Falling interest

WASHINGTON -- Kurt Browning was so upset over his second-place finish he pretended to ram his head into a concrete wall and called himself a loser.

A couple of hours later, Kristi Yamaguchi also finished a close second after falling on a triple loop, but she was all smiles.

"I just wanted to come in and enjoy the skating, and at this point in my career that's the important thing," Yamaguchi said. "It's funny, because we were watching the slow-mo of the triple loop, and I was even smiling as I was falling."

While no one doubts Yamaguchi's dedication, the competitive-intensity meter at this month's Skaters' Championship -- and at all professional skating competitions -- has swung nearly to the carefree extreme she expresses. And certainly away from Browning's the-goal-is-to-win attitude.

"I'm sitting there going, 'loser,"' said Browning, beaten by Ilia Kulik in the men's event. "I don't know how you beat Ilia on a night like this, but at the same time, I didn't give my best. I crawled off the ice going, 'I didn't want to leave anything behind.' And I'm not sure how many of us really do feel that way."

Six years ago, in the wake of the Tonya Harding-Nancy Kerrigan scandal, professional skating competitions rode an amazing tide of success. Pro events rivaled the Olympic-eligible circuit in popularity. Huge television ratings meant big money. Even 1998 Olympic champion Tara Lipinski turned pro while still a teen-ager.

Today, professional head-to-head competitions have crashed like a bad double axel. Artificial team events such as "Ice Wars" still thrive, but no one takes them seriously.

"It's not bad," Browning said. "But it's not like it used to be."

The World Professional Figure Skating Championship, an event that built prestige over more than two decades, ended this year, replaced by the Skaters' Championship. The crowds at the MCI Center were smaller than ever.

There were some mitigating factors. Tickets went on sale late. Fallout from Sept. 11 might have kept people from traveling to the nation's capital. Fans are focused more on the Olympic skaters with the Salt Lake City Games just weeks away.

But Browning cites another reason for the decline: the retirements and semiretirements of an unprecedented lineup of champions who took winning and losing seriously and who, for several years, turned every competition into a once-in-a-lifetime show.

Lack of big names

"You need outstanding champions," Browning said. "In the pro ranks, we were really hot for a while. You had Scott Hamilton, Paul Wylie, Brian Orser, Brian Boitano, me. We were all good. And right now the professional ranks are not as strong. We've seen brilliant moments, but we need more young guys to come up and be great. Right now we're in a lull."

Besides Kulik, who is still learning how to play to a crowd, and the competition-shy Lipinski, who is plagued by hip problems, many big names have remained Olympic-eligible. That's a triumph for International Skating Union president Ottavio Cinquanta, who slowed the defections by introducing a big-money Grand Prix circuit that rendered the word "amateur" meaningless.

Yet even when the field is overflowing with stars, the pro circuit is plagued by three major complaints:

The same routines get recycled again and again. Kulik won in Washington with his 1998 Olympic program, which he said he has now performed more than 70 times, including tour appearances. Last year, the World Pro introduced a rule that one routine had to be making its TV debut, and it made for one of the most lively and original competitions in years.

That rule lasted only a year.

The competitions often are broadcast weeks after they occur. No one would dream of treating the Olympics the same way.

NBC finally broke that standard by showing the Saturday artistic skate live from the MCI Center for the first time.

Not all the skaters take the competitions seriously. Philippe Candeloro knowingly violated a no-props rule during the technical program, saying he was more interested in pleasing the crowd. Yamaguchi said she's just not as competitive anymore. Kulik said, "I don't really care too much about the placement."

Browning said the lack of a competitive atmosphere hurts the event's chemistry.

"But what can you do?" Browning said. "Some things don't last forever."