1948 Winter Olympics / Figure Skating

Figure skating at the 1948 Winter Olympics
information
venue	St. Moritz
Competition venue	Badrutts Park / Kulm ice rink
Nations	12
Athletes	64 (27 , 37 )
date	2-6 February 1948
decisions	3
← Garmisch 1936 Oslo 1952 →

Three figure skating competitions were held at the 5th Winter Olympics in St. Moritz in 1948 . The venues were the Badrutts Park Olympic ice rink and the Kulm ice rink for the compulsory runs for men and women. The artificial ice rinks had the standardized size of 60 × 30 m. The competitions all had to take place during the day as there was no suitable lighting system for evening events.

Balance sheet

Medal table

space	country				total
1	Canada	1	-	1	2
2	Belgium	1	-	-	1
	United States	1	-	-	1
4th	Austria	-	1	1	2
5	Switzerland	-	1	-	1
	Hungary	-	1	-	1
7th	United Kingdom	-	-	1	1

Medalist

competitor	gold	silver	bronze
Men's	Richard Button	Hans Gerschwiler	Edi Rada
Ladies	Barbara Ann Scott	Eva Pawlik	Jeannette Altwegg
Couples	Micheline Lannoy / Pierre Baugniet	Andrea Kékesy / Ede Király	Suzanne Morrow / Wallace Diestelmeyer

Results

• K = freestyle
• P = compulsory
• Pz = place number
• Pts = points

Men's

space	country	athlete	P	K	Pz	Pt.
1	United States	Richard Button	01	01	010	191.177
2	SUI	Hans Gerschwiler	02	03	023	181.122
3	AUT	Edi Rada	03	04th	033	178.133
4th	United States	John Lettengarver	04th	02	036	176,400
5	HUN	Ede Király	03	05	042	174,400
6th	United States	James Grogan	09	06th	062	168.711
7th	GBR	Graham Sharp	06th	08th	067	167.044
8th	AUT	Hellmut May	07th	07th	068	165.666
9	AUT	Helmut Seibt	08th	12	079	162.655
10	TCH	Vladislav Čáp	10	11	096	160.233
11	BEL	Fernand Leemans	11	14th	104	157.822
12	CAN	Wallace Diestelmeyer	13	09	110	156.322
13	TCH	Zdeněk Fikar	12	13	114	154.155
14th	SUI	Karl Enderlin	14th	10	110	154.244
15th	ITA	Carlo Fassi	16	15th	135	145.966
16	THE	Per Cock-Clausen	15th	16	135	145.533

Mandatory: February 2, 9:30 a.m.
Freestyle: February 5, 2:45 p.m.

16 figure skaters from 10 countries took part in this competition. A duty with five figures and a five-minute freestyle had to be shown. The required figures were: turn, counter turn, double triple paragraph, loop paragraph, counter triple paragraph (see also: figure skating elements ).

The reigning world champion Hans Gerschwiler from Switzerland and the reigning European champion Richard Button from the USA were considered favorites . Surprisingly, Button was already leading in almost all figures in the compulsory run. His superior jumping technique was also shown in the freestyle. He was the first runner to jump a double axel and also showed elements that were otherwise only known from floor exercises. A straddle jump with a height of 1.50 m was part of his demonstration. He was superior to the Olympic champion ahead of Gerschwiler and the Austrian Edi Rada . Ten thousand spectators had come to the ice rink for the freestyle competition and thousands stood on the surrounding slopes with binoculars and opera glasses. The ice was soft. There was a minor mishap during Vladislav Čáp's lecture when suddenly the record failed and he was forced to perform his program without background music.

Ladies

space	country	athlete	P	K	Pz	Pt.
1	CAN	Barbara Ann Scott	01	01	011	163.077
2	AUT	Eva Pawlik	03	02	024	157.588
3	GBR	Jeannette Altwegg	02	06th	028	156.166
4th	TCH	Jiřina Nekolová	04th	04th	034	154.088
5	TCH	Alena Vrzáňová	07th	03	044	153.044
6th	United States	Yvonne Sherman	08th	05	062	149.833
7th	GBR	Bridget Adams	05	16	069	148.644
8th	United States	Gretchen Merrill	06th	11	073	148.466
9	AUT	Martha Bachem	14th	07th	103	144.456
10	GBR	Marion Tiefy Davies	11	12	104	144.766
11	United States	Eileen Seigh	10	10	110	144.111
12	CAN	Marilyn Ruth Take	12	13	110.5	143.722
13	TCH	Dagmar Lerchová	15th	08th	112	144.433
14th	CAN	Suzanne Morrow	09	15th	117	143.655
15th	SUI	Maja Hug	13	19th	137	141.522
16	FRA	Jacqueline du Bief	16	21st	147.5	139.022
17th	HUN	Marika Saáry	17th	14th	142	140.944
18th	AUT	Hildegard Appeltauer	18th	20th	155	139,300
19th	GBR	Jill Hood-Linzee	19th	18th	145	140,200
20th	AUT	Ingeborg Solar	23	09	186	135.444
21st	HUN	Éva Lindner	22nd	17th	192	134.188
22nd	NOR	Marit Henie	21st	23	194	133.111
23	SUI	Lotti Höner	23	20th	186	134.211
24	ITA	Grazia Barcellona	25th	24	218	122.211
25th	SUI	Doris Blanc	24	25th	221	122.622

Mandatory: February 3, 9:00 a.m. and February 5,
Freestyle: February 6, 7:30 a.m.

25 figure skaters from 10 countries took part in this competition. In duty, these had to show five figures, followed by a four-minute freestyle. The same mandatory elements were required as for the men.

The suddenly warmer temperatures brought problems not only in the 10,000 m speed skating competitions and in ice hockey, but also in the women's compulsory section, as the athletes got stuck in the soft ice after the first compulsory exercise. After a weather-related interruption of one and a half days, the duty could not be continued until the morning of February 5th. There were still three pieces to catch up. At the freestyle there was another record number of spectators. There were no more big surprises to be expected, the favorites had already moved into the top ranks after compulsory. Only Pawlik and Vrzáňová managed to advance to 2nd and 5th respectively.

The Canadian Barbara Ann Scott , who was considered the clear favorite, ran the best freestyle overall. There were runners who jumped higher, did even better pirouettes and had more to show in building their combinations. But all together, Scott was the best. In general, the increase in performance was unmistakable. This was shown not only in the large number of double jumps, novel pirouettes and difficult connecting steps, but also in the certainty of how these difficulties were mastered rhythmically. Some of the falls were only partially due to uncertainties, but rather to the ice conditions, which were not exactly ideal, but without having a decisive influence on the competition.

There were different presentations, whereby the sporting view was far superior. Occasionally there were lectures that went in the direction of ballet and variety, ice dancing or show acts. Rather modest runners such as B. Lerchová, Hug and Solar pressed. The performance of the three Swiss women was not entirely satisfactory because they had proven at the national championships that their standard was on a higher level.

Couples

space	country	Pair	Pz	Pt.
1	BEL	Micheline Lannoy / Pierre Baugniet	017.5	11.227
2	HUN	Andrea Kékesy / Ede Király	026.0	11.109
3	CAN	Suzanne Morrow / Wallace Diestelmeyer	031.0	11,000
4th	United States	Yvonne Sherman / Robert Swenning	053.0	10,581
5	GBR	Winifred Silverthorne / Dennis Silverthorne	053.0	10,572
6th	United States	Karol Kennedy / Peter Kennedy	059.5	10,536
7th	HUN	Marianna Nagy / László Nagy	089.0	09,909
8th	GBR	Jennifer Nicks / John Nicks	098.0	09,700
9	AUT	Herta Ratzenhofer / Emil Ratzenhofer	111.5	09.436
10	NOR	Margot Walle / Allan Fjeldheim	118.5	09.281
11	AUT	Susanne Giebisch / Helmut Seibt	117.5	09.117
12	SUI	Luny Unold / Hans Kuster	120.0	09.281
13	ITA	Grazia Barcellona / Carlo Fassi	121.5	09.263
14th	FRA	Denise Favart / Jacques Favart	139.0	08,700
	TCH	Blažena Knittlová / Karel Vosátka	withdrawn

Freestyle: February 7th, 1:00 p.m.

The pair skating competition, in which 15 couples from 11 countries took part, consisted of a five-minute freestyle. The performances were judged by eleven judges. The Belgians Micheline Lannoy and Pierre Baugniet won the first and so far only Olympic gold medal in figure skating for their country by relegating Hungarians Andrea Kékesy and Ede Király and Canadians Suzanne Morrow and Wallace Diestelmeyer to the places.

During the competition there was a blizzard which hindered the couples performing. But even taking these unfavorable weather conditions into account, it could be stated that pair skating was the branch of figure skating competition that had made the least progress. There was currently a lack of top talent of the former world class. Not a single pair ran like a piece, turned the various pirouettes at exactly the same speed or was equivalent in the execution of the jumps. Despite these limitations, the beauties inherent in pair skating came to the fore. This was especially true for the freestyle of the Belgian winning couple, which not only performed fluently and elegantly, but also precisely performed its program, which was riddled with great difficulties. Small bumps could not blur the overall impression that this demonstration was the best in terms of content and execution. The closest came Kékesy / Király. The Canadian couple Morrow / Diestelmeyer demonstrated a very modern pair skating style.

As with the individual competitions, the effort was unmistakable here too, at the expense of continuous performance, to concentrate on a few brilliant productions for the entire five minutes and to take breaks in between, which meant idling and had a negative effect on the overall impression. Some started at full speed with accumulation of difficulties and fell sharply towards the end, others went the other way around in their task, and the best held up a high level from start to finish. This often showed the differences in ability even more than the grades indicated, which were sometimes given according to strange criteria, but which could not have significantly influenced the outcome of the competition.

Web links

• Figure skating at the 1948 Winter Olympics in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )
• Figure skating competitions in St. Moritz in 1948 on YouTube

Individual evidence

1. ↑ «The day of the art runners» . In: Arbeiter-Zeitung . Vienna February 6, 1948, p. 4 ( berufer-zeitung.at - the open online archive - digitized).
2. ↑ «Revelations in men's figure skating»; Sport Zürich, No. 18 of February 6, 1948, page 6
3. ↑ "In St. Moritz hot weather" . In: Arbeiter-Zeitung . Vienna February 4, 1948, p. 4 ( berufer-zeitung.at - the open online archive - digitized).
4. ^ "Figure skating graces caused new attendance record"; Sport Zürich, No. 20 of February 9, 1948, pages 4 and 5
5. ↑ «The new style for couples» . In: Arbeiter-Zeitung . Vienna February 8, 1948, p. 5 ( Arbeiter-zeitung.at - the open online archive - digitized).
6. ↑ «A“ Golden ”for Belgium”; Sport Zürich, No. 20 of February 9, 1948, page 5