The Bad Girls of Figure Skating
|
|
The Bad Girls of Figure Skating |
|
I'll admit right up front that
I've never been able to understand the appeal of figure skating. The men
are too effeminate and wear blue satin suits. The women wear too much makeup
to distract from the frilly pink panties they're always flashing when they
do those triple swirls. And the music always sucks. So when figure skating
comes on TV, I reach for the remote. I will admit that (for reasons unknown
to me) Kristi Yamaguchi always looks pretty hot and I once went to see
Disney On Ice and sorta enjoyed it, but that's as far as I'll go. You watch
the figure skating, I'll watch the luge.
But. There's always a but. And in 1994, it was Tonya Harding's sorry butt that attracted all the interest, including mine. Shortly before the Winter Olympics that year, Tonya's husband, along with a couple of beefy, stupid security guys he'd hired, concocted and carried out an attack on Nancy Kerrigan, Tonya's chief figure skating competitor. They whacked Nancy in the knee with a crow bar, knocking her out of some competition which Tonya subsequently won.
As the plot thickened, it turned out to be the biggest event of the Olympics, drawing a record TV audience to watch the two bitter rivals compete. Tonya had trouble with her laces, prompting the comical scene pictured above, and ended up finishing seventh. Nancy, recovered from the whacking, stomped Tonya and finished second. It was only after the Olympics were over that the law and the skating authorities caught up with Tonya and Company. The men ended up in jail and Tonya was banned from competition for life.
As you might expect, Tonya went downhill pretty rapidly from there. After dumping the husband and seeing her honeymoon video make the rounds of the internet, she began earning a living by making "appearances" for money. Several years ago, she spent a few days in jail for attacking her live-in boyfriend with a hubcap. Most recently, she got kicked out of the apartment she shared with her female business manager and is now living in her car.
Nancy ended up finding fortune and fame, but all the publicity caused her some troubles, too. Remember her reaction when she got whacked? "Why me? Why me?" she wailed. As we got to know her, it became obvious why women figure skaters always have those ghastly painted-on smiles that makes them look like mannequins. All those years on the ice had turned Nancy into frigid, self-centered robot completely lacking in any personality whatsoever.
Tonya was no mannequin. You may not like her personality, but there's no denying she has one. Bottom line? If I had to spend a year on a desert island with either Nancy or Tonya, I'd choose Tonya. No contest. As long as she left her hubcaps at home.
I would have thought that figure skating would continue to produce an endless supply of Nancy-like mannequins and we'd never see anything even remotely resembling Tonya again. But real life and the Olympics are far more complex and strange than anything my simple mind can conjure up.
Rejoice! The Winter Olympics are here again and we have another bad girl! Have a look at Marie-Reine Le Gougne (the name is great but the lady rots), a French judge in last week's Olympic free skate competition. Marie apparently entered into an agreement with the Russians that had her give the Russian competitors first place in exchange for the Russians giving first place to France in some other event. The resulting awarding of the free skate gold medal to the Russians over the Canadians looked rather suspicious after the Russian couple stumbled and tumbled like they were competing in gymnastics rather than skating.
After the event, Marie railed on about how much pressure she was under and the head of the French skating federation, Didier Gailhaguet, said of Marie, "She is a fragile person and I think she has been somewhat manipulated."
Right. And we thought Tonya was a slut. Marie spent more time on her hands and knees for the Russians than Dick Cheney did when the Enron boys showed up at his office. The fix was in and Marie made it happen. She's going down, along with a lot of other people we haven't heard about yet. In a few months, Marie will be living in the same parking lot as Tonya.
Speaking of whom, I see this as a great opportunity for Tonya's future. The next time they need a good judge for figure skating, why not her? She's no fragile, shrinking violet susceptible to manipulation. If anyone tries to bribe Tonya, she'll cry out loud and start swinging those hubcaps.
That'll give
us something to take our mind off the curling competition.