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SkateFan4Life
Guest
heyang said:I just remember that commentators rambling on about the importance of being US Ladies National champ in an Olympic year. Perhaps it was that she always ended up somewhere on the podium. When was the last time that US Ladies champion was not on the Olympic podium in any spot?
2002 MK Bronze1988 Thomas bronze
1998 MK Silver
1994 Kerrigan Silver
1992 Yamaguchi gold
1984 Sumners silver (was Roz or Zayak national champ that year?)
1980 Fratianne silver
1976 Hamil Gold
The rest is before I was old enough to stay up and watch.....
1972 Janet Lynn - bronze
1968 Fleming - gold
1964?
1960 Heiss - gold
1956 Tenley Albright - gold, Heis - silver
1952 Tenley Albright - silver
Nancy Kerrigan was not the US champion in 1994. She was whacked at Nationals, remember? Had she not been attacked, Kerrigan most likely would have won her second national title.
As for 1964, that was the first Olympics following the horrendous air plane crash of February 1961, which took the lives of the entire US World Figure Skating Team. All of our national champions in all disciplines, plus coaches, family members and friends, not to mention the entire crew and other passengers, perished in that tragedy. The US skating program was decimated, to put it mildly, and we were fortunate to send a young, talented team to the 1964 Innsbruck Games. Scott Ethan Allen, aged 14, who had won the US title, became the youngest male singles skater to win an Olympic medal, as he won the bronze. Peggy Fleming, aged 15, won the first of her five consecutive US titles, and she finished a very respectable sixth at the Olympics - her first major international competition.
As for your comments - "the rest is before I was old enough to stay up and watch", I had to smile. Believe me when I say that I do not remember all of the wonderful skaters I write about. Many of the greatest skaters of figure skating history were in their prime and competed long before my time, but I've enjoyed seeing footage of them, and also reading about them.
Ladies and Gentlemen, our sport has a long, rich, and varied history!