DITMLOD: Ice Skating, Ice Capades and The 1992 Winter Olympics

We haven't done a DITMTLOD post in a long, long time, but here we go.

Gisela Head

I have a memory of the first time I saw a woman, who was not Princess Leia, as "attractive".  Who knows what word I had in my head?  I was probably around three years old, but it was such a weird idea at the time - that until I hit the ages where finding girls a great idea - I did not quite understand what that was all about. 

At the time, the Ice Capades were still very much a staple of American culture.  Younger readers will only know the post-Ice Capades world of "Disney on Ice" or "Muppets on Ice".  At one point, I know our family took in a mix of "The Ice Capades" and "Smurfs on Ice".  

The Ice Capades were essentially an odd relic of the Zeigfeld Follies/ Vaudeville shows that had died out decades prior with radio, film and television.  Why go out for singing and dancing and some comedy when Our Show of Shows was readily available or Ed Sullivan could show you Broadway, comedy and an opera star in one hour?  But on ice?  

For some reason, that lasted until the mid 1990's

I don't recall how often we hit the Ice Capades, but during one of those shows (maybe to see Dorothy Hamill, of whom my mom was a fan), there was a comedy skit, with a tall blonde in a silly outfit who was goofing around with a guy who I interpreted to be a scientist.  And whatever spark hits one's brain hit mine.

Of course, years passed, and I had no idea who that was, and would have no way of knowing - not to mention the embarrassment of asking for details.  Back then, we lived in a world of unknowable mystery - your local library wasn't going to probably have that answer.  But, still, every once in a while, as one does, I'd wonder about that increasingly hazy memory.

And so it came to pass that during COVID, we all had some serious downtime, and it occurred to me - this was now knowable.  And, I tracked it down.

Apparently who I had seen was Gisela Head, one half of the skating duo of Terry and Gisela Head.

Gisela had been a Swedish national champion and in the Stockholm ballet.  After her official performances, she signed up for a touring ice show where she met Terry Head, an ice-skating comedian and clown.  For years, she was a soloist and is featured on the cover of a few Ice Capades program covers (see the lead image).  At some point, they decided to do some work together.

What I saw was likely a version of the sketch in the picture of the pair with Gisela as a wind up toy.  I believe there was also a version where she was an alien.  They'd also appeared on TV a few years before I was even born, performing a similar sketch.  

Mystery solved!  It was quite odd putting this one together so many years on.  That's happened a few times over the years, sometimes by serendipitous discovery, but this one was mostly a test of my Google-ing abilities and some logical leaps.  

twirling, twirling to victory!

Apparently after the Ice Capades the couple settled in Las Vegas, but that's all I know.  Sometimes doing no further cyber-stalking is the right choice.

Anyway, a bit of an oddity, but it's nice to put a face and name with the person you realized was your very first crush.

Kristi Yamaguchi

I will admit, as much as we now celebrate the winter Olympics in this house, I really didn't know what I was looking at.  Karebear (my mom) is from Michigan and grew up around winter sports, so she'd get excited about skating, ski jumping, etc...  and I was mostly of the opinion that "all of these people are insane."  

I still kind of think that.  Have you seen Aerials in skiing?  What a horrible idea.

But while I was most into the whole thing of Speed Skating in the 1992 winter Olympics, 16 year old me was more into the idea of Kristi Yamaguchi.  Sorry, other figure skaters.

apparently I was not put off by so many sparklies

Today's kids will never appreciate a well-elevated mall-bang, and I even saw some younger folks online marvelling at the then-very-popular hair-style as a unique outlier.  I am here to report from the front lines of Texas in 1992, it was not.  But I do wonder how much Aquanet it took to keep that thing aloft during twirls and jumps. 

Yamaguchi shows off her passport to Wheaties box glory

Off the ice, Yamaguchi seemed cool and collected, like someone who wouldn't talk to me at school, and was someone I knew I probably shouldn't have objectified, but I was 16 and she was super cute.  So, yeah, 1992 was the year I watched skating for the wrong reasons.  

The good news is Yamaguchi is still super cute and a fan of one of my WNBA teams of choice, The Valkyries.  But she's also has been running around the 2026 Olympics.  

Repping the team at Ball-halla

one gold medalist to another