Strictly 2025 : Week One Post Show Chat

[EineReiseDurchDieZeit]

Starting this early because I have things to do. Please come here when the other thread fills up!

I thought Claudia looked very thin.

I immediately thought of Dirty Dancing 'this my dance space' he basically meant she wasn't keeping the right frame/spacing.

I think that Ross, Chris and Thomas will be out first, maybe in that order.

I hope those near the bottom of the leaderboard, if they're around Thomas, get a lot of votes and he's first out.

Is it very anti the spirit of this thread to mention that Karen before football was a dancer? So while it was a great piece of telly seeing someone you never expected could or would move like that she used to compete & it was her life before football. And acknowledges it for helping her have the edge in her game.
I don’t mind contestants having past dance experience btw & was blown away by her. But think she should be viewed in a similar light to those that have.

Doing street, hip hop and other modern forms of dancing for a few years as a teenager, doesn't really count though does it? Or do you think she is a not so secret ringer?

Karen does mention her dance background being beneficial to her football, so it would also explain why she had good feet discipline. Her jive, I thought, was much cleaner than Lewis', which I also loved.

What dance background does she have?

Karen spent a few years as a teenager doing dance classes.

From Googling

Just finished watching on catch up as we didn’t make it through the whole thing live.

I hope Alex gets some fairer marks next week. I was pleasantly surprised by Jimmy. Lewis seems to have a background in something, even if it was all at drama school. I liked Vicky in the jungle but found her a bit OTT - maybe it was all nerves.

When Craig said to Stefan that he had a future in Musical Theatre I had a wry smile, having seen the latter in Blood Brothers in the West End in 1995 (though not much dancing in that!).

I agree that the casting vote thing needs tweaking so that there’s no chance of a certain judge skewing it - although Shirl got away with her version of that for years.

@xsquared well no it’s not West End performing experience but she had a talent & passion for it which will certainly help her in the show. And will make her journey & opportunity to get stuck into something she loves again all the more enjoyable to watch.

”It wasn’t until I moved to Steptoes Dance School in Halesowen when I was 12 that things got more serious and I started going three or four times a week. It was there that I started to compete in some big events.

But when I started doing football and dancing, things got a bit hectic. There were times when I played football at 10am on a Saturday then I’d go and dance for two or three hours in the afternoon, and maybe just grab a sandwich in between.
“I’d dance competitively on a Sunday, too, so when I got a bit older and my football matches switched to a Sunday, I had some choices to make. I decided to give up dancing when I was 15.

Dancing is a great way of expressing yourself and I really miss it. It was a big part of my life and some of my favourite memories are from dancing”.

I agree with this. A couple of hours after school/on a Saturday is not in the same league as being in a west end show or having a career in musical theatre is it? There is no way you get to be a professional footballer whilst also becoming a trained dancer and have time to go to school.

I thought the producers were very canny to leave Karen until last because it did rightly blow us all away not to mention the surprise factor.

Edited to say, I’ve just read the post above - it does look like she did a fair bit of dancing and football. Fair play to her.

All credit to Karen for taking the harder route of football. Until recently it was a path women would not have thought they could get a career out of, and she entered it when it was more of a minority sport (for women).

Not the tedious "their" again. There's only one of him! He's a bloke however he's dressed. He has every right to have a "persona" if he wants to, but we dont have to buy into it.

For me my ringer line has always been if they have ever been paid to dance/or for a dance heavy role or studied performing arts with a dance component beyond 16. I'm now less impressed by Kaz than I was on Saturday night but she falls short of the 'but she was a professional dancer' line.

I really wouldn’t want the dance off to go back to the public vote if there was a tie in the judges’ votes. I know the show has a very different vibe so it might not happen here, but when this system was used for the sing off on X Factor I hated it because it meant that the majority of the time when it was 2-1 upon reaching the final judge, they would say “I’ll let the public decide and take it to the public vote”. It used to drive me mad as it wasn’t that they were voting for the act with one vote because they thought they should go through but just to deliberately take it to the tie break, so why bother having the judges decide at all?

But Claudia has always been very tiny and to me looks like her normal self but Tess looked different and ill level thin.

No, not anti the spirit at all! We love debating the merits of Ringers! I didn’t know about Karen’s dance background so thanks for that.

She did street dance or something as a teenager which she has mentioned i imagine it was a Saturday afternoon activity and not exactly a "dancer" having rythim and being able to follow instructions isn't exactly cheating.

The thing is though @Coffeeishotif you have learned some basic rhythm and movement in your time, how to move on the beat for example you’ve got a massive leg up over say someone like Ross or Thomas!

She does say she did it competitively – although of course as she gave it up at 15 she never competed at the highest levels. It does help to explain how unself-conscious she looked on the dance floor, which was what struck me perhaps even more than her actual dancing.

That has always been to be fair, if you are doing a celebrity dance programme then there is a chance that celebrities will have taken a dance class or some dance training at stage school.

Dropping anchor, me hearties ⛴️🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿⛵️😍

Yes - think the 'advantages' a ringah are not limited to ballroom/Latin technique which obviously someone who has done a different dance style would not have but lie in the ability to learn a routine quicker, an understanding of concepts and terminology that relate to dance, the confidence to perform, familiarity with applying the character of a dance etc.
That's why I've never understood the ah but they've never done ballroom defence of those with extensive dance training.

Obviously there are other factors that give some people advantage over others - sports people have basic fitness and are used to training (less so if the do strictly decades after they stopped their sport) and a knowledge of how to use the body to achieve an aim, actors have performance skills and the ability to step into character for the dance, musicians have rhythm and musically etc so dance training isn't the only thing that can give someone an advantage but having danced beyond primary age will have equipped celebs with skills that those who haven't danced beyond the odd bop at a wedding don't have at all.

That's why I've never understood the ah but they've never done ballroom defence of those with extensive dance training.
I think they just have to draw a line somewhere, and 'never having danced professionally in ballroom/Latin' seems like a simple one to draw.

Of course any dance experience equips you with certain skills. But I agree, being in sport or acting or music also confers advantages, albeit different ones.
At the end of the day, though, Strictly is about personalities and partnerships as well as pure dance ability, and structured so the voting audience has the only say in the final, so it's not always those with professional dance experience who win.

I wonder if she was given the jive, where the posture suits her, to bring up her confidence in week one. I agree she my struggle with ballroom, but I think she will work hard to try.

I know few this year too, and pleasantly surprised by them. Really like George and Balvinder.