Four years ago, the U.S. figure skating team had its worst results ever at the Winter Olympics.
The 2022 team named after the U.S. Championships ended Sunday could do better than 2018 – although it may not be a substantial improvement, and the assessment of it will depend largely on Nathan Chen’s performance in men’s singles.
Read MoreAbout 12 years ago, Chiara Garberi decided to check out the ice rink in her New Jersey neighborhood to see if it might be a place where she could skate for fun on weekends.
With her daughter, Isabeau Levito, in tow, Garberi arrived at a moment when competitive figure skaters were training. Levito, then age 2 ½, took one look at the situation and asked if she could go on the ice.
“I told her, `You need special shoes for that,’” Garberi recalled. “She saw a pair of rental skates next to the ice sheet and said, `Are those mine?’”
They would be, soon enough. Because what followed was a progression familiar to parents of kids who wind up in figure skating’s highest levels.
First came weekly learn-to-skate classes, which Garberi originally made a reward for her daughter if she finished her meals. Next, a year later, was asking a coach who was working with the beginners if Levito, at almost 4, was ready for a private lesson. (The answer was yes.) And then, a few years later, daily lessons. Now, all day at the rink, six days a week, with schoolwork fit in between and after skating sessions.
“Isabeau always tried to be better than everyone else, even in learn to skate,” said Yulia Kuznetsova, who has been Levito’s coach for 10 years.
Read MoreTwo-time senior national champion Alysa Liu, the most successful U.S. women’s figure skater this season, has changed coaches barely two months before the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics.
The skater’s father, Arthur Liu, confirmed the switch Monday morning in a text to NBCSports.com.
Two days after returning from the NHK Trophy in Tokyo, which ended Nov. 14, Liu left coaches Massimo Scali and Jeremy Abbott in the San Francisco Bay Area and went to Colorado Springs, Colorado, to train with Christy Krall, Drew Meekins and Viktor Pfeifer.
Read MoreIn the 32 years since the redoubtable Midori Ito became Japan’s first world figure skating champion, her country has become one of the most decorated in the sport.
All the greatest success has been in singles, climaxed by Yuzuru Hanyu’s consecutive Olympic gold medals in 2014 and 2018.
That background is why the silver medalists were the story in the Skate America pairs’ event Saturday night in Las Vegas.
With their second personal best score in two days, skating with an exuberance and joy that delighted the crowd, Riku Miura and Ryuichi Kihara became the first Japanese team to win a medal on the Grand Prix circuit in 10 years, equaling the silver won by Narumi Takahashi and Mervin Tran at the NHK Trophy in 2011.
“We weren’t really hoping or aiming for a medal,” Miura said. “We just wanted to show what we were doing in training. We’re obviously surprised we came in second.”
Read MoreBrandon Frazier sounded like a lot of the leading U.S. pairs’ skaters who have come before him over the years.
“We’re trying to push ourselves to be more competitive with the top teams in the world,” said Frazier, reigning U.S. champion with partner Alexa Knierim.
For six decades, that goal for U.S. pairs has primarily meant trying to be competitive with teams from Russia and its predecessor, the Soviet Union.
And, despite some unexpected Russian dry spells in the past 15 years, that is what it means again.
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Philip Hersh, formerly Olympic specialist for the Chicago Tribune, has covered 20 Olympic Games. He often uses sport as a way to write about the culture of a country or athlete. READ FULL BIO
