That's skating ... it figures
Robinson going to Worlds; winner Phaneuf gets iced out
By TERRY JONES -- Edmonton Sun
A star was born.
But she will not be allowed to shine.
For years Canada has waited for something like this to happen with our woeful women. Now that it has, Skate Canada has decided they wish it hadn't.
Two young skaters finally came along to knock off the old, slow champion. A new fresh face, 15-year-old Cynthia Phaneuf, was crowned the new queen of Canadian skating because she earned it, won it fair and square.
But Skate Canada has decided not to send Phaneuf to Worlds this spring in Dortmund, Germany. They've decided to take the trip away from the kid and send Jennifer Robinson instead.
They're betting the veteran, who drew a complete blank on her choreography for the short program and then landed only three clean triple jumps in perhaps the most agonizingly slow skate of her career, can pull off a top-10 finish so Canada will have two spots at Worlds next year where 2006 Olympic Winter Games berths are earned.
Instead, Phaneuf will represent Canada at the World Junior March 1-7 in The Haig, Netherlands, bumping Myriane Samson, the 15-year-old who won the Canadian Junior earlier in the day, from taking the trip she'd earned.
"It's not fair," said Maryse Gauthier, Samson's coach.
Try making a case that she's wrong. These athletes came here believing if they win the day, they win the spot. Apparently not.
Skate Canada CEO Pam Coburn held a press conference yesterday to make the announcement, totally upstaging the finals in both pairs and men's competition in which more surprise stories would unfold.
"We watched the beginning of a new era in Canada including the performance of a new champion, Cynthia Phaneuf," Coburn began.
Then, in the same breath, she made the announcement that it had been decided silver-medal-winning Joannie Rochette and bronze-medal-winning Robinson would go to Worlds.
INFORMED NIGHT BEFORE
Robinson said she was informed the night before. All three will skate for Canada in Four Continents in Hamilton Jan. 19-25. Phaneuf and her coaches will be sent to Dortmund as observers.
The last time Skate Canada did something like this in women's skating, they did it in reverse. In 1980, instead of sending veteran Heather Kemkaren, who won the Canadian championships, they decided to send 12-year old Tracey Wainman instead with the idea she represented the future and would benefit from the experience.
A year later Wainman became the youngest woman ever to win the Canadian championship. Phaneuf became the youngest woman to win the championship since Wainman.
Coburn said the thinking of Phaneuf's coaches and Skate Canada "meshes with the task at hand."
Phaneuf, who speaks very little English, said "I'm not disappointed."
With her coach, Annie Barabe, acting as an interpreter, Phaneuf said she's fine with the decision to go to World Juniors because "I need to take the experience.
"If I'm happy, people should be happy," she also said, through Barabe.
On the day, Phaneuf and 17-year-old Rochette landed 12 triple jumps between them to beat 27-year-old Robinson, who landed two triple jumps to win her first Canadian championship and three at this one.
Coburn said the decision was all about the 2006 Olympics and is as long-ranging as the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver.
"You're damned if you do and damned if you don't," said Coburn.
ALL ABOUT EXPERIENCE
The thing is, there's only one way to get experience. Skate Canada came right out and said they believed Phaneuf would go to Worlds and fail like so many other Canadian women before her who took the trip to the big event the first time.
The upshot is that it'll be the year before the Olympics that Phaneuf could go to Worlds as a raw rookie.
And being afraid to fail has been the biggest thing wrong with Canadian women's skating for ages.
It also puts pressure on Robinson.
With every evidence supplied at these same Canadian championships that she's fading, the skater who has finished 7th, 8th, 9th, 9th, 15th, 18th, 19th and 21st in her World Championship history, a competitor who couldn't beat a 17-year-old and a 15-year-old at her own nationals, now must deliver a top 10-finish.
Not for herself, but for the 17-year-old and the 15-year-old.
"We have a big challenge," Robinson said of her and Rochette.
"I have a big challenge," she rephrased it. "I'm looking forward to the challenge. I know I can do the job."
If she doesn't she'll have to say she's sorry to a 15-year-old kid who will be sitting in the stands in Dortmund watching her.
