Surprise start as Davis-White take lead over Belbin-Agosto after 1st round of ice dance

Davis-White take early lead in ice dance

SPOKANE, Wash. — Never mind those pretty dresses, tuxedoes and bling that would make a socialite jealous. There’s a good ol’ rumble going on in American ice dancing.

Meryl Davis and Charlie White won the compulsory dance Thursday, striking the first blow in a juicy showdown with Olympic silver medalists and former training partners Tanith Belbin and Ben Agosto that could have ramifications all the way to the Vancouver Games. Granted, Davis and White’s lead is just .4 points heading into Friday’s original dance, but in a discipline where upsets seldom happen, this is big.

Davis and White scored an American-record 45.42 for their Golden waltz.

“Last year was really a turning point for us,” Davis said. “We really knew we were going to be able to put ourselves at the top someday and compete with anybody.”

No doubt about that.

Belbin and Agosto have been among the world’s best ice dancers for the better part of a decade now, and their dominance in the United States was unchallenged. But as they adjusted to a coaching change last season and some untimely injuries, Davis and White were quietly rising in international stature.

Davis and White won the U.S. title last year — Belbin and Agosto were out with Agosto’s back injury — and missed the bronze medal at the world championships by a mere .04 points, a razor-thin margin more suited for swimming than ice dancing. Last month, they became the first American couple to win the prestigious Grand Prix final title. But Belbin and Agosto weren’t in Tokyo, either, sidelined by Belbin’s infected wisdom tooth.

That raised the stakes even higher for nationals. As reigning Olympic and world silver medalists, Belbin and Agosto will go to Vancouver as gold medal contenders. Beat them, and Davis and White will be in the mix, too, along with Russian world champions Oksana Domnina and Maxim Shabalin and Canada’s Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir.

“It’s very important to finish first,” White said. “We want to go into the Olympics as the top U.S. team. That means a lot. We want Olympic gold, so we want to go in as the top dogs.”

So much so that Davis and White spent an entire month working on their compulsory dance. That Bollywood-style original dance that’s been so popular with fans and judges alike? They didn’t touch it for most of December. Same for that free dance. They did the Golden waltz so often they must have been hearing the music in their sleep.

But the work paid off. Their free legs were perfectly matched, and the depth of their edges could be seen in the lean of their bodies. And unlike most couples, who paste smiles on their faces when they’re shellacking their hair, Davis and White looked as if they really enjoyed being out there.

“It felt really good,” Davis said. “We worked tremendously hard on that dance — harder than any compulsory in the past, so we felt really confident.”

Belbin and Agosto, one of the first couples to skate, were quite impressive, too. With her in a long, seafoam green dress and him in tails, they looked ready to attend a gala in 19th-century Vienna. And with the way they skated, they would have been belles of the ball.

While other couples labored through twizzles and dips, Belbin and Agosto floated through them. They covered every inch of the ice and then some, getting so close to the boards the fans in the front row could see every last detail of Belbin’s dress.

They had great speed, too, staying with every nuance of the music.

“It felt great,” Agosto said. “We were really happy to feel like we skated like we always do at home.”

“We felt like we attacked it,” Belbin added.

And the fight isn’t close to being over.

The four skaters remain good friends, despite Belbin and Agosto leaving Detroit in April 2008 to train with 1980 Olympic gold medalists Natalia Linichuk and Gennadi Karponosov outside Philadelphia. They, better than anyone, know just how good the other duo can be.

“We really need to go all out in this competition if we want to go out on top,” Belbin said.