A Falls Alarm for Kwan

It was scene teetering somewhere between the surreal and the unreal: Michelle Kwan, reigning women’s figure skating world champion, looking so lost out there on the ice, so emotionally crushed, so drained of confidence, that the fans took pity on her and began to applaud, their way of urging Kwan to press on.

This kind of gesture is usually reserved for a wobbly awe-struck novice, not the Tiger Woods of female figure skating. Twenty-four hours earlier, during her short program, Kwan had appeared so poised, so imperturbable, so invincible--seemingly unbeatable on this rink or any other against any kind of field.

But seconds into her long program at Saturday’s U.S. Figure Skating Championships at Nashville Arena, Kwan skidded into trouble, shakily completing a tentative triple-lutz, double toe-loop combination.

From there, disaster.

Kwan fell on her stomach as she came out of a triple toe-loop.

Two-and-a-half turns through a triple flip, she stumbled, maintaining her balance only by straight-arming the frozen surface.

And on her very next element, another triple loop, she fell again, taking a hard seat at center ice and looking so shattered that the crowd was moved to help prod Kwan, who, incredibly, still had two more minutes to go.

She scraped her way through to the end of the music, but as soon as the final note passed, Kwan knew: Her U.S. title was in jeopardy.

Five minutes later, it was gone, grabbed away by a tiny 14-year-old from Sugar Land, Texas, named Tara Lipinski.

Kwan left the door open--and Lipinski hurtled her way through it. Lipinski hit seven triple jumps, every one she tried, including what is believed to be the first triple-loop, triple-loop combination by an American female skater.

At 14 years and eight months, Lipinski becomes the youngest U.S. skating champion. Kwan had been the third-youngest women’s champion, winning the 1996 title at 15.

Saturday, Kwan took the silver, although her long program ranked only third, behind Lipinski and Nicole Bobek, who rallied from sixth place after Friday’s short program to win the bronze medal.

All three advance to next month’s world championships in Lausanne, Switzerland, but that news didn’t prevent Kwan from tossing aside two wadded-up Kleenex before stepping up to the medals podium.

“I was a little shocked,” Kwan said. “Suddenly I’m setting up [for the start of her routine] and then I’m on the ice. I was shocked. It threw me off. I haven’t fallen very often in a competition.”

When one fall quickly led to another, Kwan said she “panicked . . . I guess I got scared.” She said she “wanted to thank the audience for clapping in the middle of the program. It kind of brought me back to life.”

The judges were equally kind to Kwan, giving her three scores of 5.9 and four scores of 5.8 for presentation. Her lowest technical scores were one 5.3 and one 5.4. Overall, one judge rated her long program best of the night and two others graded her in second place.

Lipinski was first with eight of the nine judges, taking it all in with the wide-eyed effervescence of, well, a 14-year-old who had just unseated Michelle Kwan as national champion.

“It was great,” Lipinski said. “I was really relaxed. I knew what I had to do and I really felt confident.”

Lipinski’s coach, Richard Callaghan, tried to do what he could to keep his beaming skater grounded.

“Tara skated very well,” Callaghan allowed, but cautiously added, “Something happened tonight that we didn’t think could happen.”

Kwan fell, not once, but twice--almost thrice--in barely two minutes. It was more than anyone could have fathomed.

For the record, Kwan’s coach, Frank Carroll, claimed he “wasn’t shocked,” making him the only one.

“Once in a while, every great athlete is going to have a bad go,” Carroll said. “How many times can you go out there and do it, do it, do it, without once in a while having a bad go?

“It’s going to happen. Unfortunately, it was tonight.”