World pro championships gets more of an Olympic feel

Copyright 1997 the Associated Press. -- All Rights Reserved

It's not the Olympics, but the World Professional Figure Skating Championships is taking a few steps to gain more respect as a serious competition.

Kristi Yamaguchi won the women's title for the fourth time Saturday night, while Kurt Browning took the men's crown for the third consecutive year. The difference this time is that it took them two days to do it, skating a technical program Friday and an artistic routine Saturday.

In previous years, the whole event was crammed into a one-night marathon that took its toll on skaters as well as fans. The new format reminded Browning and Brian Boitano of their Olympic days.

''I like two nights, even though it puts more pressure on you,'' said Boitano, who finished second to Browning. ''When you have two numbers in one night, you have a tendancy to not get so serious about the second number. You go, 'OK, I'm tired.' When you have a whole day to prepare, it gets a little more intense, but I think it's better for skating.''

There were other signs that the 24-year-old world championships is trying to distance itself from made-for-TV, pseudo-competitions that seem to pop up every other week.

There was a bigger pool of judges, and those judges consistently valued content over reputation. In the dance, for instance, Renee Roca and Gorsha Sur had the most technically demanding program and earned two perfect 10s to upset heavily favored Maia Usova and Alexander Zhulin.

''I never expected that,'' Roca said. ''It's really nice because it didn't go in the predictable order that it usually goes in. It's really a big surprise.''

Still a problem is the television lag time. This year's competition won't be on NBC for another six weeks, but promoter Dick Button said there are serious talks broadcasting next year's event live.

''If it went live, it would be great,'' Browning said. ''Especially for the fans to be able to tune in and see who wins that night instead of waiting.''

The competition still has a few anomalies that hurt its credibility. The pairs and dance fields were very weak this year and hardly befitted an event called a world championship. There were only three couples in each division although the pairs were hurt when defending champions Elena Bechke and Denis Petrov withdrew due to injury and both divisions included skaters barely known on the international level.

Also, one of the judges, Irina Rodnina, acts as an occasional technical coach of the winning pair, Radka Kovarikova and Rene Novotny. Button said he was unaware of the apparent conflict of interest. The arrangement didn't seem to affect Rodnina's scoring she was the only judge to give the pair a technical mark of 9.8 Saturday night when they rest of the panel gave them 9.9s.

Plus, on Friday, Kovarikova and Novotny appeared to get away with using a prop, a hand-held fan, without receiving a scoring penalty. Props are forbidden in the technical program, but the pair said they got permission beforehand to keep it in their routine.

''That's not really a prop,'' Button explained. ''It's part of their costume.''

As for the skating itself, Yamaguchi and Browning especially were in top form. Browning was powerful and exciting in a reprise of his winning routine from two years ago, ''Brick House'' by the Commodores, while Yamaguchi's technical program could contend for gold at the Olympics.

''I think she can compete with Michell Kwan and Tara Lipinski,'' said Katerina Gordeeva, who had her best outing as a singles skater to place second. ''I try to catch up with her.''