Unqualified Success

Sasha Cohen is 15 years old and stretching the truth a little when she says she is 4 feet 10. She’s not quite 80 pounds and half her size seems to be big, wide, bright, intelligent eyes.

A porcelain doll is the way her coach, John Nicks, describes Cohen’s appearance. Strong as a tiger is the way he describes her mental makeup.

The high school freshman from Laguna Niguel will need that strength in the next three weeks as she tries to accomplish a first.

By winning a silver medal in her first appearance at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships senior level competition, Cohen appeared to put herself in position to compete in the 2000 World Championships, which begin March 26 at Nice, France.

The top three U.S. women--Michelle Kwan won the gold medal and Sarah Hughes the bronze--qualify for the World Championships.

Except Cohen hasn’t qualified yet.

She must overcome a complicated set of International Skating Union rules that were instituted last year, ostensibly to keep young skaters from competing too much or burning out too soon. Some skating experts believe the rules also guard their sport from being dominated by tiny youngsters who can jump high but haven’t mastered the artistry of skating.

Remember how 15-year-old Tara Lipinski won gold at the 1998 Olympics?

Cohen turned 15 last Oct. 26. That’s too young for the 2000 World Championships, which require competitors to be age 15 by July 1, 1999.

So she can’t compete--unless she wins a medal at the World Junior Championships this week in Oberstdorf, Germany.

The Junior Worlds are the reason Cohen, her mother Galina and her coach, Nicks, have temporarily moved their headquarters from Costa Mesa’s Ice Chalet to the Hotel AllgauStern in Germany.

On Wednesday, Cohen will join 49 other girls from around the world and skate her four-minute long program in a qualifying round. On Friday, assuming she is not eliminated in the qualifier, Cohen will skate a 2-minute 40-second short program. On Saturday, she will skate her long program again.

If, as expected, Cohen earns one of the three medals, she will return home and begin working on a different set of long and short programs so that she can be ready for the Senior World Championships in two weeks.

Senior competitors must perform different elements in the short program and skate an extra 40 seconds in the long program. Then Cohen, Galina and Nicks will fly back to Europe and join Kwan and Hughes in Nice.

“This age rule seems to be having the opposite effect,” Galina says. “Sasha is having to work much harder than the other girls.”

In this confounding sport with its byzantine rules, Hughes, a year younger than Cohen, is not bound by the same age restriction. In 1999, the year the age restrictions took effect, Hughes finished second at the Junior World Championships, qualifying her, basically forever, for Senior Worlds.

So Hughes will stay home this week in New York, going to school, training as usual. “The rules,” Nicks says, “don’t always make sense.”

When Hughes went from Junior Worlds to Senior Worlds, the time between competitions was nearly nine months. Now it’s two weeks. Between the U.S. championships and Senior Worlds, Cohen is being asked to perform at a top level of conditioning two completely different programs at three intense, tiring, exhausting competitions in a matter of six weeks.

“I’m a little tired sometimes,” Cohen says. “But I want to do this more than anything.”

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On the weekend of the U.S. championships, when Cohen won the silver medal and captivated the skating world with her balletic gracefulness, her tiny pointed toes, her stretches and twirls and her dainty jumps, the skating competition drew a larger television audience than the NBA All-Star game and Tiger Woods’ attempt for a seventh consecutive PGA Tour victory.

So now Cohen is famous. Piles of mail sit on Nicks’ desk, all addressed to Cohen. Cohen plans to answer all of it, as soon as she gets postcards made with her photo so she can autograph them.

Upon arriving home from Cleveland, Cohen took a few days off. Her skate boots needed rehabbing. They were too soft and didn’t provide enough support. “It’s such a sensitive thing, how the boots feel,” Galina says.

When Cohen got back on the ice, Nicks says: “Honestly, for a week she was terrible. I was getting a little concerned. I expected some letdown. It was such an incredible experience for her in Cleveland. But by the end of last week I was very worried that Sasha was not going to be able to be ready.

“But then on Monday she came in and, boom, she was doing it again. Skating clean programs, several clean programs. This girl is ready to go.”

It is March 2. The next day Cohen would fly to Germany, but at this moment she is more concerned about what is for lunch.

She wants to go to a favorite restaurant. Her mother says there isn’t time.

The schedule calls for two morning skating sessions, then 90 minutes of Pilates training at a nearby studio.

Pilates is an exercise program engineered to strengthen muscles, increase flexibility and improve body alignment. Cohen and her rink partner, Naomi Nari Nam, the 1999 national silver medalist from Irvine, are both noted for beautiful positions while skating, and both credit Pilates.

Sasha wins the lunch argument. She eats a giant bowl of soup, some salad and a cup of frozen yogurt while Galina tells her to hurry. But Sasha doesn’t hurry. She finishes every speck of the yogurt. It is, Nicks says, impossible to get Sasha to do anything she doesn’t want to do. It is both a blessing and a curse. “She can drive me crazy,” Nicks says, “but she is also a strong-minded girl.”

Galina was a gymnast while she was growing up in Odessa in the Ukraine. Galina’s father, Lev, was a gymnast who once performed for Stalin. Lev, a Russian Jew, was an engineering professor, but Galina says she never realized she grew up in a restrictive society. “We just accepted life,” Galina said. When she was 16, Galina’s family came to San Diego. Galina met and married Roger Cohen while she was attending San Diego State. Roger is a lawyer specializing in Internet start-up companies. Neither parent expected to raise a driven athlete.

And driven Sasha must be.

Her schedule:

Mondays she has three skating sessions, starting at 8:40 in the morning. There is a break for lunch before the third skating session, then two hours of ballet lessons before dinner, homework and bed.

Tuesdays she has three skating sessions, lunch, and an hour of stretching before homework.

Wednesdays she has three skating sessions and 5 1/2 hours of tutoring at Futures High School in Mission Viejo. Cohen talks to teachers, turns in assignments, gets more work.

Thursdays there are three more skating sessions and her Pilates training.

On Fridays she has three skating sessions and more ballet training.

And weekends? Usually, she takes them off . . . except for the ones she spends in Lake Arrowhead training with skaters such as Kwan.

Hers is a schedule that no parent or coach could force a teenager to keep. Sasha wants it, and no age rule will keep her from learning more and harder jumps, or stop her from the stretching, Pilates and ballet.

“I want to go to Senior Worlds because it’s just what I want to do,” Cohen says. “I don’t feel too young. I feel ready for this now and I don’t want to wait.”

For Galina, there is a juggling act. She and Roger have a sixth-grade daughter, Natasha, who prefers piano to skating and goes to regular school.

The whole family has always accompanied Sasha on her trips, but this timeRoger and Natasha have stayed behind.

Galina is with her daughter, but will bring her home right after the competition to keep the family together even though Nicks says it would be better for Sasha to stay in Europe should she medal at Junior Worlds.

“I have to come home with Sasha,” Galina said. “We can’t be away that long.”

But neither Nicks nor Galina wants to think ahead a week.

“Right now,” Nicks says, “this can only be about Junior Worlds.”

Sasha can think ahead though. “I want this now,” she says. “I want to skate at Senior Worlds. This is what I have to do and now I’m going to do it.”

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Diane Pucin can be reached at her e-mail address: diane.pucin@latimes.com