GO FIGURE

Russian men have skated their way onto the medals podium at big events for years. The Russian women are now joining in.

Maria Butyrskaya was the one who upset Michelle Kwan at the World Figure Skating Championships last year. Irina Slutskaya is the favorite this time.

In the men’s event, Alexei Yagudin, like Kwan a two-time world champion, also faces a strong Russian challenge. Yagudin has been beaten twice this season by compatriot Yevgeny Plushchenko.

With the competition tight, the top women will be trying more triple-triple combinations, while the best men will try more quads.

Slutskaya hit a pair of triple-triples to beat Kwan in January at the Grand Prix Finals. Since then, Slutskaya easily won the European title without pulling out her triple-triple jump combinations, while a lackluster Kwan won the American title only after rallying from third in the short program.

Entering the world championships, which begin Monday, there is one statistic hanging over Kwan’s head: Since 1997, she has won only one major international competition, the 1998 worlds, when many top skaters were absent. Kwan has lost five: the Olympics, two GP finals and two worlds.

Slutskaya found out how much she loved the sport after she failed to make the Russian team last year.

After winning the European title twice and coming in second to Kwan in the 1998 world championships, Slutskaya finished fourth in the ’99 Russian championships. She even considered quitting the sport, but came back, slimmer, married, and with renewed motivation.

“I’m so happy I was able to come back and overcome all the difficulties,” Slutskaya said. “My coach, my family and my husband helped me along the way.”

At the Grand Prix Finals, she included a triple lutz-triple loop jump combination, becoming the first woman to complete the difficult set in competition. Few men have even tried it.

For defending champion Butyrskaya, who at 27 faces a field made up mostly of teen-agers, the world championships will be a test of nerves after the last two major competitions. Her car blew up during the Russian championships last December, and she lost her European crown to Slutskaya.

In the men’s competition, defending champion Yagudin has been plagued with problems for months. He was kicked off an exhibition tour in the United States last summer for inappropriate behavior linked to drinking. Then he missed the Grand Prix Final in January because of foot and boot problems.

Just before the European championships in Vienna, Austria, he broke his hand and had to skate with a soft cast, losing to Plushchenko.

“This year didn’t start out well for me,” Yagudin said.

Since then Yagudin has changed his free skate program to challenge Plushchenko, who has been unbeatable since last October, consistently landing solo quads and quads in combination.

Elvis Stojko, the Canadian who first performed the quad-double combination almost 10 years ago, is back for possibly his last world championships.

Stojko needs to hit his quad jumps not only to challenge the Russians, but to hold off the Americans. He was fourth last year.

Michael Weiss, the two-time U.S. champion, won the bronze in 1999, using the quad in qualifying.

Tim Goebel raised the bar of difficulty by doing three quadruple jumps in one program, but still couldn’t beat Weiss, who presented a more-rounded routine.

Goebel has since split with his coach, Carol Heiss Jenkins.

“Nothing’s permanent. But for right now, for the rest of the season, yeah, this is how it’s going to be,” he said.

He will be with Glyn Watts, who had been part of the coaching team.

“I just felt I’d be more comfortable at worlds with Glyn. Not doing anything now would’ve been more of a distraction,” Goebel said.

In the pairs event, Russians Yelena Berezhnaya and Anton Sikharulidze look to hold off another challenge by the high-flying Chinese pair of Shen Xue and Zhao Hongbo, who nearly beat them last year.

The ice dance title is virtually certain to go to France’s couple of Marina Anissina and Gwendal Peizerat, taking advantage of the absence of the injured Angelika Krylova and Oleg Ovsiannikov.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Jumping to new heights

Here are jumps that may be seen at the World Figure Skating Championship in Nice, France, starting Monday.

Quad salchow

Last year, American Tim Goebel was the first man to do a quadruple salchow in world competition. He hopes to have three quads-- a salchow, a salchow in combination and a loop-- in his program at this year’s world championships.

Approach on left foot

Takeoff from left foot

Four rotations

Landing on right foot

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Triple lutz-triple loop combination

Russian Irina Slutskaya was the first woman to do the triple--lutz loop combination in competition when she beat Michelle Kwan at the Grand Prix final in January.

Approach on left foot

Takeoff from left foot with right toe pick

Three rotations

Landing on right foot

Takeoff immediately from right foot

Three rotations

Landing on right foot

Source: Complied from AP wire reports