Now that we’ve got a Tonya Harding-Nancy Kerrigan solution, let us get to figure skating’s really hot stuff: Todd and Jeni in pairs. That’s Todd Sand and Jeni Meno, who dumped Natasha Kuchiki and Scott Wendland, respectively, to become partners.
Creative differences? Sure, that’s part of it. But Todd and Jeni-ahem, wink, wink-freely admit their routines aren’t confined to the ice. “Being boyfriend and girlfriend adds a spark there,” Sand said. “It helps us as skaters because we communicate better when we have a problem on the ice.”
Initially, John Nicks, their coach, was against the idea. See, Nicks, the fuddy-duddy, thinks it isn’t a good idea for pairs skaters to, well, continue pairing when they’re off the ice. But now even John thinks this arrangement has been beneficial to the skaters.
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“I’d been in singles a long time and I always wanted to do pairs,” Jeni said. “It’s more interesting. There’s a lot of give and take between us. One of the reasons we started skating together is because we had the same ideas about what we should do.”
Meanwhile, Natasha, who was with Todd in the ’92 Olympics, has linked up (on the ice only) with Rocky Marval, who you may recall was Calla Urbanski’s partner in the ’92 Olympics. Wendland? He doesn’t have a partner. He is teaching and coaching. Hey, wait a minute. Urbanski’s available.
They’re back: What’s an Olympics without a fabulous Mills brother (or sister)? Chicago’s Nate Mills, whose sister Phoebe won a bronze medal in gymnastics in the ’88 Games, is making his second-and last, most likely-Olympic stab at long-track speedskating. He was 35th in the 1,500 at Albertville.
“I realize I’m not a medal contender here,” said Mills, 24. “With that in mind, I’ll go out without any pressure and maybe with the race of my life finish in the top six.” Mills, a theater major who plays in a rock band, has been attending Northwestern part time over the last five years while he pursued his speedskating. Interestingly, he received a good-luck card from Wildcats basketball coach Ricky Byrdsong earlier this winter. He was startled to learn here that Byrdsong had taken a leave of absence.
Police blotter: On the Games’ opening day, pickpockets got only 10 wallets in Lillehammer. There were just two arrests-one Finn, one Norwegian-for drunkenness. . . . Seven sniffer dogs, all springer spaniels, have been imported from Belfast to detect bombs. A local Lillehammer police official noted the Irish people have “exceptional dog-training traditions.” . . . There have been two reports of reckless driving since the competition started. That may sound light, but consider this: Regular traffic is prohibited and only buses and official Olympic Volvos are allowed on the streets. In each case, the drivers of the sanctioned vehicles were told by Lillehammer police to go a little slower after they received complaints from pedestrians.
Poor choice of words: After Norway was defeated by Russia 5-1 in a hockey opener, losing coach Bengt Ohlson said he thought a goal by his team when it trailed only 2-1 would have spurred the crowd to “bring the roof down.” Sounds good, but the game was played in Cavern Hall-Norway’s interesting new arena that’s actually a cave built inside a mountain. In fact, the ice is under 180 feet of solid stone.
And finally: There are 8,000 media reps at the Winter Games. That’s a 4-1 ratio over athletes, an IOC spokesman said. Of course, 4,000 of those media reps are here to follow two athletes: Tonya and Nancy.
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(Odds & Ins will appear Monday, Wednesday, and Friday during the Winter Olympics)