Kuchiki-Sand Lead Pairs Competition

For some people, coaching Christopher Bowman, who calls himself “a member of the After 11 figure skating club,” would be a full load.

But John Nicks, who accepted the challenge of restoring Bowman to his national championship form of 1989 three weeks ago, apparently has not neglected his pairs teams at Costa Mesa.

Defending national champions Natasha Kuchiki of Canoga Park and Todd Sand of Costa Mesa skated a clean original program Wednesday night in the Orlando Arena for first place in the U.S. championships.

Another of Nicks’ pairs, Jenni Meno of Westlake, Ohio and Scott Wendland of Costa Mesa, were equally efficient for second place. Last year’s runners-up, Calla Urbanski of Chicago and Rocky Marval of New Egypt, N.J., were a disappointing third because she nicked the wall and fell after appearing to have landed a double axel. Any of the top three teams could still win the championship by finishing first in tonight’s freestyle program, which accounts for two-thirds of the final score.

“I didn’t have a problem with the jump,” Urbanski said of her fall. “I nailed it, but freak things happen. I landed it and ran out of room. This rink is a lot smaller than the one we train on at home.”

Wendland said that wasn’t a problem for the Costa Mesa pairs.

“Our rink is a little smaller than this,” he said.

There were two injuries. Jeff Myers of Indianapolis was hospitalized because of internal bleeding after a collision with his partner, Holly Benson, and Kara Paxton of Annapolis, Md., suffered a concussion in a fall.

Skating Notes

Michelle Cho, 12, of Costa Mesa won the novice girls’ championship Wednesday. Kristy Venasky, 13, of Torrance was second. . . . The novice men’s championship was won by Roman Fraden, 15, of San Diego. . . . Sabrina Corbaci, 15, of San Diego and Eddy Zeidler, 21, of Poway, finished third in novice pairs.