Helio Castroneves upsets Melanie Brown to win 'Dancing with the Stars' crown
By SANDY COHEN, AP Entertainment Writer
November 28, 2007
LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Race-car driver Helio Castroneves upset Spice Girl Melanie Brown to capture the "Dancing With the Stars" mirrorball trophy on Tuesday night.
"It will look so good between my two Indy 500 trophies," Castroneves said.
He and his partner, Julianne Hough, came into the finals in second place, one point behind Brown and Maksim Chmerkovskiy. Both couples received perfect scores of 30 from the judges in their final dances Tuesday.
Overall, Brown was by far the more polished performer, consistently wowing the judges with her versatility and flair. But Castroneves' personality and enthusiasm, plus an effortless quickstep on his final performance, earned enough viewer votes to carry the day. His partner, Hough, also had won last season's competition, with speed skater Apolo Anton Ohno.
Afterward, Castroneves said that he was "shocked" by the victory: "I was not expecting it. Mel, she's an incredible dancer."
Brown admitted that losing "was a horrible feeling. I'm not going to deny it."
Earlier Tuesday, as expected, Marie Osmond was the first finalist to be eliminated. She and her partner, Jonathan Roberts, came into the finals in third place with 46 points after a doll-inspired freestyle routine panned by judges and bloggers alike.
Osmond, 48, had enjoyed strong viewer support throughout the hit show's fifth season while enduring the death of her father and fainting on stage.
The show "gave me something that I knew was solid, something I can count on," she said in a segment recorded before her ouster. "It's been one of the best experiences of my life."
The hit ABC show, which drew up to 20 million viewers per week, began with a dozen dancers. Model-actress Josie Maran was the first to be eliminated. Other nixed contestants were actresses Sabrina Bryan, Jennie Garth and Jane Seymour, billionaire entrepreneur Mark Cuban, entertainer Wayne Newton, boxer Floyd Mayweather, actor Cameron Mathison (who took off his shirt after his last dance Tuesday) and model Albert Reed.
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