Week 14, and we finally got there - the GRAND FINAL.  Tonight Ricky and Chris will battle it out with their Lindy Hop and Show Dance for the honor of lifting that glitter ball.  Who will it be?

You may notice that I am NOT watching this live.  I'm currently in Manchester with my family, and woe betide anyone who tries to come between my six year old neice and her barbie videos.  So I will be watching the Final on the BBC iplayer - which doesn't go live on the website till about 7pm!   Come back then to catch up!

7.45pm - still waiting for BBC iplayer to put it up so I can watch it.  Horay, we're there!  I'll go as fast as I can.

8.35pm - I'm up to date so the second show will be typed live!  Apologies for any spelling errors I'll try and pick them up during the filler sections!

Week 13, and the end is in sight. This week is the Semi Final and with just three couples and two dances the competition should be fierce. One dance is the Argentine Tango, the other is a reworked version of the celebrities favourite dance so far in the series (by that we mean probably the one they got the highest score in from the judges)

Sorry for the delay in getting this to you – doing a lantern festival in Milton Keynes last night meant I was away from Strictly and a computer. There has been a media blackout in my vicinity today though and I am coming into the show ‘cold’ so my initial responses haven’t been ‘sullied’ by an preconceptions.

‘Results Show’ and Dance off

Professional Performance – Foxtrot (Ian & Natalie)

You don’t bring me flowers. Very pretty routine (once they started!)

It's at about this time of year, and this point in the series that I always get a load of questions as to how the voting works and if I think the public vote is ‘rigged’ in someway. I think this is largely because it’s easier to do the numbers mentally with a few couples instead of 16!

As already reported here and elsewhere, this week's Dance-Off has been dropped for the Semi-Final, with the Judges and the Public Vote being combined to give a final score. The couple with the lowest score automatically go home, and in the case of a tie, it’s the PUBLIC vote that swings the result.

So for example:

Chris scores 1 point with the judges but 3 with the public.
Ricky scores 2 points with the judges but 2 with the public.
Both couples score 4 points in total. But Chris was more popular with the public so goes through, and Ricky goes home.

There have been some comments that this takes power away from the Professional Panel and hands it to the whims of the public – but does it?  At this stage in the game does this make it a popularity contest rather than a dance contest? – Well lets have a look at the maths (warning, science bit, pay attention ;-)