Great Cranston

Great Cranston
Full name	Great Shalitoe Montague Cranston
nation	Canada
birthday	April 20, 1949
place of birth	Hamilton, Ontario
date of death	at January 24, 2015
Place of death	San Miguel de Allende, Mexico
Career
discipline	Single run
Medal table
Olympic medals 0 × 0 × 1 × World Cup medals 0 × 0 × 1 ×
winter Olympics bronze Innsbruck 1976 Men's  World figure skating championships bronze Munich 1974 Men's

Great Shalitoe Montague Cranston , OC (born April 20, 1949 in Hamilton , Ontario , † around January 24, 2015 in San Miguel de Allende , Mexico ) was a Canadian figure skater who started in a single run .

biography

Cranston was born in Hamilton, Canada in 1949 and grew up in Kirkland Lake . He started figure skating at the age of six. In his first national championships in 1968, he missed the nomination for the Winter Olympics in Grenoble . His trainer Ellen Burka managed to motivate him.

He was the Canadian figure skating champion from 1971 to 1976. In 1975 he was Canada's Sportsman of the Year, and in 1977 he was awarded the Order of Canada . Although he never became world champion or Olympic champion because of his weaknesses in the compulsory program, he regularly received top marks in the freestyle program, in which he impressed with his expressive presentation. Together with John Curry , he raised figure skating to a new artistic level.

Cranston's only medals at major international tournaments were two bronze medals. He won this at the 1974 World Cup in Munich and at the 1976 Winter Olympics in Innsbruck . In Munich he was celebrated like a world champion. At the age of 27 he became a professional and also appeared as a choreographer for Eisrevuen. In 1980 and 1982 he received the Golden Rose of Montreux for this . He also worked as a television commentator.

He has appeared in numerous figure skating films and TV specials, such as Stars on Ice (1980/81), Strawberries on Ice (1982) and Die Eisprinzessin (1996) with Katarina Witt .

After retiring from sports, Cranston lived in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, and worked as a painter and illustrator . His pictures often revolve around figure skating. His works have been shown in numerous exhibitions. Cranston has also published three books, two of which are autobiographical, co-authored with Martha Lowder Kimball. In his second autobiography, When Hell Freezes Over: Should I Bring My Skates? Cranston claims that he had an affair with Ondrej Nepela during the 1973 World Cup that had a major impact on his athletic performance.

On January 24, 2015, he was found dead in his home in San Miguel de Allende.

Results

Competition / year	1969	1970	1971	1972	1973	1974	1975	1976
winter Olympics				9.				3.
World championships		13.	11.	5.	5.	3.	4th	4th
Canadian Championships	3.	2.	1.	1.	1.	1.	1.	1.

Books

Together with Martha Lowder Kimball, Toller Cranston wrote several books on figure skating:

• Zero tolerance: an intimate memoir by the man who revolutionized figure skating. Toronto 1997, ISBN 0-7710-2334-0
• When hell freezes over, should I bring my skates? Toronto 2000, ISBN 0-7710-2336-7
• Ice cream: thirty of the most interesting skaters in history. Toronto 2002, ISBN 0-7710-2332-4

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Great Cranston, figure skating legend, this in Mexico at age 65

Web links

Commons : Great Cranston  collection of images, videos and audio files

• Great Cranston in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )
• Toller Cranston at the Internet Movie Database (English)
• Official website ( Memento of June 14, 2012 in the Internet Archive )