I have a sports obsession. But it isn’t the Super Bowl. It’s ice skating.
I once tried to stand up on ice skates. Talk about muscle memory! My muscles remember very well the sensation of plopping onto my derriere on a very hard, cold surface.
But watching the competitions and performances on TV fascinates me, even though I have a smallish set and those twirling, leaping figures are the size of ants. Somehow, even during the warmup sessions, I can recognize the styles and identify my favorites.
Oh, what a year this is! How can so many of my friends and relatives fail to recognize how everything depends on the way skaters perform at the World Championships? Don’t people realize that the skaters’ placements this year will determine the size of their national representation (one, two or three skaters in each of the four disciplines) in 2009, and that having fewer skaters next year might adversely affect the size of the nation’s team at the 2010 Winter Olympics?
Nobody seems to care except Dick Button and me. I’ve never met Dick Button, but the sportscaster/multiple Olympic gold medal-winner has personally attended 55 U.S. Championships. I’ve personally attended exactly zero.
But I’ve been watching on TV since 1980, when I was three years old (NOT).
Perhaps I’m a little overly emotionally involved. When 14-year-old skating whiz and former World Junior Champion Caroline Zhang moved from my hometown of Brea, Calif. to nearby Irvine, it broke my heart. When Kimmie Meissner flubbed her jumps at the U.S. Nationals, I wanted to cry for her. But my spirits leaped when I heard she’d been named to the U.S. world team anyway. A second chance!
Not that I’m blind to the brilliant talent from other nations. I swoon over hunky Swiss former World Champion Stephane Lambiel and Canada’s Jeffrey Buttle. I love the German pairs team of Aliona Savchenko and Robin Szolkowy, and thoroughly enjoy the talent and grace of Korea’s Yu-Na Kim and Japan’s Mao Asada. I want them all to win.
Okay. Splash a little ice water on my face and I’ll come down to earth. By April, the season will be over, anyway.
Just in time to get ready for this year’s Summer Olympics in China and those absolutely fabulous gymnasts from around the world! (Did I mention that I have two obsessions?)
Friday, February 01, 2008
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4 comments:
I love to watch ice skating, too.
I have to admit I took some spills on my rear on the cold surface when I was younger.
I too have been watching it for years. I was lucky enough to get to one live exhibition with a lot of the greats. And I like gymnastics too. They're the best part of the olympics!
I love to watch ice skating, especially ice dancing, because it's so graceful. I cannot imagine being able to do all those twirls, jumps and the rest of it without seriously damaging something, LOL!
I'm sure we'll all enjoy watching the World Championships, which start March 20 on NBC. Thanks for posting!
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