The Winter Olympics are big in Switzerland, being that Switzerland is home of the Alps, some cool bobsled runs and the Avalanche’s goaltender. The landscape inspires winter athletes. Take one look at the Matterhorn from a hiking trail outside Zermatt and you want to dump your backpack, put on a pair of cross country skis and go shoot a rifle in the woods.
But figure skating usually has inspired nothing but amused yawns from the Swiss. One of the glamour sports of the Winter Olympics has had all the impact in Switzerland of Velveeta cheese.
Then came Stephane Lambiel.
Suddenly, a Swiss man is the world figure skating champion. Lambiel’s surprising world championship in Moscow last March showed his countrymen you can do other things on ice besides ride a luge sled or cross check someone into the boards.
“It’s something new, a guy becoming world champion in Switzerland,” Lambiel, 20, said last April at the Pepsi Center during a stop with Champions on Ice.
In Denver, the man walked around in total anonymity. After Moscow, Switzerland suddenly became Triple Lutz Central. A phalanx of photographers was waiting for him at the airport, where the mayor of Geneva joined him for a whale of a party.
Saxon, his little hometown (population 3,000), crammed 10,000 people into the city limits to see its new national hero parade down the street on a float. Top- ranked Swiss tennis star Roger Federer called to congratulate him.
The Swiss are the inventors of fondue, cellophane and the term “staid.” Wild celebrations usually require an act of the Swiss government.
“I think we need something great to enjoy,” said Lambiel, who begins competing in Turin today in the men’s short program. “And my world title was something great.”
How great? Lambiel’s world title was Switzerland’s first world medal in figure skating since Denise Biellmann’s gold in 1981 and the first in men’s competition since Hans Gerschwiler’s silver in 1948. It was only the sixth for Switzerland in the history of the world championships.
Switzerland has won only two Olympic medals in figure skating, none since Gerschwiler’s silver in 1948.
So it’s understandable that Mrs. Lambiel reacted the way she did when her young son, watching his sister skate for three years, asked if he could try.
“She told me, ‘Figure skating is for girls and hockey is for boys,”‘ he said with a smile. “I’m very strong in my mind. So I told my mom, ‘It’s figure skating or nothing.”‘
Why the strong attachment?
“Because in figure skating you have all these competitive feelings and athletics and it’s a very difficult sport,” he said. “And you have the artistic part so the combination of these two things, it’s like sport and art. And I like that. I’m very competitive.”
That’s why he wasn’t satisfied with his skating until last year. But he saw steady progress. He took 15th at the Salt Lake Olympics, 18th at the 2002 world championships and 10th at the 2003 worlds.
Then came a breakthrough.
At the 2004 worlds in Dortmund, Germany, Lambiel, already one of the sport’s best spinners, experimented with a quad, a four-revolution jump and the most difficult in skating. He tried it in practice, nailed it and put two in his program. He took fourth.
“I’d never tried it in practice,” he said. “It was so beautiful it was like, ‘Oh!”‘
In Moscow, Lambiel landed both his quads in the long program to easily win with 262.46 points, outdistancing Canadian silver medalist Jeffrey Buttle (245.69).
Cynics say Lambiel was merely the best of a notoriously bad three nights of skating in a field that didn’t include Russian three-time world champion Evgeni Plushenko, who withdrew from the long program because of a groin injury. Mention that and suddenly the Swiss champion isn’t so staid.
“I didn’t win because he was injured,” Lambiel said. “It’s not just one week. It’s all the season. So I won all the season. I’m world champion 2005, not just this week. And he did the short program. He did the competition. I think he was injured because his preparation was not good.”
To back it up, he will have to beat Plushenko in Turin. They met in St. Petersburg, Russia, for the Cup of Russia in November and in Lyon, France, for last month’s European championships. Both times Lambiel finished second to Plushenko.
American Timothy Goebel, the 2002 Olympic bronze medalist, saw Lambiel skate for the first time in Moscow.
“He happened to have a really good skate when a lot of people made a lot of mistakes,” Goebel said. “That’s not to say he’s not a great skater. But he definitely had some help.”
Lambiel will have help in Turin. It’s only 60 miles from the Swiss border.
