energy, and we’re seeing the impact of what the Canadian team accomplished in February. Back home, the numbers at the club are good. We have six dance teams and I’m proud to say we have eight boys skating at Ilderton.”

“I want to help them. I miss home when I’m gone. I miss being a contributing member of my family. That’s important to me. I do have a ton of projects, but I want to be involved in the lives of my nieces and nephews. I need to get back to that a little bit.”

He plans to visit schools, inspire young people and become a mentor, on and off the ice.

“I’ll focus on that the next couple of years, while I can, before people forget my name,” he said. “We’ve been lucky to be successful and have a bit of a platform. I think it’s my job and our duty to make sure we’re good role models, talk to kids and help them shape their lives through sport and extracurricular activities.”

“To me, that’s what being Canadian is all about.”

It’s not about the Internet meme that followed Moir since Games end of him standing up at the women’s gold medal hockey game, beer in hand and complaining to the referees.

“If there’s one athlete that doesn’t want that viral attention, it’s Scott,” Virtue said with a laugh.

Moir remembered talking to Olympic skeleton champ Jon Montgomery, still famous for chugging from a pitcher of beer on the streets of Whistler after his victory in 2010.

“He couldn’t shake that,” Moir said. “His corporate relationships, they just saw him as a beer-drinking party animal when that’s not really Jon at all. He’s a great athlete and person. I like to have a beer, but I also have to be mindful of what 13-year-olds see when they watch the Olympics. I want them to see sport moments. I try to stay away from that other stuff and I have Molson Canadian sending me fridges.”

“I don’t need to be on TV reacting to every single event. After that game, I did kind of shut it down. At the curling game, I was sitting between my parents being very well-behaved.”

Virtue and Moir were an important part of Canada’s Olympic viewing experience. It felt like they were on TV continuously, from the CBC documentary and commercials they did as lead-in, to carrying the flag at the opening ceremonies, through their performances and right until the end.

“Starting the Games by carrying the flag, that was an Olympic moment by itself right on par with competing,” Virtue said. “And then you go right through to the exhibition gala on the closing day.”

“We got a lot of Olympic time, which is awesome.”

They don’t get enough credit for their leadership in bringing together the Canadian figure skating team to deliver that first team gold — the one that made Patrick Chan an Olympic champ.

“I didn’t necessarily take that lead in Sochi (2014) and I regretted it,” Moir said. “After that Olympics, I talked with Meagan (Duhamel) and Eric (Radford, the pairs skaters who retired from competition Wednesday) and they were in the same boat. We felt we weren’t aggressive enough in our approach to the team event.”

“This time, we were. We talked about it a lot, sent emails. I’m pretty outspoken and maybe the guy branded as the captain because of it, but it was a complete team effort. Meagan drove the gold-or-nothing train. Because of Stars on Ice, we’ve travelled and lived together, grew up together and that was a special team feeling no other country had.”

“We relied on building each other up instead of cutting each other down, and we never let up.”

It turned into an old-fashioned blowout. By the time Virtue and Moir got on the bus to go perform their free dance, they found out the Canadians already had clinched gold.

“That was a different feeling,” Moir said. “Here you are, nervous and getting ready, and you look at your phone and find out you’re Olympic champion.”

But there was still extra motivation.

“For me, with all the Russian doping allegations, I wanted to crush them,” Moir said. “I didn’t want the Russian team to be able to say, ‘Well, oh, one of our pairs teams wasn’t here, so we lost (a nail-biter)’. We wanted to say back to them, ‘Yeah, are they going to skate seven times, because we beat you by eight points.’

“That whole event reminded us of how great Canada is. We do sport for the right reason. That win-at-all-cost mentality really brings us down. It was a tough year for amateur sport that way and we needed that at those Games.”

“I’m very passionate about that because that’s something we have to protect, clean sport.”

When controversy overtakes the Games, it ruins the stories the athletes want to tell. Virtue and Moir were able to make theirs shine through on their biggest stage.

“Tessa was really mindful of that,” Moir said. “She had that vision. It didn’t feel forced. Maybe when you’re younger, you’re playing the Olympian card, trying to prove yourself and it feels like you have four minutes on the ice to prove it.”

“We didn’t feel like we had to do that this time. We just knew that here it is, this is Tessa and Scott, we love what we do, we love each other and it’s a really authentic story.”

“People grabbed onto it and that has been fun for us.”

The partnership — and party planning — rolls on.

RYAN PYETTE

#article #very very very interesting article

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cuteiceprincesslove · 7 years

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Olympian skaters Moir and Virtue ditch Bieber tune, seek new song for ice dance routine

By Ryan Pyette, The London Free Press

Tuesday, May 2, 2017 4:41:02 EDT PM

"Sorry," Justin Bieber fans.

Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir plan on mothballing their ice dance take on the Canadian heart-throb's hit tune to bid a proper farewell to Purple Rain during their abbreviated Stars On Ice tour commitment this week.

"We put Biebs to bed," Moir, the 29-year-old Ilderton native, said by phone this week. "I think we'll do Prince. We'll turn our short program into a show program. We just weren't quite ready to say good-bye. It'll be a nice way to send it off, with three more shows."

That last sentimental skate will be, of course, at home in London Sunday afternoon at Budweiser Gardens.

It's the perfect venue to let go of their world-record, Prince-themed short dance, which fueled a third world title last month in Helsinki, capped a remarkable undefeated season and highlighted one of the greatest comebacks in figure skating history.

The former Olympic champs took two years off after silver in Sochi, and now find themselves favourites heading to the Winter Games at PyeongChang, South Korea in 2018.

"We were surprised, actually," Virtue, the 27-year-old Londoner said. "It's one thing to set realistic, achievable goals, but another to live it. Coming out of that Japan competition (NHK Trophy last fall) where we beat (French stars and training mates Gabrielle Papadakis and Guillaume Cizeron), I felt we needed to prove it wasn't a fluke at the Grand Prix Final (in France)."

They won that event for the first time in their careers, then cemented their rise back to top spot in Finland.

"We want to keep that momentum going," Moir said. "It's just a bit of fresh energy. For us, we came back for what we feel is the right reason -- just for us. I think that's powerful and that's why we were able to have a little bit of the success we had.

"We weren't too focused on the results this year."

But that's about to change. It's a big reason why they have passed up the full Canadian "Stars" tour to spend more time in Montreal building their gold-medal platform.

"The key is to go in and train as if you're the underdogs," Virtue said. "I don't think we're under any illusion that we have this in the bag. From the outside, I'm sure the perception was we had a smooth, easy comeback. There were a lot of new challenges, a lot of unexpected things. Those were the obstacles we missed when we were off.

"It was one of our toughest years, but also our most fulfilling."

The plan is to strip down their skating even more, rebuild their on- and off-ice mechanics and build the foundation they need to reclaim their Olympic crown.

They need another short dance like Prince. On Monday, Virtue put out the call on her Instagram account for song suggestions.

"Prince was so iconic and it was a lot to live up to," she said. "We love skating to every kind of different music. Year-to-year, we want to show some departure, and mostly we just have to connect to a piece. It wasn't hard to tell we connected with Prince and hopefully, we find something that thrills us just as much."

Their team in Montreal, led by husband-and-wife coaches Patrice Lauzon and Marie-France Dubreuil, will not change, other than to add a few experts to the specific dances (the short this season requires a Latin feel).

"We stepped on the ice at the world championships feeling more prepared than we've ever been," Virtue said. "That's the best feeling as an athlete and we're so grateful for that support."

They expect the ice dance field to remain the same, as deep as it has ever been. Defending Olympic champs Meryl Davis and Charlie White have said they won't compete in Korea -- but they're not officially retired.

"Olympics always bring some sort of surprise," Moir said. "I'd like to see a couple of comebacks. They're fun."

Will this be the last competitive season for the Canadians?

"It's looking that way but we jokingly always say to each other, 'we said that in '09, we said that in '13'," Moir said. "We're going to try not to say it this time.

#tessa and scott #interview

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virtchandmoir · 2 years

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OLYMPIC GOLD MEDALIST SCOTT MOIR REFLECTS ON MINOR HOCKEY

GREW UP IN ILDERTON, PLAYING UNTIL HE WAS 15 YEARS OLD

November 22, 2022

Scott Moir is an Olympic gold medallist, pairing with Tessa Virtue to create Canada’s most accomplished ice dancing partnership and the most decorated Olympic figure skaters in history. As part of the Special Olympics Canada Champions Network, he was a guest at the annual Limitless Gala fundraiser in Toronto last week.

Not many know that Moir started as a hockey player, growing up in Ilderton and playing with the Jets. We had the chance to catch up with him and reflect on his days in minor hockey playing in the OMHA and how he still has love for the game playing men’s league.

HOW DID YOU GET INTO HOCKEY?

Before I figure skated, I was a hockey player. Back then there was a ‘get your third child free’ kind of a deal, and I was the youngest of three boys, so my parents just kind of threw me in when I was three years old. I played with the older kids and couldn’t really keep up. We used to rotate as goalies, and nobody could raise the puck, so my uncle just told me to lay down and I fell asleep while I was in the net and they had to come wake me up. It wasn’t really a glorious start.

That was always my first love, hockey. I always played for the Jets in my home town. The arena was in my backyard. I played until I was 15 years old and I moved away from home.

WHAT ARE SOME OF THE SKILLS IN HOCKEY THAT HELPED YOU IN FIGURE SKATING?

Mostly aggression. Just being able to attack the ice and take my space. It helps me a lot when I’m on practice. I joke with the guys who never played hockey that they don’t know where everybody else is on the ice, where in hockey you have to. There were a lot of things. Just to be more forward on your blade helps with figure skating.

WHY DID YOU WANT TO GET INVOLVED WITH SPECIAL OLYMPICS?

I really feel like I’m the lucky one to be involved in Special Olympics. It’s the purest sporting environment that I’ve ever been around. The sense of fair play, camaraderie, sportsmanship, I’ve never seen anything like it in any sport. I always feel like we’re the ones taking the most out of these events.

WHAT IS YOUR FAVOURITE MEMORY OF MINOR HOCKEY?

When I was in Novice we won the OMHA West, that’s the highest we would go at that time. I can still remember the feeling of being on the team and the championship game and winning it and being on the ice for the game winning goal. That’s probably the big memory, that run, even at that age, something about playoff hockey, it still feels special.

WHAT ARE SOME OF THE LIFE SKILLS YOU’VE LEARNED FROM HOCKEY?

I was always very lucky. I had Tessa as a teammate. I love team sports, I still play hockey. It’s all about being part of a team and serving a role. Sometimes you’re the star and sometimes you’re uplifting your teammates. That’s the part of team sports that I really love.

—OMHA

#scott #off ice #special olympics #appearance #limitless gala 2022 #interview: omha #what an odd angle for an interview

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justlookingvm · 6 years

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Virtue Moir Lindt Master Class Talk 1 (uploaded youtube August 2015) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H8dX2xEjAlQ

Tessa and Scott’s Journey (Crank up volume or use headphones. They started skating together when she was 7 and he was 9)

Tessa and Scott are in the front of a room sitting on a table

S – that we were 7 and 9 and skating at a little skating club called the Ilderton Skating Club, and my aunt coached both of us and decided that, I think it was just so we would skate together, they thought it was cute. We weren’t very good, we didn’t like to hold hands, we didn’t talk.

T – no we didn’t

S – So, we had no idea that we were going to be Olympic ice dancers when we were 7 and 9

T – we always say that the sport chose us because we never consciously made that decision, but, we started skating together sort of just doing a few dances together and we had fun, we really liked it, and maybe after about 10 months or so we actually started talking too so that (muffled can’t understand), but every year our parents would sit us down and (she sees someone and says) do you need a chair? (gets up and says) we have extra ones here

S – (Scott also gets up and says) there’s chairs (they give out chairs), do you want a chair chair so you don’t have to roll around? (motioning to someone off camera, they say no) Oh you like rolling around. How about you guys back there? (motions to someone in the back of the room), you sure? OK, I’ll use it for my feet then (sits back on the table and puts his feet on the chair)

T – (sits back down on the table) save your legs (unintelligible), um, so our parents would sit us down every year and ask if we wanted to commit to skating one more season together and we were never allowed to quit in the middle of a season but every year we said yes, we were enjoying it, and we had success pretty early, we won the juvenile nationals when we were I don’t know about this tall (indicating with her hand how small they were), we were the smallest and youngest team, not sure we could even see over the boards

S – don’t think so

T – but uh that was a first kind of taste of standing on the podium and receiving a medal and we realized OK we want to just continue to get better and better so set our sights on pre-Novice, Novice, and just sort of continue that way

S – once we got up to Novice we started competing at a pretty serious level then um our parents would drive from, we live in London Ontario, and we were training in Waterloo so our parents would have to wake up at 4:30 in the morning and drive us to Kitchener/Waterloo so we could train for 3 hours and then drive us all the way back for school. We weren’t able to get the hours that we wanted to um so when we were 13 and 15, Tessa skipped 8th grade and we went to Waterloo to live there permanently, away from our parents

T – yes so we were quite young to move away from home at just 13 and 15, but uh we lived with families there and we were training every day and training with teams that were pushing us to be better and we would skate 3 hours in the morning, we would go to school, and then come back to the rink or return to the rink and do ballet and workout and um dancing, things like that and often then we would go home and do some homework, have dinner, and really be in bed before 8 or around 8 PM. So that wasn’t normal for high students I don’t think, we didn’t really do any semi-formals, no parties or movies, no sleepovers, we kind of missed out because we were so focused on training

S – and we were away from our families so it was really odd but we had a great coaching staff there, we billeted with some fantastic families and uh one coach in particular, ah Suzanne Killing [Sp.], our choreographer, um she would sit us down every week and we’d talk about goals, talk about what our goal was for us every day, what our goal was for the week, what our goal was for the month, and the season and so on. And what we also talked about is how each other are feeling, and more specifically how our actions made each other feel, and um started to really communicate. We would challenge each other, she challenged us to watch other teams on the ice (pause) fighting, yelling at each other, she’d ask “what are they getting accomplished, like how are they going to do when it comes time to compete?”, and that was a big start to our relationship where we had to communicate and we also had to have this level of respect that we kept through our whole career. We never told each other to shut up, we don’t raise our voices at each other, our biggest fight goes something like this (he looks down and stops talking), we’re very very sensitive people and what we found is that just not talking to each other is hurtful, we had to make sure that we didn’t hurt each other because we needed each other to be at our best, so I think ever since that those meetings, we are each other’s biggest fans

T – hm, we sorta cultivated our code of respect and set boundaries for um, you know we never name called, we don’t blame one another, and those are things that were just never crossed those lines, so even still 18 years later we have that understanding and that trust, that took a long time to work on, but ah

S – we were successful

T – ya we did well in Waterloo but when we were 15 and 17 we needed to make another change, um Waterloo we were sort of the top team in the rink, and we were still just in Junior, we needed to be around, we needed to skate with more senior teams, people who were better than us, world champions, and people who we were aspiring to skate with, so we moved to Michigan. Um and that was another big shift, because I still couldn’t drive and Scott had to drive me everywhere to get groceries, or to the rink, or to the gym, or everything, we were each other’s family, we relied on one another, but was also a big shift in our coaching staff because in Waterloo they were like our family members, and they were warm and they were encouraging, supportive and in Michigan we switched to some Russian coaches and the dynamic was entirely different, it was quite intimidating, and quite an aggressive style of coaching that we weren’t used to, and a lot of new things, we couldn’t go to regular high school, we couldn’t live with families, um we had to grow up pretty quickly

S – and um I can remember when we were driving across the border (garbled speech) and 15 and was something we would do together which was dangerous in itself (garbled speech), um we’d get to the border and they would think that we were eloping, and I was stealing Tessa from her parents, so we used to have to have a letter from her parents, a letter from my parents, a letter from Skate Canada, to cross the border every day, um but we grew really close in this time, because like Tessa said, we live with older skaters and we needed to be there for each other, and so here we are with these really intimidating Russian coaches, we’re both so scared out of mind, but our skating starts to get better, the (something) stuff that they taught us just kinda passed on to you today, ah you know their coaching style was magnificent (something garbled) teams and we love the product that they’re giving us. So we started to kind of get better and better and better. And um it was around 2005 that we moved there and 2006 when had our first shot at the Olympic Games. So we went to the National Championships knowing that we needed to be the top 2, and then we had a very we thought, we had trained all year, we were ready to go to the Olympics, so we ended up 3rd in the a compulsory dance segment, and then we were 2nd in the original dance and 2nd in the free dance, but ended up 3rd overall by .02 (Tessa gives a wry smile), so we thought that Skate Canada was going to send us to the games because we were young, and we wanted to win Vancouver, so they thought that they would see the future and that we needed to go to a Games, but, we were wrong. They didn’t send us to the Olympics and we were crushed.

T – I remember just feeling like everything was crumbling down, and everything we had worked for was, was um absolutely devastating I’ve never cried harder probably and still to this day I just thought, you know, we missed our chance and that was just devastating. They had even sent us we have all of the sort of destination Torino gear, so we had t-shirts, baseball hats (unintelligible)

S – our Olympic accreditation

T – yes, we had everything, we were at home watching the Olympics from our couches, and it was then that we made a decision, you know, 4 years from now, we’re not going to leave anything to chance, we have to be there and we have to be the best position as possible to win. Um, so we sort of retrained it and decided, OK, we can’t go to the Olympics, but we have Junior Worlds this year, we ended up going and winning, um we were motivated, we wanted to prove a point to everyone and to make a statement, and uh, so that was really successful but it was then that we sort of started on this 4 year plan to the Vancouver Games. And things were going along nicely. Our first year Senior we were 6th at Worlds, and our second year we won the free dance at our 2nd Worlds. That was a big leap and we thought OK, in 2008 this is great, we’ll be 2nd, we planned to win in 2009 Worlds and then we just go and win the Olympics. And that just seemed easy

S – easy (they say it at the same time)

T – we just had it figured out. So, in order to do that, um, in 2008, we decided we needed to work as hard as humanly possible, so we started skating or training 13/14 hour days, at the rink, um because we thought that working longer meant working smarter or working harder, and little did we know at the time that that was probably the worst thing that we could have done because surprise surprise I ended up with an overuse injury. So I had pain in my shins, uh basically my muscles were being strangulated ‘cause I could skate for 20 or 30 seconds at a time ‘til I had to stop when there was numbness and cramping and

S – and stop working

T – ya it was a really hard thing to explain and no one could diagnose it ‘cause it’s not a common injury so, eventually I mean we were sitting in our team doctor’s office and she said well “you have compartment syndrome and it’s a chronic thing, there is a surgery so we could try the surgery which may or may not work, or you know the alternative is just to stop skating, and to stop competing”. We’re a year and a half out of the Olympics so that wasn’t a choice a question for me, um I ended up getting the surgery and I spent my time rehabbing and doing physio in London Ontario when after the surgery, and Scott was training…

Virtue Moir Lindt Master Class Talk 2 (uploaded youtube August 2015)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FWY_PgHbK8g&t=610s

T – I think I was reluctant to tell him about the pain I was experiencing and I felt like I was disappointing him or somehow letting the team down, and I just couldn’t bear to get myself to deliver that disappointing news every day

S – and I felt like uh I was training really well and hard, I was skating with a sand bag and a hockey stick, just like trying to do anything so when Tessa came back I was ready, um and I didn’t want to remind her that I was just waiting there ready to go every single day, and I was training hard and I was in great shape, I kinda felt guilty about that too, so our relationship really struggled really suffered (garbled), now coming back with this injury not only does Tessa have to get over the fact that she just learned kind of how to re-walk again with her legs ‘cause remember her injury was on both legs, um that’s quite a process, so, also the one of the hardest parts was the we just didn’t communicate with each other during this time, and we had this weird, didn’t know how to look at each other, we didn’t know how to talk to each other, and that was probably one of the weirdest times in our partnership

T – it was really strange, we sort of pushed through we had Nationals, Four Continents, and Worlds in that winter championship series, and we would, guys you can appreciate this, we would step on the ice, and because I was still in pain we couldn’t train the way we were used to, so we would get on the ice for a competition without ever having done a full run through of our program, or maybe having done one at home

S – this is like World Championship stuff

T – so we would start, and we would just sort of cross our fingers and hope to make it to the end and hope that adrenaline carried us through, um, that’s the worst feeling, unprepared, and not ready, that was a big struggle, and on top of that to not have that trust and loyalty in the safety net that you know we came to rely on in our partnership, so that was challenging and we thought that once that season was done we ended up 3rd at Worlds which was it was respectable, no team had ever won the Olympics without first having won Worlds, so it seemed an impossible task to prepare for the Vancouver Olympics and think that we would win, and yet, we still decided that that was our goal

S – so we’re one year out of the Olympics, and remember we talked about the little relationship problem between the two of us so we decided to make it, we both knew that we needed to find a way to come together and stronger so did start taking a bit of counseling which was kinda like marriage counseling, uh the guy that we went to was a marriage counselor and a sports psychologist, so we used him for both but then again we started talking about our feelings, and how each other were feeling, um that was huge for us, we still actually worked on it up to the Games and it wasn’t easy, it’s not like we sat down once and we just it’s like OK everything is perfect, water under the bridge, we had to work on the whole season and uh what a lot of people don’t know as well with the Vancouver Games, Tessa was still very hurt, the pain in her shins had gone away uh a little bit but not not for very long and we adapted kind of the (metro?) (a little aside to Tessa, speaking low can’t understand), but since we couldn’t train like everyone else we needed to make sure that we were trained but we needed to train in our own way. And uh going into the Vancouver Olympics, Tessa was even more hurt, she was doing about 6 or 7 hours of physio a day, but we were very trained, we were very ready for the Olympic Games.

T – and there’s something about the energy in the building at the Pacific Coliseum in Vancouver that I just felt right, just felt like it was it was our building and we took the ice and I just remember sort of the magnitude of the situation, it was larger than life because judges, and the media watched our every move and and criticized um we were sort of in a horrible position with this we were in the hunt for a medal, and yet, with all of that attention I think our focus narrowed and it was really just the two of us, our little world was all that we saw and that was all that mattered. We took the ice in this little bubble and started forgetting that there were 30 million people watching or you know caring and invested in this, and we skated really well, we had 3 strong performances, um

S – couldn’t hear our music for some of them

T – laughs

S – the crowd was so loud

T – it was amazing and it’s really an athlete’s dream come true to represent your country at a home Olympic Games, so standing on the podium and singing Oh Canada with 12,000 people in that building was absolutely incredible and a bit of a whirlwind, it was amazing

S – highlights?

T – absolutely and shortly after that actually we had the World Championships, we won our first world title 3 weeks after that, and I think we were just exhausted

S – in Torino Italy, so destination Torino, we had those shirts, we might not have gone to the Olympics, but we got to win a World Championship

T – (at the same time) we redeemed ourselves

S – I remember being in the final position and watching the tape afterwards and just seeing our faces, we just look exhausted

T – ya we just relieved to have that season done, um, but it didn’t take long for us to decide that we wanted to continue, we felt we still had more to give and more potential to explore, we wanted to sort of push ourselves and push the envelope in skating and in ice dance, and um see what else we could do, so we worked with different Cirque du Soleil acrobats on our lifts, we brought in various choreographers, and off-ice dancers, we sort of made that our mission to change up the sport a little bit, um or at least change our dynamic on the ice, uh but I needed another surgery ‘cause the pain moved not only in just my shins but I got it in my calves as well, um a few months after the Vancouver Games I got a 2nd more aggressive surgery on my legs, but the recovery process went smoother because we kept in touch and we were supportive and learned our lesson (Scott nods approval), so, sort of battled that for a couple of years, actually I considered a 3rd surgery believe it or not, the exact same surgery, um before Sochi Olympics ‘cause I still had that pain, um and I remember my surgeon just joking that he liked to see new patients every now and then (laughter in the room), but it was then that I was put in touch with a sport scientist physiotherapist and they call him movement whisperer, and he looked at my mechanics and how I moved and how I skated and said well no wonder your calves are so sore, you’re expecting them to do all the work for you. So I wasn’t using my glutes and my bigger muscles, you know what we talked about on the ice today, that squat position and I wasn’t doing any of that

S – and evidently we were watching tapes, either was I really, um we would watch he’d be pointing out things like saying Tessa look at your hip position here, she used to skate with her hips really forward and not coming back at all, and then I’d look over to me and I was doing the exact well not quite the exact same thing because obviously I didn’t have any pain but there was a lot of room for me to improve as well so it took this advantage that we found through this injury and then made it our style

T – ya

S – a lot of our exercises and stuff that you guys saw today

T – ya we took a lot of video work and it was a way more intellectual and sophisticated way to train because we realized why we were doing what we were doing so we understood why our warmup was important, exactly what muscles we needed to work through for certain things, it was tedious, like learning to write with the other hand, and he would even, this guy would film us doing our cooldown walk, we do this walk when we get off the ice or our session, he’d video that and he’d correct every single step that I made, so that was kind of interesting and just extended it to every exercise that we were doing

S – a couple of you weren’t very happy with me when I was (bending in today?) imagine walking to the end of the hallway and back and me being like nope that was wrong, try it again (laughter from the room), just you walking

T – so that was a challenge that I actually was able to skate without pain and that was incredible, we changed a lot of our on-ice training and preparation for competition became more integral work and it was harder that we had ever done before but I was not in pain, so it was amazing leading into the Sochi Olympics, um because I was present and I wasn’t getting 7 hours of physio every day as I was in Vancouver, and we were 4 years older and think we were approaching it as if it was our last Games, so it was a totally different experience. We just embraced every part of it, we embraced the (?), we loved chatting with the athletes in the cafeteria, in our workouts, and standing on the podium, they’ve got an outdoor ceremony and we just wanted to be present and to take it all in, and um we knew that 17 years of work sort of led us to that point. So we had our best performances at Sochi Olympics. We couldn’t have skated any better and in fact we sort of lucked out. (Scott says something and laughs, but it��s too low to hear). Um in fact I think we felt better about our skates when we got off the ice in Sochi than we did in Vancouver, and we got Silver medals in Sochi, so a lot of people saw that as a failure or as a disappointment, um and (typically?) it wasn’t what we wanted

S – we wanted to win

T – we wanted to win, but we were so genuinely satisfied with our skates, our performances that we realized that the colour of the medal didn’t define us, didn’t identify us, you know it didn’t matter what those 9 or 11 people thought about us on the panel, it was really, how do we feel about ourselves, how do we feel about what we’ve accomplished, and that was put to the test

S – we got our moment, it was really neat because in 2010 we said to each other we’ve done the work so no matter what happens we’re so proud of each other, let’s go out there and have our skate, we’re focused (the video cuts to him saying) the colour of the medal that made the moment special after all was more so what we had together, the 18 years that go into it, mastering our craft, mastering every step of every program, we felt that we did the best that we could

T – so, after that we decided that we needed a bit of a

S – ya we needed a break

T – break (laughs), um we took a year to sort of step away from competing but we challenged ourselves in new ways on the ice, we were performing come around the world, doing tours, we worked with different choreographers, and it was a clean slate because we could create programs without rules, (something about appeasing judges), technical requirements, things like that, so it’s been a really thrilling year for us, we tried to say yes to everything, things that scared us, tried new things

S – work with different choreographers, (something) opportunities outside of the sport, now we have to decide if we want to try for 1 more Olympics, figure out if we, we have to make sure if it’s right, we would love to go to another Olympics, but I think with our 2 experiences, um with Sochi and Vancouver, we are always going to want to be at the Olympics, we’re 75 where we want to be representing Canada in ice dance, it’s just not the reality, so we hope that we have 1 more run in this, but we never know.

#tessa and scott

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mysticseasons · 6 years

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Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir to co-produce their own cross-Canada ‘thank-you’ tour

Ice dance gold medalists Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir will be co-producing a cross-Canada tour this fall – and this time, they’ll be the ones in creative control.

Though the details are still being worked out, in an interview with the Star, Virtue described the concept as a sort of scaled-down combo of a rock concert, dance extravaganza and traditional skating show.

Virtue, on the phone from Kanazawa, Japan, said she and Moir have been busy, “Picking the buildings, finding sponsors, putting a cast together, creating a team of directors, choreographers and costume designers, and thinking about everything we’ve always wanted to do in a show.”

The two have been performing during the Olympic off-season for many years now, but, “We would sit in every show and think ‘I wish I could do this, I wish I could do that, I would do this differently.’ Well, now we’re actually trying to make that happen,” Virtue said.

Virtue and Moir, who won individual and team gold at the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Games, are known for their ice-meltingly sexy routines .

Since their win in February, the pair has appeared in skating shows at home and abroad, including the spring Stars On Ice tour across major Canadian cities.

Tour producer Byron Allen told the Star that, thanks to Olympic fever and Virtue-Moir madness specifically, Stars on Ice had a banger year, selling out six venues and generating a level of attendance and excitement not seen since the summer of 2002, when Jamie Salé and David Pelletier headlined.

This new venture — dubbed the Thank You Canada Tour, in honour of the gratitude the two feel towards Canadians who supported them through their Olympic journey — will make its 30 stops in smaller communities; kicking off in Abbottsford, B.C. on Oct. 5 and concluding in St. John’s, Nfld. On Nov. 24.

It will feature some of Virtue and Moir’s closest friends, who happen to make up the majority of the Canadian Olympic figure skating team, as well as Elvis Stojko and a number of as-yet-unannounced guests.

Virtue said they want to perform in places where people don’t usually get to see professional figure skating. She spoke wistfully of the skating club in Ilderton, Ont., population 1,800, where she and Moir met at just seven and nine years old, and imagined what it would have been like, back then, to see ice dance at a high level on home ice.

“We were lucky that we got to travel when we were young and do seminars and get exposed to other ice dancing teams and athletes,” Virtue said. “We don’t think we’re going to be changing the world (with this tour), but if we can go into these cities and put on a good show, that maybe is a little fresh and different, and have fun with 5,000 people in Grande Prairie, Alberta, then that would be really cool.”

Over the years, exhibition skating – especially those seasons when they were deep in Olympic training and just appeared as guests for a few minutes in a number or two — has been fun, but they had no “creative control or investment in the full product,” Virtue said.

“We’re all-in people. That’s not really fulfilling for us.”

When asked what they want to do creatively, Virtue said there is a “long list” but that budget and the limitations of small venues will rein them in somewhat.

“But” she said excitedly, “even things like having a stage and doing some off-ice dance, but then the choreography comes on to the ice. Or doing the lighting a different way. Or having loud music. Or confetti! We’re at that stage now where we’re just throwing out all our crazy ideas.”

“We’re shaking things up. It’s really our way to tour Canada and say thank you. We’re so excited.”

- The Star

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samirgianni · 8 years

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A Visit to Rolling Ridge Maple Products

Wow, has it ever been a long time since I've paid a visit to anyone, but when we were coming home from Windsor last weekend we drove past Rolling Ridge Maple Products, remembered we were out of maple syrup, and paid a flying visit.

Rolling Ridge is located at 22681 Vanneck Road, just west of Ilderton, Ontario. (Ilderton is about 20 kilometres north-west of London.)

This is a very nice little set-up. In addition to the combined boiler room (refinery? evaporator? sugar shack?) and store, you can walk through the bush from which the sap is collected, reading notes on the production of maple syrup as you go. Although I admit my eyebrows went up at the description of the method of collecting sap as being "invented by the early pioneers". Um, really?

There's the old sugar shack, as well as the original cast iron kettle.

They have a couple of the old collection buckets on display, but as with every modern maple producer, the sap is now directed straight to the boiler via blue plastic tubing.

You can just about spot the tubing in the background behind the old sugar shack.

Inside, our purchase is rung up by Jamie Robson, a member of the family behind Rolling Ridge. There's maple syrup, maple syrup, and more maple syrup - oh, and little maple sugar patties in the form of maple leaves, maple "butter", and if you are there at the right time apparently maple cotton candy, which sounds to me like genius or at least about the only thing that would induce me to eat cotton candy. They opened up in late February and will go until some time in April at this location, although their products are available all year in other places.

Barrels of maple syrup sit in the boiler room. This years season has been early, long, and odd; with temperatures all over the map, making the process somewhat trying. However, spring approaches and the sap rises and the outcome is maple syrup.

As the syrup is decanted from the boiler, it passes through a serious series of filters. Jay Robson, Jamie's brother, oversees the process.

Maple syrup grading names are in a period of change. From my point of view this will have advantages and disadvantages. What is now being called Very Dark is my favourite, and it used to be somewhat hard to get but often cheaper when I could find it - not always! I think I am not alone in preferring it now (it used to be that the lightest in colour and flavour was at least officially the most highly regarded) so I will find it easier to get but no less expensive than any other kind. Of course, the exact proportions of each kind produced will continue to depend more on weather conditions than on the demand for them.

Our gallon of syrup came in a big plastic jug. Since it takes us quite a while to go through that much, we will re-can it into smaller glass canning jars. It will keep up to 3 years in our cold cellar that way, although I doubt it will take us that long to use it. from Seasonal Ontario Food http://seasonalontariofood.blogspot.com/2017/03/a-visit-to-rolling-ridge-maple-products.html

#Seasonal Ontario Food

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virtchandmoir · 5 years

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What Community Means to Me by Janet Smith

If you live in London, Ontario, you’ve probably been to a Start.ca sponsored event. As we prepare for the upcoming Continental Cup, of which we are the Community and Stage Sponsors for, I stopped to reflect on what these sponsorship's really mean. Why did being a part of the community mean so much to the company? And for that matter, what did “community” mean to me?

I started thinking back on moments in my life where I had experienced community support. I grew up in a very small town of about 330 people just north of London, called Ilderton. Some of you may recognize this town, as it is also the hometown (and home ice) of Scott Moir, one half of the amazing Canadian Ice Dancing duo, Scott & Tessa. Coincidentally, Scott is going to be one of the many celebrities that will be participating in the celebrity match on the Start.ca Community Sheet.

Some of the wonderful advantages of living in a small town were that you knew everyone by name, you were never bored, and everyone always seemed to help you out when you needed it. It was kind of like having a large support net. I have so many wonderful stories about growing up in Ilderton, but I would like to share one of them in particular with you.

When I was 22, I was living and working in Toronto, but travelling home most weekends. My father had been diagnosed with cancer was given a few months to live.

It was a chaotic, confusing, and exhausting few months. While my dad lay in the hospital, my brother and I were tasked with moving our parents’ things from their home (my childhood home) to a new property, five houses down the street. It seemed an overwhelming mountain of a task given the emotional weight of everything, but we dug in, and reached out to our friends in the area to ask for help. When we woke up the next morning, I think there must’ve been 20 families that had arrived with their trucks, hoping to help.

Many hands make light work. They quickly organized themselves into groups. A group of women and men in each house; a group loading; unloading and moving 22-years of an entire families’ stuff from one home to the next. The younger men were literally picking up couches and mattresses and carrying them down the street. By 1pm that afternoon, I walked through the empty house I grew up in, alone. The echo of each footstep bringing on a lifetime of memories.

I walked into the new home expecting a week of organizing ahead. Instead, I walked into a house that was filled with laughter. Every box had been emptied. Every room was set-up as if it had been that way for years. There, in the centre of the living room, a comical scene was unfolding; a group of farmers moving furniture and pictures around, playfully arguing about what should go where. They had to experience it, to make sure the Feng Shui was just perfect for my mom and dad. I knew in that moment that I would never be alone because I had this incredible community that I could lean on when in need. By 2pm that afternoon, my parents’ new house had been turned into a home.

Stories like this remind me of the importance of giving back to the community. I feel so thankful that Start.ca provides me with opportunities to volunteer and get involved. I help where I can, when I can, in any way I possibly can. This is my way of giving back to the communities that have given so much to me over the years.

I am looking forward to spending some time with my friend Scott Moir at the Continental Cup. It’s serendipitous that he is a guest celebrity at the event where the company I work for is the Community Sponsor. After all, it seems like not that long ago I was watching a teenage Scott Moir carrying my parents’ couch down the street with his brothers on a hot day in the summer of 2001. That time, nearly 20 years ago, will always be one of the most extraordinary examples of a community coming together that I have ever experienced.

Janet Smith

Start.ca Marketing Manager

Start.ca

#scott #off ice #appearance #continental cup 2020 #press #the only place where scott's name comes first

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virtchandmoir · 5 years

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‘Means the world to us’: Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir honoured with Canada’s Walk of Fame Hometown Stars

August 7, 2019

Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir are just 30 and 31 years old, respectively, and they’re at the top of their careers. And now they have Hometown Stars courtesy of Canada’s Walk of Fame.The pair will be honoured with special ceremonies in their respective hometowns of London, Ont. and Ilderton, Ont. on Aug. 7.

The four-time world champions and five-time Olympic medallists both toldHELLO! Canada they find the whole thing a bit surreal.

“It’s kind of strange because we’ve always said we’re not saving lives, we’re just ice dancing,” Tessa said. “And what we do is meaningful to us and we love representing our country, but to be recognized on that stage is really quite something.”

Scott said he hadn’t even contemplated the possibility of being honoured in such a way.

“Tessa and I have been working together at our goals for over 20 years, so to see them culminate the way they did last February at PyeongChang was amazing, but these little things, you don’t really ever think about,” he said, pointing out that they are both still very young.

Tessa and Scott began skating together in 1997, when they were eight and 10 years old, respectively. It quickly became apparent they were a blockbuster pairing, and after five years of skating together they won bronze at the 2002 Canadian Championships as novices. By 2005, they were the most decorated junior-level ice dancers of all time.

Four years later, they had won gold at the Canadian Championships, which was followed up by the highlight of their careers at that point: gold at the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics. They became the youngest ever ice dancing team to win a gold, and the first Canadians to do so at home. They took two silvers at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, which they followed with two golds at the Pyeongchang Olympics in 2018.

Scott said everything comes back to Ilderton for him.

“Fame is something that I never really think about, I don’t really gauge my success on,” Scott told HELLO! Canada. “But what I can say is the support that we’ve gotten over the years, over our careers, that keep us going, that fuels us every day, the support from Canadian people and the support from the people in our community is the reason why we have this star on the Walk of Fame.”

Tessa said she can’t thank the community enough for its support.

“From the very beginning, Ilderton and London respectfully, they’ve been so supportive of us and it’s been a long career for us, almost 22 years already,” she said. “They’ve really lived our journeys with us and we’re just so grateful. Whether we were competing at home at the Budweiser Garden or in PyeongChang in Korea, we always felt like our hometowns were with us and part of that story. And that we get to celebrate with those closest to us means the world to us.”

Canada’s Walk of Fame launched its Hometown Stars program in 2017. It is intended to provide all inductees with the additional opportunity to give back to their home communities and have a plaque mounted in a location of their or their families’ choice. CEO Jeffrey Latimer said it’s part of the Walk of Fame’s new mission to be a national platform instead of one centred on Toronto. All inductees are also provided with $10,000 to donate to a cause of their choice.

Tessa has chosen to contribute $10,000 to the London Abused Women’s Centre, a feminist agency that provides women and girls with long-term, women-centered counseling, support, and advocacy and addresses many of the issues and barriers faced by women and girls. Scott has chosen the Lions Club in Ilderton, which he said is helping “fill the gaps in municipal funding” so kids can continue to have access to sports.

Jeffrey told HELLO! Canada Tessa and Scott were not only chosen because of how they’ve helped their communities, but also because of how they learn by getting back up after falling down and trying again – literally, in their cases. That can be difficult to do alone, but it shows true commitment when you’re doing it with someone else.

“Many of the athletes that have been inducted, they weren’t sort of in their prime, it was later in their career that they got inducted, or at the end of their career after they retired,” Jeffrey said. “It was really important for us for two reasons for Tessa and Scott. One, because they’re still on top of the world. They’re still a household name, they just got back from winning again at the Olympics. They’re young, they’re youthful. These were all really important things.

“But the second thing that I think we love about Tessa and Scott is what does it take to truly partner with someone to become the best in the world? I think that’s something that people forget a lot.”

MORE: The private moment Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir shared after winning Olympic gold

Tessa and Scott head out on a 31-date tour of Canada dubbed Rock the Rink this November. The idea is to combine live rock music with skating. Canadian Olympians and figure skating legends including Elvis Stojko, Patrick Chan and Kaetlyn Osmond will be involved, as will America’s Jeremy Abbott and Italy’s Carolina Kostner. Tessa told HELLO! Canada the preparation for the extensive jaunt has made her and Scott reflect on their careers so far.

“One thing Scott and I have really been [thinking about] is where do we find joy and fulfillment?” she said. “Funny enough, it’s not podiums or holding a gold medal. Those are nice markers of the fact that we pursued something and accomplished a dream, but it’s really that process. It’s the grind of training. It's that full commitment to something and investing everything. It’s that feeling of vulnerability and embracing your fears and facing your fears and kind of putting yourself out there.

“I think it’s just that whole kind of, not to sound too cliche, but it’s that whole process of pursuing something,” she continued. “And, I think if we’ve learned anything, it’s that there has to be joy in the details and there has to be some kind of gratification every day from the hard work. And it is that, I mean there’s no shortcut to success, it’s just a lot of hard work and sacrifice.”

Scott said if he had any advice for young people pursuing their dreams, it would be just that – work hard and follow what you love.

“The big thing is having that passion,” he said. “In sports, I mean, that’s what we're drawing off after even 22 years of being together, being passionate about your craft, really finding the love for what you do and letting that passion fuel you.”

—Hello!

#tessa and scott #off ice #honor #canada's walk of fame 2018 #hometown stars 2019 #interview: hello! canada #just for the charity bit

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virtchandmoir · 6 years

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Ice-dance pair Tessa Virtue, Scott Moir named Postmedia's Team of the Year

December 28, 2018

Twenty-one years ago, Carol Moir made the Canadian sporting match of the century.

The coach at the Ilderton Skating Club asked her nephew Scott to hold Tessa Virtue’s hand because she figured it might be a strong team for ice dance competitions.

Scott, back in his more bashful days, knew the drill. He grew up steps from his hometown rink in a family that discussed figure skating around the supper table — in the hour or so before the puck dropped for the Maple Leafs game on Hockey Night in Canada

The Virtue clan, from nearby big-city London, were athletes. They had sport in their blood.

Tessa, who loved ballet, impressed her first teachers with the uncanny ability to replicate movement almost immediately on first sight.

When she and Scott took the ice together, the talent was evident.

“We weren’t skating to win the Olympics when we were skating (then),” Moir, now 31-years-old, said. “Pretty much, we were worried if we could go up and get ice cream afterward.”

They quickly outgrew their home rink, moving first to Kitchener-Waterloo and then to Canton, Mich., for pro-style training. Mike Slipchuk, then a coach and now Skate Canada’s director of high performance, first saw them skate on the other side of the world — at a junior Grand Prix event in Harbin, China, in 2004.

“It was one of those things where I was well aware,” he said. “As they were young and moving up, there was always a lot of talk about them. It’s neat to see where they started and where they end up in their careers.

“It’s been an incredible journey to watch.”

How many star athletes have risen to the top of their field, then got knocked off their pedestal, took a couple of years to regroup, then returned to dominate their event like no one has ever done before?

That list is short.

Michael Jordan, probably, after he came back to the NBA from his self-imposed hiatus to try professional baseball.

Muhammad Ali, for sure, when he reclaimed boxing’s heavyweight title.

That’s what Virtue and Moir accomplished these past two seasons. That makes them the perfect pick for Postmedia’s Team of the Year.

When they became the first North American duo to win Olympic ice dance gold in 2010 on home ice at Vancouver, they were only four years into their maddeningly platonic partnership on the senior circuit.

They still produced the performance of a lifetime, but it was understandably pushed into the national sub-conscious during a massive two-week Canadian gold rush capped by Sidney Crosby’s famous goal against the United States in the men’s hockey final.

Four years later in Sochi, Virtue and Moir were bested in figure skating’s most riveting rivalry. They finished second to training mates Meryl Davis and Charlie White, who used their post-Olympic Dancing With the Stars platform to become TV celebrities.

The Canadians retreated from the competitive realm for two years before creating their legendary bounce-back. This time, they moved to Montreal and constructed a familiar training pattern.

They were at the same club as the reigning world champs and their top competitors — Gabriella Papadakis and Guillaume Cizeron of France.

“They never shied away from training with the best,” Slipchuk said. “When you’re in that environment, there are no days off. It’s something they always did in their career, and with (coaches) Marie-France (Dubreuil) and Patrice (Lauzon), they recreated their skating and passion.

“The last two years was the best I’ve ever seen them. They went undefeated (in 2016-17) and then went out and won the Olympics again.”

The volume of their careers, which started with whispers and a growing buzz, developed into a deafening roar.

Virtue and Moir were Canada’s hopeful faces at the start of the 2018 Olympics in South Korea. They carried the flag into the opening ceremonies of a Winter Games without NHL players.

Then they delivered a transcendent skate that brought their discipline to its highest level.

They have become as revered as Kurt Browning, Brian Orser, Elvis Stojko, Liz Manley and Sale-Pelletier are in the country and figure skating world.

“The one thing that will always stick out to me is they wanted every piece of information to make them the best,” Slipchuk said. “Here’s the best dance team we’ve ever seen and they were always open and wanting advice any time we brought in officials, judges or technical people. They were so respectful of everyone there to help them. They’re professionals and perfect ambassadors for their sport.”

The 29-year-old Virtue was selected by ESPN as one of the most-recognizable female athletes in the world. People worldwide continue to be stumped by how her relationship with Moir isn’t romantic.

They’re flattered by it, but that’s not what makes them tick.

“If we can inspire young people to follow their dreams and believe in themselves, how fortunate are we that we can have that connection,” Virtue said.

Every so often, we get a glimpse of tremendous chemistry — from the way the Golden State Warriors move a basketball to John Tavares and Mitch Marner creating a goal. But those partnerships won’t last two decades.

This one did.

VIRTUE VERY TRENDY

When the Olympics rolled around in February, Canadians took to the Internet to search for the answers to their most pressing questions.

They wanted to know why NHL players weren’t participating this time, how come so many Russian athletes were banned and a lot of us just needed a refresher on the rules of curling.

But the most sought-after information in Canadian sports this year revolved around the relationship status of two beloved champion athletes.

Are Tessa and Scott dating?

“It’s not a surprise to anyone this was the No. 1 question on everybody’s mind,” Google Trends expert Nicole Bell said. “Coming of their very emotional performance in Pyeongchang where they won the gold medal for ice dancing to that sexy Moulin Rouge song, people were like, ‘Omigoodness, is it possible this is ‘The Notebook’ for real?’

“We want this to be real-life love — but sadly, it’s not true.”

Google is able to chart the rise in interest in personalities from year-to-year. Justin Bieber and Donald Trump, for instance, aren’t found on the list because online searches for their names didn’t move the needle much above their 2017 levels.

In this country, Tessa Virtue ranked first among Canadians and athletes in general in 2018. Hoopster Tristan Thompson is second among Canadians and new Raptor Kawhi Leonard is runner-up for athletes behind the figure-skating star.

Though the anxiety over William Nylander’s eventual signing with the Leafs and John Tavares’ Toronto homecoming checked in highly, the level of curiosity around Virtue and Moir, especially during and after the Winter Games, was the biggest story.

“It’s kind of interesting because they have been on the scene for a long time as a pair, but that (dating) questions hasn’t been a burning topic in the Canadian mind until this year’s performance,” Bell said, “and Tessa did a lot of beauty campaigns (for Dove and Nivea), along with being involved in fashion, and those activities produced additional interest in her beyond the skating world.”

Virtue finished fourth on Canadian searches for people around the world, behind Demi Lovato, Khloe Kardashian and Hailey Baldwin.

“Demi Lovato had a bit of a dramatic year with an overdose, Khloe Kardashian made the news for (a stormy relationship with) Tristan Thompson and Hailey Baldwin married Justin Bieber. Tessa is there with no scandal — just someone whose athletic feats and talent was so incredible.

“She’s somebody Canadians are incredibly proud of and she’s a role model. If you had a vote for Canada’s sweetheart right now, she would win, hands down.”

THEIR GREATEST HITS

2017-18 Moulin Rouge free dance

They put their own twist on a tried-and-true figure skating theme and it proved the final step to another Olympic gold medal. Though it was deemed second-best on the big night to the runner-up French, it still scored 122.40 points, enough for the win. The program is still burned into everyone’s brain — including theirs — and that’s why it will remain a favourite on tour for years to come.

2012-13: Carmen free dance

The final scores say it was only good enough for second at their hometown worlds behind Americans Meryl Davis and Charlie White, but the boundary-pushing dance highlighted the athleticism and chemistry of the Canadian duo. Moir has stated he wished they would have kept the program the following year for the Sochi Olympics, believing a polished version of it with nothing held back (and some less dodgy judging) could have put them over the top.

2009-10: Symphony No. 5 (Mahler) free dance

Then-coach Marina Zoueva described it as a marriage proposal and it was the launching point for Virtue and Moir as “Canada’s Sweethearts.” The program delivered their first Olympic gold in Vancouver and first senior world title in Turin, consistently scoring 110-plus points. It included their signature Goose Lift. And don’t forget, Virtue could barely walk from the immense pain in her legs due to her compartment syndrome woes along the way.

youtube

—Toronto Sun

#tessa and scott #off ice #honor #postmedia team of the year #interview: postmedia #a lot of fluff but at least there are pictures

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