The End Of An Ice Age

If there is a lesson to be learned from the 1988 World Figure Skating Championships in Budapest, besides the obvious one—that it is redundant to hold such a competition in an Olympic year—it is that retirement has a sweet-sad fragrance more powerful than winning or losing. Somehow it seemed as important to know who was leaving the world of amateur skating—for starters, all the world champions, the first time that has ever happened—as to know who finished this long year on top. There were no big losers among the skaters. Rather, every one of this memorable group lost a little something, as Brian Boitano and Brian Orser, and Katarina Witt, Debi Thomas and the late-blooming Elizabeth Manley competed against one another as amateurs for the final time.

The singles skaters weren't the only ones making their last hurrahs in Budapest. Natalia Bestemianova and Andrei Bukin, the theatrical Russian ice dancing champions, won their fourth consecutive world title, then retired.

In the pairs competition, the Soviet husband-and-wife duo of Elena Valova and Oleg Vasiliev pulled the biggest upset of the worlds by beating their young compatriots Ekaterina Gordeeva and Sergei Grinkov, who had won the last two world titles and are the reigning Olympic champions. Gordeeva, shaky from the effects of a cold, fell during a triple Salchow throw in Wednesday night's final, giving Valova and Vasiliev the tiny opening they needed. In their final amateur performance the '84 Olympic champions, who are leaving the sport to start a family, left the international ranks the way they had entered them in 1983: on top. "It's such a pity we won't compete anymore," said Valova, who missed five weeks of training this winter because of a foot injury. "Every medal was pleasant, but to finish with the gold is the best."

The most dramatic confrontations, as usual, took place in the men's and women's singles, with their veteran, charismatic cast. Following his loss to Boitano at the Calgary Games, Orser, the '87 men's champion, had trained mostly on his own for a week. It had given him a chance to gather himself after the searing glare of the Olympics. The Toronto Star had not taken his defeat very well. "I remember one headline: ORSER MAGNIFICENT—BUT STILL A LOSER," he said. "I cried when I read that. No one likes to be called a loser." Orser had arrived in Budapest nine days before the competition, anxious to defend his title. "It wasn't like I had to scrape myself off the bottom of the barrel to be here. I skated well, came close but didn't win."

Unfortunately, Orser had brought an old nemesis with him to Hungary: the compulsory figures. Although he has steadily improved that aspect of his skating, he finished fifth. Boitano was third. Alexander Fadeev of the Soviet Union, who would later withdraw from the worlds with a groin injury, finished first in all three figures. A number of competitors were outraged by the judging. "I saw Fadeev's loop," said Boitano, "and it was about eighth-best. Christopher Bowman's was better. So was Orser's. They should get rid of the figures altogether."

There is a proposal to do just that before the International Skating Union, which will vote on it in June. The Canadian Figure Skating Association (CFSA) and others have proposed a number of less drastic alternatives, such as reducing the number of figures from three to two; they would then count for only 20% of a skater's overall score instead of the current 30%. "If you've got a judging problem in figures—and they do—solve it," said David Dore, director general of the CFSA, "because once you get rid of figures, they aren't coming back."

Boitano, loose and relaxed all week, had been on a high since Calgary. After winning the gold medal, he had gone to the White House to meet the President, then to Los Angeles, where look-alike Bronson Pinchot, who stars in the TV series Perfect Strangers, had offered Boitano a guest role as his character's long-lost brother. Back home in San Francisco, Boitano had signed on with lawyer and agent Leigh Steinberg, who is negotiating contracts with ice shows. Then it was on to Budapest.

Orser needed to beat Boitano in both the short and long programs to retain his title. But on Thursday night Boitano performed a magnificent short program. It earned him a standing ovation and a slew of 5.8's and 5.9's. When Orser missed his combination jump, the title became Boitano's to lose. Boitano could now finish second in the freestyle program on Friday night and still win the championship. He had been promising all week to try his quadruple toe loop—a move that had never been landed cleanly in competition—in the long program, and he now had the cushion to do so.

Later Thursday night Elaine DeMore, a U.S. judge for the men's competition, bumped into Boitano's coach, Linda Leaver. Few in the U.S. figure skating establishment wanted Boitano to try his quad, because a fall would automatically take one tenth of a point from his score. Play it safe was the advice from above. "What's he going to do tomorrow?" DeMore asked Leaver, referring to the quad.

"What do you want him to do?"