Turin – Sasha Cohen has said all the right things. She is now all about the journey and not just the destination. She channels John Wooden, saying she doesn’t think about the past or the future but only the present. She is joking with the media.
Sasha Cohen has done all the right things. She is soaking up the Olympic experience. She is socializing in the Olympic Village. She is watching other sports. Oh, yes. She also had the best short program Tuesday and leads the Olympic women’s figure skating competition entering the free skate.
Tonight the world will learn if this grounded, mature attitude changes Sasha Cohen’s reputation forever. All she needs to do is win gold. That’s all.
“If she skates the same Thursday night,” said her coach, John Nicks, “she’ll be very difficult to beat.”
He could have said that many times before. Such as at the 2000 U.S. Nationals in Cleveland, where she led after the short program but wound up second to Michelle Kwan. Or the 2002 Olympics in Salt Lake City, where she stood third after the short program and finished fourth. Or the 2004 World Championships in Dortmund, Germany, where she was first after the short and finished second.
Cohen, 21, prepared for the biggest skate of her life by skipping practice Wednesday.
The Corona del Mar, Calif., resident didn’t meet with the media, but Nicks did. He said Cohen didn’t get much sleep Tuesday night and wanted to rest. After Tuesday’s short program, Cohen was seen icing her knee for what she called “maintenance.”
“We didn’t get out of here (Tuesday) night until 12:30, a quarter to 1,” Nicks said. “She didn’t sleep very well.”
It may not be a big deal, but Cohen has no margin for error. She leads by the equivalent of one skate width. Her score of 66.73 barely tops the 66.70 of Russia’s Irina Slutskaya, the two-time world champion, and the 66.02 of Japan’s Shizuka Arakawa, the 2004 world champ. Slutskaya practiced Wednesday. So did Arakawa.
How much will it hurt Cohen not to practice?
“I think it’s important to be out there on the Olympic ice,” said Kimmie Meissner, Cohen’s teammate who stands fifth, “to be comfortable with it and kind of get your bearings straight, like do your program and do all your jumps and make sure everything’s comfortable.”
Then again, Meissner is only 16. Nicks is 76. At one time, say four years ago in Salt Lake City, he would have cracked the whip. As Cohen has developed, so has Nicks, um, matured.
“I’ve trained a lot of skaters, and I’ve made a lot of mistakes,” said Nicks, a member of the Figure Skating Hall of Fame. “They’re all different, and if you treat them differently, you’ll get the most out of them. Even if I insisted, it wouldn’t have done any good.”
Cohen also probably didn’t feel like talking much. She talked plenty Tuesday night as she bubbled over after a near-flawless short program. She talked about winning, about dreams, but also maintained her theme about perspective.
It is an approach that worked through her first national title in St. Louis last month and could produce her first Olympic gold medal and America’s third straight in women’s figure skating.
“My main job here is to enjoy the process and have fun with every moment, to believe in myself and stay strong,” Cohen said. “Anyone on the street can say: ‘I want a gold medal. I want a billion dollars.’ But what makes a difference is what you do day by day that determines if you get that goal. I’m just working on the day by day right now.
“I always think about winning and being positive with that, but the biggest thing I’ve worked on is to find the positive. Like, wow! That was a great job. Enjoy it. Have fun. Mr. Nicks said (Tuesday): ‘Don’t think about the long (program). Enjoy tonight. Enjoy the short.’ I always went, ‘I have to do this and this and this’ and get ahead of myself.”
She can’t here. The field is too strong. However, there is no question which skater is facing the most pressure. If gold medalist Evgeni Plushenko is Russia’s icon, Slutskaya is Russia’s sweetheart. Russian men have been known to rush on the ice during exhibitions and hand her flowers on one knee. Her fight with vasculitis, an inflammation of the blood vessels, was a daily news story in 2004.
However crazy Russia is about figure skating, no woman from that country has become an Olympic champion. She would not only be the first but would make Russia the first nation in Olympic history to sweep all figure skating golds.
Unlike Cohen, Slutskaya has held her ground at this level. In 2002, she was second after the Olympic short program and won the silver. At last year’s World Championships in Moscow, she was first after the short and held off Cohen for the gold.
However, don’t forget Meissner, whose 59.40 is 6.62 points out of medal contention, or even 17-year-old Emily Hughes, Michelle Kwan’s 11th-hour replacement who stands seventh. Meissner is just naive enough to think she can medal and just young enough to say it.
“I think I have a good shot,” Meissner said after practice Wednesday. “I think everybody in the last group does.”
In tonight’s last group, Cohen skates second, followed by Arakawa. Meissner goes before the last skater, Slutskaya. If Cohen, Arakawa or even Meissner puts on the skate of her life, it’s up to Slutskaya to top it and win a gold everyone in Russia wants her to win and most in the world expects her to win.
Get set for a wild finish.
Staff writer John Henderson can be reached at 303-820-1299 or jhenderson@denverpost.com.
