Medal chances for U.S. lie with skaters

Press, 27 January 1988, Page 30

Medal chances for U.S. lie with skaters

NZPA-Reuter New York Since the Winter Olympics began 64 years ago, the United States has faced an uphill battle for glory, as Americans have not shown the same passion for winter sports as they have for warm weather competition. Since the Olympics took to the cold in Chamonix, France, in 1924, U.S. athletes have captured just 116 medals and it appears that another lean yield may be in store for the Americans next month in Calgary.

The best bets for U.S. medals in the fifteenth staging of the Winter Olympics lie, as usual, with the skaters.

Debbie Thomas, runner-up last year to the East German, Katarina Witt, at the world figure skating championships, underlined her supremacy in her own country by winning the nationals earlier this month in Denver.

Thomas’s defeat of Witt at the 1986 world championships is the only blemish against the East German’s record in four years.

Jill Trenary, who beat Thomas in the U.S. nationals last year, was second this year and has an outside shot at a medal.

On the men’s side, Brian Boitano hopes to get a big boost toward the winners’ podium this year by successfully landing the first quadruple jump ever in competition. But Boitano, fifth at the 1984 Olympics, is also facing a formidable favourite — Canadian Brian Orser, the reigning world champion and silver medallist at Sarajevo. Speed skating, America's saving grace at the Winter Games over the years, is the main hope for a medals haul.

In the four Olympics leading to 1984, U.S. speed skaters won 23 medals — more than half of those taken by all U.S. Olympians combined during those years. Nick Thometz, the world record holder at

500 m, is the star of the squad. But a rare blood disease landed him in hospital at the U.S. trials last month and has hampered his training. Dan Jansen, United States second best racer, was fourth in 1984 at 500 m. He and Thometz will also likely skate the 1000 m. The Americans have decent medal hopes over 1500, 5000 and 10,000 m, but their best chances will come over the shorter distances from Thometz and Jansen. The indoor track at Calgary is expected to favour Thometz’s style which relies more on finesse than the brute strength of other skaters who can bull their way through the wind outdoors.

The same applies to Bonnie Blair, by far the best U.S. women’s speed skater.

But the former world 500 m record holder heads a squad that suffers from a severe lack of depth. Two skaters, one at the age of 31, were summoned out of retirement to complete the eightmember women’s team.

U.S. Alpine skiers were a big surprise at the last Olympics, grabbing five medals in Sarajevo but they will be hard pressed to break into the medals column this time.

Injuries and a lack of top-quality fresh talent have made the Americans extreme long shots. The leading hope, Tamara McKinney, broke her ankle in November. She is expected to be back practising before the Olympics but has lost at least six weeks of training. Injuries to three other women have further weakened the team. On the men’s side, Bill Johnson, who backed up his boast by ski-ing to a gold medal in 1984, has been subdued lately by knee and back surgery and has not shown championship form. The U.S. hockey team is unlikely to match its goldmedal heroics of 1980. It failed to reach the medal round after a dismal showing in Sarajevo.