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No wins, but gains for skaters Lysacek and Zhang

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Ten things I know, and you should, as Vancouver, Canada, nears its Thursday festivities marking one year from the start of the 2010 Winter Olympics.

Preface to the first five items: it is impossible to get a completely accurate picture of a figure skating competition from a 60-inch high-def television, let alone a computer screen image about the size of an index card. You don’t see the speed or ice coverage or emotion that comes across live, especially from the judges’ standpoint. With that caveat, here are a few observations (from the computer screen. via icenetwork.com) of what I saw at the Four Continents championships that ended Saturday in Vancouver.

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1. Caroline Zhang’s free skate could be a transformational moment in her senior-level career. No matter how you looked at it, the 15-year-old Californian (pictured at left) moved with far more confidence and speed than she had at any event since her brilliant 2007 junior season. This may have been good enough only for fourth, behind three contenders for world medals, but it was a big step up for Zhang, especially after her slow, robotic performances at the U.S. championships. Zhang finally seemed able to let herself go.

2. Great to see a successful quad back in Evan Lysacek’s free skate. Yes, Patrick Chan of Canada won without one, but the quad is a key part of Lysacek’s arsenal. Now if Lysacek can remaster his triple axel -- it was both downgraded to a double and downgraded for execution -- he is right back in the hunt for a world medal after a disappointing third at the U.S. championships. Lysacek lost the Four Continents free skate to Chan by 4.79 points; he lost by 7.90 points to Chan on the triple axel alone.

3. What kind of sport goes backward technically? The last three Olympic champions all landed quads (yes, I know that was before the nitpick age of judging) but Canada’s Jeffrey Buttle won worlds without one last year, and it appears the only world title contenders this year with quads are France’s Brian Joubert, who hits the jump consistently, and Lysacek, who does not.

4. An upset win by Meryl Davis and Charlie White means the best chance for a U.S. medal at the upcoming Los Angeles worlds is in ice dance. (Pardon while I yawn.) Ice dancers are terrific athletes, and their discipline is technically demanding, but it’s no more a sport than ballet is. And the over-the-top costumes many ice dancers favor make it even more impossible to take the event seriously. Extremely hard to do it well, definitely. Sometimes beautiful to watch, yes. Sports competition, no.

5. Mao Asada of Japan and Kim Yu-Na of South Korea are exceptional skaters who almost certainly will finish one-two, in some order, at worlds. But I would get a lot more excited about both were they to get through a competition without a major error.

Kim won the Four Continents title despite falling in the free skate. Asada finished third because she fell in the short program and then won the free skate even though she turned an individual triple toe loop into a double -- to an elite skater, a double toe loop not at the end of a combination is ridiculous -- and a double axel into a single. Asada won last year’s world title after recovering brilliantly from a complete splat on the first jump in her free skate; Kim wound up with the bronze because she fell in the short program.

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On to other wintry matters:

6. While Erin Hamlin’s landmark luge world title Friday (first by a U.S. woman) should be duly celebrated, it needs to be put into perspective before starting to think of Hamlin as a potential Olympic champion next year. First, the worlds include two runs, but the Olympics have four, and U.S. sliders generally have had far less success in four-run events. Second, Hamlin won in Lake Placid, where the peculiarities of the track mean home-ice advantage probably counts for more than anywhere else on the international luge circuit.

7. Alpine skiers always talk about how the season-long World Cup is a truer test of ability than one-race events like the worlds or Olympics, and never was that truer than in the men’s downhill Friday at the worlds in Val d’Isere, France. The weather conditions changed so dramatically during the race that two former world downhill champions, Bode Miller of the U.S. and Aksel Lund Svindal of Norway, both skied in thick fog. (Try doing that at 70 mph while worrying about losing the miniscule amounts of time -- less than two seconds -- that separated Miller, eighth, and Svindal, 10th, from the winner.) While similarly unfair conditions often occur during World Cup races, they tend to even out over the course of a 30-race season.

8. Nordic combined skier Bill Demong gave up his chance to become the first U.S. winner of a World Cup overall title by skipping four European meets to train in Lake Placid for the upcoming world championships in the Czech Republic. Two years ago, he won a world silver medal -- only the second world medal ever for a U.S. Nordic combined skier. ‘My focus is medals at world championships, and the way I’m going to get there is three weeks of training at home,’’ Demong said. ‘And this is also a really effective dry run for next season, to see if this plan works.’’

9. Give veteran U.S. hockey player Natalie Darwitz credit for telling the truth about international women’s hockey, which remains a two-team contest between the U.S. and Canada even if Sweden (silver) finished ahead of Team USA (bronze) at the last Olympics. Asked if it would be more fun to have the Olympics become a best-of-seven series between the fierce North American rivals, who have won every gold and silver medal at the two other Olympic tourneys and the 11 world championships, Darwitz laughed and said, ‘I would love to see a little more progression in the game, so people aren’t seeing 11-0 or 12-1 games. It’s kind of a good idea, a seven-game series with Canada. In the long run, it would be better for the fans, but it won’t help out the game very much around the world.’’

10. Short track speed skater Apolo Anton Ohno’s biggest win since the 2006 Olympics was the 2007 edition of ‘Dancing With the Stars.’’ (Yes, he also won the overall title and 500 meters at the 2008 worlds, but the only picture of him with an award on the first page of his website is for dancing, not skating.) Can he win gold in a third straight Olympics? ‘I am definitely still one of the top contenders for medals -- and for gold,’’ he said. ‘Yes, I can still skate -- and dance.’’

-- Philip Hersh

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