Episode 9: Mailbag!

[Music] Hello and welcome to Unlaced with Truck and Bates. I'm Madison Trock. And I'm Evan Bates and we're Olympic Ice Dancers for Team USA. If you're into sports betting, bet online is the fastest and easiest way to bet all your favorite sports. Head to their new updated desktop or mobile website to sign up today and receive your 50% welcome bonus on your first deposit. Just use our promo code "Believe50" to receive your bonus. Okay, so let's get started by saying hello to December and where did you come from? Hello December, where did you come from? Just sped up on us real fast. Didn't it? Can't believe the year 2021 is already coming to a close. But here we are. Yes, here we are. I think it's been overall a nice year. I would agree. I think it's been overall a nice year too. Okay, yeah. It has been overall. I can't even, I would have to think back to what the year entailed because it'd be hard for me to remember. Right, it's been a lot, I think, but it's been nice. It feels like we got to compete more this fall and it was really fun. And last week we celebrated Thanksgiving. Well, we didn't really celebrate, but we had a fun episode talking about our favorite Thanksgiving traditions. That was our celebration. Yes, that was our celebration. So this week we thought it'd be fun to interact with our listeners. So we asked for questions on social media and many of you delivered. So we want to say thank you so much for taking the time to submit your questions and it was so much fun to hear from you. So let's jump right in. Let's do it. So the first question comes from Eva Mativa. What is your favorite ice program? Well, Eva. Of ours or like an ever, I wonder. Maybe both. Maybe both of ours. I would say it's hard to name my favorite. But apart from this season there are a few that I've really loved. The snake dance, of course. That was so much fun to make and fun to perform. But also a throwback one from our Cirque du Soleil short dance in 2012 was particularly fun to make and to perform. Yeah, I agree. Favorite program of ours. Well, I guess it would be the snake dance then. That was pretty fun to perform. Yeah. And especially when we had an audience. That was really fun. And then what about a non-truck baits program? For me, Torval and Dean's Balero really always sticks out. I think whenever I look back on programs across all disciplines that have been performed, it just I find it so timeless and the choreography so innovative that even to this day watching it, I'm so like wow, like how do they do that? It's so impressive. Yeah, I can say for some firsthand experience working with Christopher Dean. He has some tricks up his sleeve. He is so clever in his choreography. So they make it look easy but it's definitely very tricky. Oh yeah, I feel like that program would would stand today as absolutely a masterpiece in today's you know, I stand's competitive field like the inter-casee, the transitions, like the completeness of everything. There are no laws in the program. It's just like one giant bill interesting choreography from start to finish. Love it. What about you? What about what's your favorite program ever? Desens Gotz umbrellas? That was pretty good. That was so good. That was one of my favorites too. That was really in love with that program. I think also the program that Scott and Tessa did that was kind of I don't know if underrated is the right word but I don't think they won a world title with it was their Carmen program. Oh yeah. I felt like that was so innovative and so different for them and it was super modern and it was cool and I remember being backstage at worlds when they were skating in London and hearing Scott Yel in the beginning of the program like he roared literally. He's a human lion. In the beginning of the program and I was like oh my gosh was that his voice like did he do that with his lungs? Like reverberate to the entire arena. Yeah he definitely did. Whoa man that was intense but I feel like that program obviously matched their intensity and charisma but the innovation in that program was pretty awesome. Fantastic. Next question from Mike Cajue. What are your favorite ice dance teams from the past? Well we kind of just mentioned a few good ones. Torval Dean, Virgiumoyer, Dave Sahuayt. Marilyn Charlie for sure. Yeah. Tanneth and Ben were a huge influence. Oh I remember when I first started ice dance or was about to start ice dance. Tanneth and Ben were just fire. They were it. They were ice dance. I remember watching a Gypsy program for the first time and I was like okay I'm sold on this sport. I will switch from singles to ice dance. Sign me up. I remember being in the arena at Nationals when they got all sixes for the Gypsy program. So cool. That was so cool. Yeah. The Chopin program was nice. That was the first year I competed against them and it was like a welcome to a senior moment. I'm like I'm on the extra Tanneth and Ben. I always loved watching Tanneth especially. I just found that her expression always reached the rafters. Like the last seat in the house. You could feel her emotion and the way she expressed her skating and it was such an inspiration. Yeah she's captivating. Yeah. Love them. Love them. Next question from Nira Kayama Skates. Did either of you compete in singles or pairs when you first started skating? Evan. I did. I competed in singles for a while until I was like 13. I feel like I feel like most young skaters get their start in singles. Yeah. Yeah. Except Gabby and Gilm. They just began ice dance. No I think they both started singles for now. I think Gilm said he never jumped. Oh really? Yeah they just started ice dancing. Wow. Makes sense. That does make sense. That's why they're so good. Yeah. Yeah I did a little bit of singles as well and I did pairs also but I didn't compete in pairs but I did a bunch of tests. I've seen you in an overhead list. Yes. I used to love overhead lifts and twists but I didn't make it in pairs because I just really did not like the idea of being thrown. It just did not sit well with me. Yeah you found your niche. Yeah. Okay so the next question comes from Laura and Finland. She asks, between competitions do you take care of your costumes a certain way? Between competitions, Matthew definitely touches up our costumes. If fix any little rips that we might have caused at competition and stones that may have just rubs off along the way any little blood stains from cuts and scrapes. Yes they're definitely well tailored in between events. And I wash mine or I have mine washed because they don't smell very good. And I'm okay discussing that because I feel it doesn't really represent my hygiene so much as it's the fabric that I wear. Totally the fabric. That it is just like unforgiving. The sports stretch spandex fabrics just yeah. Unless they're the Lulu silver scent. I don't know. I don't know. They're older ones. It's it's very smelly. So don't get too close to me to competition. I mean I love you no matter how you smell. You you have to get closer. Yeah. Oh other people. Okay another question from Laura, do you usually watch other disciplines after your own competition? Yeah I love watching other disciplines especially if we have the time and if we're one of the first events finished then yeah we'll definitely be there. Agreed yeah. If we typically don't watch before we compete too much maybe if it's I don't know. If it's convenient in our schedule we'll go to the ring otherwise we just keep to ourselves and tell our event is done. It's nice when the ice dance is not last so we watch other events because we love doing that. Next question from C. Shang 21. Can you tell us the story of how you guys got Henry and Stella? Yeah, absolutely. So we actually each got Henry and Stella individually. I had Stella from my family. Henry was Henry was adopted by me. Henry just perked up. And this is so appropriate right now. We're sitting and Stella is with Evan and Henry is sitting on my lap. Well they do kind of each gravitate towards their original owner I think and it just so happens it's funny because people think we look like our dogs like Stella. I look like Stella. Maddie and Henry look alike but the eyebrows I think. Stella was actually a dog that was in my family. My family had his had poodles since I was a kid and Stella was a product of my family dogs and she was actually birthed at my cousin's house. So she's a homegrown poodle and happy to have her. I love her so much. So Stella, the less her she is the best. And yeah Henry and I found each other in Michigan. It was love it for sight. I can tell you that for sure. I knew he was my little fluffy soul mate and so lucky to have him in my life. And then Evan and I got together and grew our family. Yeah. Two people, two poodles. Funny how that worked out. Yeah. Okay moving on from the poodle stories. The next question is do you have any Christmas plans already? That would be kind of. Oh we do. Well I think we're going to do a little get together with the school. Oh right. So that's kind of that's coming up. It's not on Christmas day, but it's the week of Christmas. Yeah. I think that'll be. Oh yeah, we got a nice little sware as they say. I invited my calendar. I do remember that. Excellent. So we do have some Christmas plans. But for a day of, I think it's a Saturday. I don't think we're going to do anything. I would love to go to the Christmas market at Atwater. It's new. I think it's open on the weekends. It looks so cute, but it looks so cute. I feel like we should go do that. I wonder if they're open on Christmas day. Oh, I hope so. It's a Christmas market. So maybe we could do that. Yeah. That'd be fun. Okay. It's a plan. It's a date. This brings us to our next very relevant question from my cajou. Have you bought all your Christmas presents already? Of course not. Yeah, that is hard. No. I am definitely not finished with my Christmas shopping. It's more than three weeks away. Is anybody? I don't know. Yeah. Finish your Christmas shopping? Sam told me yesterday that Mark has finished all his Christmas shopping. Wow. Okay. You need to get on it. Yeah. I have purchased some presents. You have purchased some. I've purchased some. As you know, there's a gift sitting in the trunk of the car that you know is for you and you know that I've been hiding it poorly from you. Yeah, very poorly. It's a very dangerous spot. No, I didn't see it. I mean, I see that it's there hiding under the covered and necessary parts. I've just been too lazy to carry it upstairs into the apartment from the garage. So it's been in the car, which is really flirting with danger because we share a car, obviously. Well, I have some for you as well as you have seen. They are wrapped. Yeah, I already wrapped them. I brought them home. Wrap them instantly so there would be no risk of using anything. Well, I am just burning with anticipation to unwrap those presents. I've been looking at. If you need some more inspiration for anything else, maybe you want to get me. Yep. I would turn you to our friends at Lightbox at Ron Diamonds. Okay. Nice. The brightest gift of the year. They use cutting edge technology and innovative techniques and they've cracked the science of sparkle creating the highest quality lab-grown diamonds you can find at a light price of $800 per carrot. Lightbox lab-grown diamonds are the gift that you'll never want to take off and the key to making any outfit sparkle. So just casually dropping some holiday gift ideas, Evan. Received. Visit lightboxjulary.com to add sparkle to your holiday shopping. Lightbox diamonds never a dull moment. Nice. Yeah. Wow. That was timely. I like how you snuck that in. Thanks. I think it's back to the questions. Sparkly. Rosca06 asks, "Can you share more on what your training is like and how it progresses between events?" Great question. Yes. I would say the summer is kind of the heavier training. We're trying to create new programs and we just spend more time on the ice because of that. Once you get everything kind of set, it just becomes about repetition and fine-tuning and especially when you start competing on a monthly basis or sometimes a weekly basis. You don't have a lot of time to tinker in between events. So we really just try to just make necessary changes and most likely keep the hours a little bit shorter on the ice during the season. Just because with travel and everything, it seems like that works well for us and then you get into a rhythm and things fly by. I feel like the season goes by so quickly. Right. Once competitions start. Next question from Anika Horst-John. Sorry if I am pronouncing that wrong. How long does it take to practice such lifts? For example, the straight line rotation lift in your free dance. Well, that one we worked on all summer off ice for quite some time before we put it on the ice and it kind of evolved from one of the lifts that we used in 2014 or big 2015. Yeah. Our tall standing lift named the Statue of Liberty. Yeah, so it evolved from that and we kind of tweaked it and altered it and I would say we worked on it. Yeah, for the better part of the off season. Oh yeah, we worked on that one a lot. It just depends some of the lifts are trickier. That one is probably the one that took us the longest. To say the choreo lift at the end of the free dance is another one that took us a while to be able to do it in a run-through. Yeah, just because it's at the end of the program, it's like a very high physical lift for us and yeah. But some of the other is not so difficult and can be done pretty quickly. Yeah, so it just depends on the lift. Next question from the European Londoner Mateo. How does it feel to have cameras following you for On Edge? That's a great question. Yeah. And I feel like we actually haven't spoken much about the documentary or TV show that's happening on our podcast. For those who don't know, we've been part of a new TV show that the Olympic channel is putting on called On Edge and they've been following us since July and it has been, I think we've gotten a lot more comfortable with the cameras. Definitely. Yeah. At first it was a little bit weird. Yeah, but now it's just we go about our business almost. You almost forget they're there. They're really they're really great about just not, I don't know, interfering in our training day or like our normal schedule. They are super nice and they just kind of follow everyone around the rank. They mic the coaches and I feel like they've gotten some really cool, unique footage that I'm actually really happy to have. I think it's going to be cool to look back on later in our lives and have this part of our season documented with all our good friends. I agree. I would also say it was weird to think that any given moment could end up on a TV show. Yeah, that too. Where I'm like, I don't know how they're going to edit this. What did we just say? What did I say? What was I wearing and did I really make that face? Is that what my hair looks like from behind saying it? You're like, well, at a certain point you're like, well, oh well, it's me. This is me. What can you do? What can you do? It's going out there. We're happy to be a part of it. It's a really cool project and it really shines a cool spotlight on our school, which we're really proud of. One more question from Mateo. Maddie, are you still drawing? Sadly not as much as I would like. I haven't picked up my pencils to do any portraits recently, but I did doodle a few costume ideas that popped into my head, but that's about it. I would love to get back into it though. Yeah, you should. I haven't seen you drawing much lately, but I mean, you've been busy. Yeah. So understandable. Okay, so the next question comes from @39Love2. Is there a place you want to go privately in Japan? Maddie? I always love going anywhere in Japan. And the more I can see in Japan, the better. I'm so sure that there are many places that would be really special to visit that I don't even know of, so I would love some suggestions. But the first one that pops in my head is Tokyo Disney. I absolutely love Disney and I love Tokyo. So the two together is just the perfect combination. Plus whenever we stay in Tokyo, we stay at the same hotel and usually they have a shuttle service to Tokyo Disney, which I have contemplated jumping on once or twice every time we pass it. The bus is right there to Tokyo Disney. I'm like, we have to get on this bus and go to the ice rink and skate. That's why we're here. No, Tokyo Disney. So close. I would say maybe to get out of the city and see some of the countryside would be really nice and Mt Fuji would be amazing to go see. I feel like we've always stayed in cities. So seeing some of the more rural areas, I would be really interested in that. Yeah, the countryside. Yeah. Question from Jam Stern. Do you see yourselves coaching in the future? I feel like yes. I feel like that's probably in our future. Yeah, definitely at least for a period of time. I mean, we love skating so much and it'd be so fun to get lessons from you. I'd take lessons from you. Sign me up. Okay. Check. I guess we'll just be teaching each other. But yeah, no, we would love to coach and maybe choreograph. I think it would be really fun to participate in the sport in a different way and yeah, we love our coaches so much too. They really inspired us. Yeah, we've got great role models to yeah, start our mold from. All right, the next question from Ilana M10. Do you want kids in the future? Yes, we do. We have two poodle kids right now and they're amazing, but we would like some human kids in the future for sure. These guys are great, but they don't talk. Yeah, I would love to talk. We talk for them. We give them voices. Right Henry Henry. Do you want a snack? Oh, buddy. Okay. As soon as we're done. I love it. All right, we better finish now. We promise Henry a snack. But we do want to mention the obvious news in the skating world today that the Grand Prix final has now been postponed. So we are of course very sad that the competition won't be happening. Hopefully this won't linger on and we can get back to what we love to do very, very soon. Yeah, Maddie, what do you think? Yeah, it's definitely really disappointing news for all the teams that have been training and all the skaters that have been working hard. It doesn't feel good to not be able to compete after you put so much work into gearing up for one event, but we completely understand the decision that they made and it's for for the right reasons to keep you. everyone safe and we support their decision of course and we will look forward to returning to Japan under better circumstances and hopefully in the near future. In the meantime we wish everybody a happy holiday season. This has been an episode of Unlaced with Chalk & Bates presented by Bet Online and Lifebox Jewelry. Yeah! Make sure you subscribe for future episodes. You can follow us on social media at Chalk Bates and we will talk to you soon. Bye!