Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean have finally admitted to "dabbling" in romance during their long career together. The papers and public have always been curious about their relationship, but the skaters have denied their union was romantic until now. Only two years ago Torvill said: "We decided very early on that if we had slept together we couldn't have skated.
Twenty-nine years after they won Olympic gold in Sarajevo on Valentine's Day, eight million people tune in to watch them every Saturday night on primetime TV. Sport is not a natural breeding ground for romantic tales, despite Gary Neville's best efforts with Paul Scholes and David Beckham.
Most sporting glories can be traced back to the solitary determination of individuals or the collective will and skill of teams. It is rare for two people to come along as a duo and forge a successful career together. Torvill and Dean are different. They are so indelibly linked that their names only sound right when said together. That their most sensual performance won Olympic gold on Valentine's Day adds an extra whiff of romance to the tale.
She worked as an insurance clerk and he was training to be a police officer, so they practised in the mornings, evenings and weekends. They became British champions in , a title they would retain for the next six years. After coming fifth in their first Winter Olympics in and then fourth in the World Championships, they decided to devote themselves to skating full-time. Unlike their Eastern European contemporaries, Torvill and Dean had held down regular jobs while competing, but thanks to a grant from Nottingham City Council, they scraped together enough money to dedicate themselves to dancing.
Four years later they glided their way into sporting folklore at the Winter Olympics in the old socialist republic of Yugoslavia. Half the British population watched on TV as they won gold for their slow and gentle imagining of Ravel's Bolero. The music was too long for the competition's rules, so they held the blades of their skates above the ice for the first 18 seconds of the routine to avoid disqualification.
