Ennio Morricone and figure skating

Ennio Morricone finally won an Oscar at this year's Academy Awards - it's about half a century overdue, but nice to see the maestro finally recognized with a competitive award (to go along with his lifetime achievement one). Morricone has had an amazingly prolific career, spanning decades and films genres. His compositions have proven very popular with skaters over the years - some more than others - and have provided fans with some memorable and entertaining skates. Here are a few that come to mind:

Elena Berezhnaya and Anton Sikharulidze, Lady Caliph. Not only is it the best program to Morricone music, it's one of the best programs ever seen in skating. Perfection.

Aliona Savchenko and Robin Szolkowy, The Mission - the free skate from their breakthrough 2006-7 season.

Brian Joubert skated to Morricone scores for two years running: The Mission in 2001-2 and The Untouchables - probably a better choice for his skating style - in 2002-3.

The Shibutanis are among the many skaters who have skated to Cinema Paradiso. Their 2009 FD at Junior Worlds was my first time seeing them skate, and I was quite impressed.

After switching from representing France to skating for Italy, Samuel Contesti decided to star in an on-ice spaghetti western. I feel that points should be deducted for throwing Cotton-Eyed Joe into the mix.

In 2012-13, Kiira Korpi skated to Once Upon in America (in a gorgeous dress, as always).

And finally, this year's crop of Morricone programs includes Federica Testa/Lukas Csolley's free dance, which uses the Malena soundtrack.

Golden Skate has a very helpful index of program music (current/past), in which Morricone's work features prominently. Check it out for more Morricone goodness!

Called it in 2012 or "How I out-speedy-ed Speedy!

In all likelihood, most of you have already heard about the most recent open letter from Ottavio Cinquanta and the groundbreaking innovations he puts forward in it, all for the good of the sport, of course. Among other brilliant ideas, he advocates getting rid of the short programme.

Grays Sports Almanac 2000-2050: Savchenko & Joubert (Pairs Team)

An unlikely match?

After Worlds 2014 and the retirement of Robin Szolkowy, Aliona Savchenko was actively

looking for a partner to continue her competitive skating career.

Brian Joubert, although having effectively retired from singles skating, had in the past often hinted at wanting to take up Pairs skating. After secret try outs in the summer of 2014, Aliona and Brian teamed up with the goal to make the podium at the 2018 Olympics.

By popular demand: The LETDOWN-O-METER

When selecting pictures for the Olympic LETDOWN-O-Meter (the star indicating my current Olympic satisfaction), I didn't imagine, I'd ever have to change those polar opposites, which were so prototypical, they were almost absolute incarnations of what they were meant to represent. A week or so later, it seems, all I needed was some kind of perspective. Perspective very difficult to compute but still...

Sorry Dennis, you had a good

 free skate, but you are part of the podium.

Sochi 2014 - Men Singles Short Program

Much to my surprise, especially after Plushy's WD, the Men's short turned out to be quite enjoyable. It had drama, melodrama, good performances, surprisingly good performances, good judging, bad judging. Overall, it could have been much worse. Let's look at 5 short programmes, which are, in my opinion, among the most interesting and/or best performances of today.

Old age should burn and rave... - Evgeni withdraws from the Singles event

No, no, no, no, no! It wasn't supposed to end like this. It simply wasn't. Alas, Evgeni has just withdrawn, shortly before his SP, right after the warm-up had ended.