Scott Hamilton ready to skate last hurrah

TOTING 16 years of Stars on Ice memories in his skate bag, figure skating legend Scott Hamilton is back-flipping his way across Canada one last time.

When Hamilton lands in Winnipeg next week for the April 25 ice gala, he will be just five curtain calls away from taking his final bow with the ensemble show he founded in 1986.

"I'm not retiring. I'm not going to stop skating. I'm cutting back," says the 1984 Olympic champion, whose last show is May 1 in Vancouver. "There's so much else I want to accomplish ... like doing a theatre show on Broadway. The tour needs to develop more beyond me with the next generation.

"It's tough to move on, but I have to," adds the 42-year-old.

At the opposite end of the experience spectrum is new recruit and legend-in-the-making Alexei Yagudin. His tenure with the Stars on Ice troupe will total just 16 days when he entertains Winnipeg fans next week.

Yagudin reported for rehearsals fresh from battle at last month's World Championships where he had hoped to replicate Hamilton's four consecutive world wins. A foot injury dashed those hopes. He settled for silver and headed to New York for treatment.

The Russian sensation, who was just a year old when Hamilton won his first world title, feels fortunate to have joined the Stars cast before the consummate showman skated his last hurrah.

"It's a chance to learn a lot and to train with Scott Hamilton, Brian Orser, Kurt Browning. I look at how they work and their presentation to the audience," says Yagudin, who will be gunning for gold at the 2002 Olympic Games where Hamilton will be in the broadcast booth.

Watching the veteran buzz around the ice at top speed, Yagudin finds it hard to believe that Hamilton is twice his age.

"I'm not sure what I'll be doing in 21 years but I think I'll still be skating. Why not? Brian Orser is 40 and he's still doing triple Axels sometimes," notes Yagudin, who is performing a variation of his competitive Gladiator program on tour.

Hamilton founded Stars on Ice as an alternative and more rewarding career option for elite figure skaters who would have previously gone the Ice Capades route on retirement from competition.

"Scott single-handedly gave us those options," says Orser, the 1987 world champion who headlines the Canadian tour along with Browning, a four-time titleholder.

Orser, who joined Stars after winning Olympic silver in 1988, has toured with Hamilton every year since. "I've always looked up to Scott and learned a lot from him about the entertainment business," says Orser, who has no plans of his own to skate off into the sunset.

As Stars on Ice came into its own as a top-notch entertainment spectacle, Hamilton, too, evolved into a polished performer whose comic irreverence proved a hit with audiences. He was not above plopping an overgrown mop of hair on his balding head and slipping into some wild '60s garb for his rendition of Hair.

Hamilton's finale number this tour is a medley of his greatest hits interwoven into Paul Anka's My Way. The routine begins with a deceivingly serious tone but quickly dissolves into a study in self-deprecation.

The only time the Stars on Ice show went on without its founder was in 1997 when Hamilton was diagnosed with testicular cancer. He underwent chemotherapy and surgery and was back on the ice before the year was out. Hamilton is now cancer-free.

This year's Canadian tour, featuring Josee Chouinard, Steven Cousins, and Shae-Lynn Bourne and Victor Kraatz, plays 11 cities from Halifax to Vancouver.