Compulsory Preparations Well Underway

The moment the last triple salchow was landed and the last quadruple loop was looped at this week’s U.S. figure skating championships, preparations intensified for next year’s competition, to be held at Staples Center and the Sports Arena Jan. 6-13.

Although a year seems ample time to get ready, preliminary planning has long been underway for the first U.S. championships in Los Angeles since 1954 and first in Southern California since San Diego hosted the event in 1981. Long Beach was the site in 1972. Avid figure skating fans have also gotten an early jump. More than 1,000 all-event tickets at $195 to $500 each and hundreds of tour packages have been sold, although tickets haven’t officially gone on sale and single-session tickets won’t be available until September.

“This is really sort of a kickoff for us in terms of visibility and marketing,” David Simon, president of the Los Angeles Sports Council, said of the just-completed championships.

“You can go out and do things too early, and we didn’t want to do that. The skating community knows we’re going to have this, but the general public really doesn’t.”

Planning began more than two years ago. That’s when the U.S. Figure Skating Assn., which designates a skating club as host rather than a city, chose the bid the All Year Figure Skating Club of Culver City had formulated with the L.A. Sports Council. To meet USFSA requirements that a free-standing corporation run the event, LA2002 (https://www.la2002.com) was born.

“The event was awarded in October 1998 and we’ve been working ever since,” said Larry Kriwanek, a national figure skating judge, referee and member of the All Year club. “Staples was a hole in the ground when we started.”

Kriwanek and Simon were part of a 25-member delegation from Los Angeles at this year’s event, held at FleetCenter and Matthews Arena and staged before record attendance of 124,372. Many delegates observed operations at the 2000 championships in Cleveland and the 1999 event at Salt Lake City. Others, such as Kriwanek and Doug Williams of Los Angeles, who was a 1990 U.S. pairs bronze medalist and is a skating judge as well as president of the All Year Club and LA2002, have been to several U.S. championships and are familiar with the logistics.

“It’s a big job,” said Williams, who looked into using the Arrowhead Pond but determined the Staples-Sports Arena combination worked better. “It’s not just a competition. It’s a 10-day series of events that most people haven’t seen. It’s a huge challenge.”

By observing for several years and attending seminars organized by the USFSA, Los Angeles organizers learned what to do and what not to do when it’s their turn. However, they will have to factor in a key difference: the 2002 championships will determine who represents the U.S. at the Salt Lake City Winter Games less than a month later.

USFSA spokesman Bob Dunlop said his group issued 5,000 credentials for skaters, coaches, chaperons, media and volunteers in Boston. That number will soar in Los Angeles.

“I can’t even estimate what it will be, but in an Olympic year it increases in greater numbers of media and sponsors,” said Carrie Wolf, the USFSA’s senior director of events. “The hype gets bigger.”

And most of the skaters, coaches, chaperons, media representatives, volunteers and spectators must be housed and transported from hotels to rinks. The senior competition will be held at Staples Center, while the Sports Arena hosts junior and novice events and practices. The HealthSouth training center in El Segundo, which has two ice sheets, will be the primary practice rink; the USFSA has already drawn up a tentative practice schedule.

Wolf said Staples Center, which has hosted the Grammy Awards, Democratic National Convention and NBA finals, is well-equipped to host the figure skating championships.

“All the new facilities are so easy to work with and have the technical capacity to handle events of this magnitude,” she said.

Kriwanek estimated the economic impact on the city at $25 million. Simon wouldn’t offer an estimate but said the ripples will be bigger in Los Angeles than the last two sites.

“Take any figure from Boston or Cleveland and I’m sure we’re going to beat it,” said Simon, who is a board member of LA2002 and president of the LA2012 Olympic bid committee. “This is one of those events I particularly like going after because it’s underappreciated. Most people haven’t been to one but I think it will go over very, very well. The core audience is a high percentage of women, and you don’t often have that with a sporting event.”

The All Year skating club paid the USFSA a $250,000 bid fee. It hopes to recoup that through ticket sales, sponsorships and bus passes.

“Any proceeds will go to a foundation that will help amateur sports in Los Angeles,” Kriwanek said. “Some [hosts] have lost money, some have made money. We’re very much hoping the skating community of L.A. will support our effort and come down and buy tickets to see the best skaters in the world.”

Kriwanek and Simon said they have received positive responses from potential advertisers. Organizers hope spectators will have the same enthusiasm.

“L.A. has lots of events and lots of teams. The key is making people understand this is unique and has the added importance of being an Olympic year,” said Valerie Lundy, chief financial officer of LA2002 and mother of a skater.

Although the event hasn’t been in Los Angeles for many years--Wolf said no club bid for it--the area has produced many elite skaters.

Four of this year’s top six senior women are from the area: Five-time U.S. champion Michelle Kwan is from Torrance and trains in El Segundo, third-place finisher Angela Nikodinov lives in San Pedro and trains at El Segundo and Lake Arrowhead, Amber Corwin (fifth) is from Harbor City and trains in El Segundo, and 12-year-old Beatrisa Liang of Granada Hills finished sixth in her first senior nationals.

Men’s champion Timothy Goebel trains in El Segundo and fifth-place finisher Trifun Zivanovic of Santa Monica trains in Torrance.

“The last time nationals were in the L.A. area was ‘72, and that was an Olympic send-off, so we’d like to have a theme related to this being an Olympic send-off,” Williams said.

That’s one of hundreds of details Williams must tend to in the coming months.

“I’ve been working on this since April of ‘98,” he said. “By the time it happens, it’s a four-year project. But this year will fly by.”