P.H. to K.M. -- You go, girl

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Hey, K.M., it’s P.H.

I noticed you called me out at the end of your blog post about reporters’ questions. That’s OK by me. I’ve asked you some tough ones over the years, and you always responded with unfailing courtesy, no matter how hard you were biting your tongue.

Actually, I’m jealous. A lot of what you wrote is pretty darn clever -- a little snarky, but mainly just plain funny. I’m glad you’re sticking to skating, or you might take my job. But I thought I would respond to some of the points in your blog post by giving you some idea of what it’s like on the other side of the barrier and why we ask some of these questions.

First, the ‘are you happy’’ question. That’s mainly an anodyne ice-breaker, trying to get a dialogue going in some direction. With the limited time we get for interviews, especially in the mixed zone after each skater competes, the idea is simply to get you to say anything and go from there. Anyway, it’s a lot better than starting with, ‘Boy, you must feel lucky to be champion.’’

(A digression: There long has been a feeling that reporters should coddle figure skaters, as if you were Meissen dolls. All elite skaters are professional athletes, and you merit the same

scrutiny as any other professional athletes. By ‘merit,’’ I mean exactly that: It is a mark of respect for the sport that you would face the same types of questions as any other pro athlete. If not, no one should take your sport seriously.)

Now the body change question. Like it or not, this is an issue for female skaters, because the transition to womanhood, which changes the center of gravity, affects several critical skating areas, like jumps and spins. It was exactly 12 years ago, as Tara Lipinski won the world title at age 14, that I jokingly wondered if women’s skating was becoming an episode of ‘The Young and the Breastless.’’ (Christine Brennan included that remark in her book ‘Inside Edge.’’). It was a flip line but it summed up the advantage that pre-pubescent girls had in skating.

While no reporter, male or female, should ask a young woman about personal details of the change, it is fair game to ask if the change has made certain things in skating difficult and how the skater is working to compensate. For me, the taboo is to ask about weight: Girls have enough self-image issues in adolescence without being asked if they have gained (or lost) pounds.

Last one: hanging up the skates. Though I never have asked you that question point-blank, I certainly have suggested it -- either in a question that asks if frustrations had driven you to think about retirement or simply by writing that I hoped frustrations in trying to regain your championship level would not turn the sport you love into a joyless exercise. As uncomfortable as it is to ask and answer them, those are reasonable questions for an athlete who has struggled to rediscover the exceptional skating level she once could find day after day.

Anyway, I’m glad you used the blog to say the things you did. And I’m not responding because I want to have the last word.

I’m going to give that to you, in recalling what you told us after finishing fourth at the 2007 worlds -- a year after you had won the world title -- because I think it still applies today, because I think you still feel this way:

‘I know I have to do it again, but I’ll always be a world champion. I’m still growing up, and I still have a lot to learn. I think I have a couple of more years in me. I’ll be back.’

-- Philip Hersh