Word: lipinsky
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...loss to articulate the mechanics of her whirlwind style, Lipinski once said, "I just rotate." In a fairy-tale blue-and-yellow frock, she flew to the Anastasia sound track, whipping through her triple flip, exploding into a grin that dwarfed her 80-lb. frame and skating circles around everyone but Kwan. Then the 17-year-old veteran showed that having soul as well as legs counts. Kwan drew out the chords of Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 3 in D Minor into a smooth legato line as she flowed, left leg extended, straight toward the panel of judges. When...
...scared." The uncharacteristically anxious words came out of Tara Lipinski less than two hours before her final program. Uncharacteristic because her legend is so well known: a toddler, transfixed by the star-spangled anthem blaring from the TV, stages her own Olympic ceremony --with an overturned Tupperware container for a podium, some ribbon and dried flowers...
...Friday, over a meal of spaghetti in her parents' hotel room, the 15-year-old just wanted her mother's comfort. "It's O.K. to be scared. It's good to be scared," said Pat Lipinski. "But you can do it." After that, Tara was back in character and on the way to an upset and the fulfillment of a legend--not just the gold medal but the record as the youngest Olympic figure-skating champion ever. To do that she had to overcome a rival whose eloquence on ice had moved judges to tears. Michelle Kwan, just 17 herself...
First, though, Lipinski had to survive the short program, a 2-min. 40-sec. contest in which one misstep, one deviation from the eight required elements can mean instant elimination. Nicole Bobek, 20, was out in under a minute: she hit the ice during her first triple Lutz and never recovered, taking with her the talk of a red-white-and-blue sweep. The world offered up its best--Russian siren Maria Butyrskaya, China's comeback kid Chen Lu and French wonder woman Surya Bonaly--but one competitor, Elena Sokolova, voiced what everyone knew: "It's really between Tara...
Going into the final 4-min. free skate, the message was clear: just rotating wouldn't be enough. Could Lipinski rise to Kwan's level of artistry? A judicial preference for maturity on ice certainly decided the bronze, claimed by the elegant Chen, 21. Bonaly, who might have been a contender, knew that judges have little appreciation for her muscular acrobatics. "The judges aren't pleased with anything I do anyway," she said. So, in her long program, she gave the judges figure skating's equivalent of the finger: an illegal back flip. Take that! It was a mandatory deduction...