Pair skating in the context of "Figure skating lifts"

Figure skating is a sport in which individuals, pairs, or groups perform on figure skates on ice. It was the first winter sport to be included in the Olympic Games, with its introduction occurring at the 1908 Olympics in London. The Olympic disciplines are men's singles, women's singles, pair skating, and ice dance; the four individual disciplines are also combined into a team event, which was first included in the Winter Olympics in 2014. The non-Olympic disciplines include synchronized skating, Theater on Ice, and four skating. From intermediate through senior-level competition, skaters generally perform two programs (the short program and the free skate), which, depending on the discipline, may include spins, jumps, moves in the field, lifts, throw jumps, death spirals, and other elements or moves.

Figure skaters compete at various levels from beginner up to the Olympic level (senior) at local, regional, sectional, national, and international competitions. The International Skating Union (ISU) regulates international figure skating judging and competitions. These include the Winter Olympics, the World Championships, the World Junior Championships, the European Championships, the Four Continents Championships, the Grand Prix series (senior and junior), and the ISU Challenger Series.

The World Figure Skating Championships are an annual figure skating competition sanctioned by the International Skating Union (ISU). The World Championships are considered the most prestigious event in figure skating. The first World Championships were held in 1896 in Saint Petersburg, Russia, and they have been held ever since with only four interruptions. A separate competition for women was established in 1905, with the men's and women's events held as separate competitions for several years. Pair skating was added in 1908 and ice dance in 1952. Skaters are eligible to compete at the World Championships, provided they represent a member nation of the International Skating Union and are selected by their respective federation.

The corresponding competition for junior-level skaters is the World Junior Figure Skating Championships. The corresponding competitions for synchronized skating are the World Synchronized Skating Championships and the World Junior Synchronized Skating Championships.

The European Figure Skating Championships are an annual figure skating competition sanctioned by the International Skating Union (ISU). It is figure skating's oldest competition. The first European Championships were held in 1891 in Hamburg, Germany, and featured only one segment – compulsory figures – with seven competitors. They have only been interrupted five times since 1891. Women were allowed to compete for the first time in 1930, which was also when pair skating was added to the competition. Ice dance was added in 1954. Only eligible skaters from ISU member countries in Europe are allowed to compete, while skaters from countries outside of Europe instead compete in the Four Continents Figure Skating Championships.

Medals are awarded in men's singles, women's singles, pair skating, and ice dance. Ulrich Salchow of Sweden holds the record for winning the most European Championship titles in men's singles (with nine), while Irina Slutskaya of Russia holds the record in women's singles (with seven). Irina Rodnina and Alexander Zaitsev of the Soviet Union hold the record in pair skating (with seven), although Rodnina won an additional four titles with a previous partner. Lyudmila Pakhomova and Aleksandr Gorshkov of the Soviet Union hold the record in ice dance (with six).

The Dutch Figure Skating Championships (Dutch: Nederlandse kampioenschappen kunstschaatsen) are an annual figure skating competition organized by the Dutch Ice Skating Association (Dutch: Koninklijke Nederlandsche Schaatsenrijders Bond) to crown the national champions of the Netherlands. While regional figure skating championships were held in the Netherlands prior to 1950, official national championships were not recognized until 1950. Since 2017, the Dutch Championships have been contested as part of the International Challenge Cup, the marquee figure skating competition of the Netherlands. The top Dutch competitors at this international competition are recognized as the Dutch national champions. No competition was held in 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Medals are awarded in men's singles, women's singles, pair skating, and ice dance at the senior, junior, and novice levels, although not every discipline is held every year due to a lack of participants. Wouter Toledo holds the record for winning the most Dutch Championship titles in men's singles (with seven), while Karen Venhuizen holds the record in women's singles (with nine). Daria Danilova and Michel Tsiba hold the record in pair skating (with three), and Marie-Louise Gijtenbeek and Xander Gijtenbeek hold the record in ice dance (with seven).

Four skating is a figure skating and artistic roller skating discipline that has been primarily competed in Canada and to a lesser extent in the United States. Fours teams consist of two women and two men. The discipline is similar to pair skating, with elements including overhead lifts, twist lifts, death spirals, and throw jumps, as well as the elements of single skating in unison, pairs elements in unison and unique elements that involve all four skaters.

Four skating began in Canada in about 1908 and began to be contested in the Canadian Figure Skating Championships in 1914. In its earliest years, it consisted of skaters performing compulsory figures in unison before evolving into free skating performances of four skaters. As in synchronized skating, unison between skaters remained important, and skaters were encouraged to do elements both in pairs and synchronized as a group as well as changing partners throughout the program.

The short program of figure skating is the first of two segments of competitions, skated before the free skating program. It lasts, for both senior and junior singles and pair skaters, 2 minutes and 40 seconds. In synchronized skating, for both juniors and seniors, the short program lasts 2 minutes and 50 seconds. Vocal music with lyrics is allowed for all disciplines since the 2014–2015 season. The short program for single skaters and for pair skaters consists of seven required elements, and there are six required elements for synchronized skaters.

Spins are an element in figure skating in which the skater rotates, centered on a single point on the ice, while holding one or more body positions. They are performed by all disciplines of the sport, single skating, pair skating, and ice dance, and are a required element in most figure skating competitions. As The New York Times says, "While jumps look like sport, spins look more like art. While jumps provide the suspense, spins provide the scenery, but there is so much more to the scenery than most viewers have time or means to grasp". According to world champion and figure skating commentator Scott Hamilton, spins are often used "as breathing points or transitions to bigger things".

Figure skating spins, along with jumps, spirals, and spread eagles were originally individual compulsory figures, sometimes special figures. Unlike jumps, spins were a "graceful and appreciated" part of figure skating throughout the 19th century. They advanced between World War I and World War II; by the late 1930s, all three basic spin positions were used.

Figure skating jumps are an element of three competitive figure skating disciplines: men's singles, women's singles, and pair skating – but not ice dancing. Jumping in figure skating is "relatively recent". They were originally individual compulsory figures, and sometimes special figures; many jumps were named after the skaters who invented them or from the figures from which they were developed. Jumps may be performed individually or in combination with each other.

It was not until the early part of the 20th century, well after the establishment of organized skating competitions, that jumps with the potential of being completed with multiple revolutions were invented, and when jumps were formally categorized. In the 1920s, Austrian skaters began to perform the first double jumps in practice. Skaters experimented with jumps, and by the end of the period, the modern repertoire of jumps had been developed. Jumps did not have a major role in free skating programs during international competitions until the 1930s. During the post-war period and into the 1950s and early 1960s, triple jumps became more common for both male and female skaters, and a full repertoire of two-revolution jumps had been fully developed. In the 1980s, men were expected to complete four or five difficult triple jumps, and women had to perform the easier triples. By the 1990s, after compulsory figures were removed from competitions, multi-revolution jumps became more important in figure skating.