Skating on Thin Ice Over Judging

As an uproar grew over a controversial pairs skating decision, officials launched an inquiry Tuesday into why the judges elected to award gold to Russia for a challenging but sometimes flawed program over a Canadian couple who many said were flawless.

The flap over Monday night’s judging quickly took on a life of its own Tuesday, and by day’s end there were dueling news conferences marked by angry allegations, threats to quit the sport and suspicions voiced of bloc voting among judges. Seemingly every skater and skating expert weighed in with an opinion, resulting in a media feeding frenzy for what is shaping up to be the biggest controversy in skating since Tonya Harding and Nancy Kerrigan.

“This is the worst thing that’s happened in a long time in figure skating,” said longtime Southern California coach Frank Carroll.

Russians Elena Berezhnaya and Anton Sikharulidze performed a classical and dramatic long program but had one misstep, when Sikharulidze stumbled on the landing of a double axel jump. Canadians Jamie Sale and David Pelletier--who are also off-ice sweethearts--offered up a sometimes poignant, sometimes whimsical performance to the pop culture staple “Love Story.”

The winners seemed obvious. When the Canadians finished, fans chanted “Six! Six!” in anticipation of a perfect score, and NBC commentators, meantime, had all but assured audiences at home that the Canadian effort was as good as gold.

But by a 5-4 margin, the Russians won, reviving long-standing debate about the subjective judging that is an inherent part of the sport.

“Robbed!” read the front page headlines of the Ottawa Sun and Winnipeg Free Press newspapers.

Sally Rehorick, a representative of Canada’s Olympic delegation and a figure skating judge, said she was “horrified” and might quit judging because of what she perceived as an injustice against Sale and Pelletier, who said at his own news conference that he was considering leaving the sport.

“The Russians are a wonderful pair, an exquisite pair,” Rehorick said. “[Monday] night, Jamie and David skated better. . . . I do feel the credibility of our sport could be negatively affected by this decision.”

John Nicks, a 10-time U.S. Olympic coach and two-time Olympic pairs skater, said even if Berezhnaya and Sikharulidze had performed more intricate footwork than Sale and Pelletier, that should not have been decisive.

“Not for first place,” said Nicks, who watched the event on TV at home in Southern California but will return to Salt Lake City on Friday to coach Sasha Cohen in the women’s competition. “You don’t win and lose a 4 1/2-minute freestyle program on footwork. I thought [the decision] was baffling. . . . Probably only five people agreed--the judges.”

But the Russians, who have historically dominated the sport, defended the victory that marked the 11th consecutive Olympic gold medal for Soviet or Russian pair skaters.

Coach Tamara Moskvina said her skaters’ transition moves were far more challenging than the Canadians’, and she rated her skaters’ footwork as more difficult. She also pointed out that the Russians did not protest at last year’s world championships in Vancouver, when voting went the other way, with the Canadians beating the Russians.

“We considered that Elena and Anton won, but it went to the other couple,” she said at her own news conference. “We didn’t accuse the North American bloc [of voting together], we just accepted it. So now it is our time.”

Separately, Chinese judge Jiasheng Yang, who was joined by colleagues from Russia, France, Poland and Ukraine in voting for the Russians over the Canadians, withdrew from judging the men’s short program Tuesday “due to an illness,” according to the Olympic news service. Judges from the U.S., Canada, Germany and Japan voted for Sale and Pelletier.

Governing Body Opts to Review Decision

The International Skating Union, the sport’s international governing body, said it will review the decision “to respect the public opinion.” Union General Secretary Fredi Schmid said in a statement that the organization “is doing an internal assessment to monitor if the ISU rules and procedures have been respected.”

A reversal of the judges’ decision is unlikely, but judges have been suspended by the ISU when it has been determined that bloc judging occurred.

Controversy is nothing new to figure skating, in which judges award one set of marks based on skaters’ execution of jumps, spins and other quantifiable elements, and another set of subjective marks for performance.

In Olympic figure skating, especially, debates still rage over medals awarded long ago, amid accusations of deal-making by judges to help each other’s skaters and of bloc voting by judges from the former Soviet republics against Western skaters.

Fans of the sport still debate the outcome of the men’s competition at the 1992 Albertville Games, where Paul Wylie of the U.S. was the only skater among the top six to perform a flawless long program and yet finished second to Viktor Petrenko of the post-Soviet breakup team.

Arguments still rage over whether Oksana Baiul of Ukraine deserved her gold over Kerrigan at the 1994 Lillehammer Games, or whether Tara Lipinski’s energetic long program was deserving of gold over the more elegant Michelle Kwan, who won the silver in the 1998 Nagano Games. That contest in particular ignited arguments among skating fans about the value of technical mastery versus the importance of maturity and artistry--subjective judgments all.

Scott Hamilton, an NBC commentator at Salt Lake City and the 1984 men’s Olympic gold medalist, also condemned the decision Monday and said it would be “debated forever.”

Canadians’ Choice of Music Cited

In a sign of just how personal it can get, Hamilton said the Canadians’ biggest mistake may have been choosing music that appeals more to them than to the judges.

“I always try to defend that as a cultural thing, not as bloc voting,” he said. “Their artistry may not be judged on the same level because it isn’t an established-for-generations thing.”

The International Olympic Committee on Tuesday declined to become involved in the controversy, saying it was the domain of the ISU, which has scheduled a news conference for today.

Director General Francois Carrard said the controversy is “not the first and not the last” at the Games, for the simple reason that “you don’t have an objective answer” as in other sports. “Judges are judges, people are human, results are results. That’s life.”

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Staff writer Alan Abrahamson and Associated Press contributed to this report.