Turin – She was doomed before she began.
Sasha Cohen came into the biggest four minutes of her life Thursday night not only fighting two former world champions but a reputation for flopping when only outstanding would do. As if the ghosts of past and future failures came to Palavela’s ice to cross-check her into the boards, Cohen’s warm-up turned into a microcosm of her skating career in the spotlight.
She fell twice and nearly collided with Japan’s Shizuka Arakawa. Then, when it counted, Cohen fell once, nearly fell twice and collided with fate. She lost the gold medal she precariously held after Tuesday’s short program and hung on for the silver only when favored Irina Slutskaya fell and the new scoring system gave Cohen some badly needed style points.
Arakawa, the only one of the three not to fall, won, giving Japan its only medal of these Winter Olympics. Slutskaya dropped to a bronze, preventing a Russian sweep of figure skating golds.
For Cohen, 21, it meant her first Olympic medal, but the way she reacted didn’t make it sound as if she would clear wall space for it.
“Ultimately it’s four minutes of one day of my life,” she said in a jam-packed news conference. “I look back on my last four years and my individual journey, I’ve grown so much as a person and as an athlete. I’ve become stronger. I’m tougher than I think I am. I should be proud of all those things.”
Notice she didn’t say skating. She was not proud of Thursday’s performance. She defended skipping Wednesday’s practice because of fatigue after a late short program Tuesday night, but she looked shaky shortly after taking her warm-up with the last group.
The Corona Del Mar, Calif., resident practiced all her jumps but finished her warm-up by falling hard on a triple loop, nearly clocked Arakawa while skating into a triple flip and flopped on that one, too. By the time Cohen went out to start her program as the group’s second skater, her smile couldn’t have been more pained if it were pinned on her face with railroad spikes.
“I was a little bit surprised because my first two jumps (in warm-up) went extraordinarily easy,” Cohen said. “I just felt on. And when I got to the triple loop, I slammed on that and on the flip and lutz I just didn’t get as high. I was shooting backward. That surprised me because I did them fine (Thursday) morning.”
She tried to get her head back. She didn’t think back to Salt Lake City when she was third going into the free skate and fell to fourth, or the 2004 World Championships when she dropped from first to second.
If her head was in the right place, her feet weren’t. With the pro-American crowd screaming wildly and U.S. pairs skater John Baldwin waving a California flag, Cohen started her program to “Romeo and Juliet.” She fell on her opening jump, a triple lutz, and never got to the other two jumps in that combination. Then in her second element, a triple flip-double toe loop, she lost her balance and caught herself with both hands.
“I had a real hard time with the two jumps in the warm-up so I wasn’t surprised,” Cohen said. “I tried really hard when I went out there. I just didn’t get the height or get over myself. And I somehow was able to block it out and pull myself together for the rest of the program.”
She landed her five other jumps, including one combination, but she knew she blew the gold. In fact, when she left the ice, she changed out of her dress, thinking she wouldn’t need to skate out for the medals ceremony.
Her fate seemed sealed when the 25-year-old Arakawa, who was third by only .71 of a point, skated a clean if not difficult program to gain 125.32 points for a two-day total of 191.34, easily topping Cohen’s 183.36.
“I was a little bit in shock,” Cohen said.
She had to sweat out three more skaters. Japan’s Fumie Suguri, fourth entering the free skate, skated clean but scored only 113.48, and 16-year-old American Kimmie Meissner couldn’t rise up from fifth after two-footing her first jump and finished sixth, one spot ahead of American Emily Hughes.
That left Slutskaya, the defending Olympic silver medalist and world champion who hadn’t lost when healthy in three years. She skated clean until halfway through her program when she fell hard on a triple loop. That was her only fall, but she scored only 114.74, nearly two points less than Cohen’s 116.63 and finished with a 181.44.
“I’m a little disappointed with my skating,” Slutskaya said. “I was ready. Life is competition, and you can’t change anything.”
Getting bronze behind a skater who nearly fell twice was a surprise to many in the audience of 6,200. However, Cohen scored Level 4 – the highest possible under the new International Judging System – on three of her footwork elements and Slutskaya had only two. That was worth 4.4 more points, and Cohen beat Slutskaya by 1.92.
Slutskaya wouldn’t enter any judging debate.
“I don’t think now anything,” she said. “I’m happy I have a medal.”
Meanwhile, Cohen has four years to ponder another fateful long program. She goes to the World Championships next month in Calgary but after Thursday, will anyone watch?
“Of course I was disappointed and shocked,” she said. “But you take what life gives you and do the best you can with it.”
Staff writer John Henderson can be reached at 303-820-1299 or jhenderson@denverpost.com.
