Torvill and Dean: Perfect Partners

They danced across the ice at the 1984 Winter Games in Sarajevo with passionate perfection that secured their place in Olympic history. Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean of Great Britain not only won the gold medal in ice dancing for their stunning performance to Ravel’s “Bolero,” they redefined their sport by receiving 12 perfect scores out of 18 marks, including nine perfect scores for artistic impression.

“This is like the pinnacle we’ve been going towards the whole time, since we put on skates,” Dean said after winning the gold medal. “Tonight we reached the pinnacle.”

Actually, it was only the beginning.

After their Olympic victory, Torvill and Dean performed on television specials, in the Ice Capades and eventually formed their own touring company. They staged a comeback for the 1994 Winter Games at Lillehammer, Norway, where they won the bronze medal, then skated together professionally until 1998. In all, they performed “Bolero” more than 1,500 times in their career for audiences around the world.

Torvill, 44, married American Philip Christiansen in 1990 and lives in Turnbridge Wells in England. Dean, 43, married Canadian skater Isabelle Duchesnay in 1991. The couple divorced two years later and, in 1994, Dean married American Jill Trenary, a former U.S. and world figure skating champion. The couple has two sons and lives in Colorado Springs, Colo.

Both Torvill and Dean continue to choreograph and coach other skaters. They couldn’t have predicted the success they would enjoy when they became partners in 1975 in their hometown of Nottingham. Torvill, who began skating at 8, already had won a British national pairs title with partner Michael Hutchinson. She was working as an insurance clerk when she met Dean, who left school at 16 and eventually quit his job as a police cadet in Nottingham to pursue training full time.

In 1980, they won their first British national title and finished fifth at the Lake Placid Olympics. The next year, they won the first of four consecutive world championships and in 1984 made history with their Valentine’s Day routine at Sarajevo that told the tale of two lovers who throw themselves into a lava pit because they cannot be together. That performance continues to resonate.

In 2000, Torvill and Dean were summoned to Buckingham Palace where they received from Prince Charles insignias designating each an Officer of the Order of the British Empire.

Before the Salt Lake Games, Torvill told the London Observer that she enjoys life out of the spotlight.

“In the end,” she said, “you have to decide if you want to carry on being famous, which means you kind of hide away most of the time, or if you want to join the rest of the world--to be normal again.”

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Gary Klein