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SIMMONS: The last dance for Kurt Browning - Canadian legend retiring
| Source: |
Toronto Sun |
| Date: |
April 25, 2023 |
| Author: |
Steve Simmons |
The finish line is coming for Kurt Browning, the last of the bows and
the applause, the last of the shows and the Axels and he isn't exactly
sure how he feels about it.
For the past 30 years, he has worked with Stars On Ice and has been
their star on ice. As one of the most decorated athletes in Canadian
history, a four-time world champion, a three-time Olympian, Browning
is skating in public for the last time in early June.
"At the age of 10, when my mom turned 50, I asked her if she was
passing away soon because I had no concept of what 50 meant," said
Browning in a lengthy interview at his north Toronto home. "Now I'm
56, still doing what I did as a kid. It's not realistic but for some
reason, I've been very lucky physically to be able to do this for so
long and still very much enjoy it.
"When you hit a home run in front of people and they've paid for it,
and you feel like they've got their ticket price worth and got their
parking paid for and their food and their beer, well, I think I've
done my job tonight. I always thought, I had to be an athlete, a
skater, and an entertainer, and if one of those goes, then I'm done. I
don't have a long career because my jumps and my spins and my skating
is fantastic. And I don't have a long career because I'm a good
performer. I think I have a long career because if I can make you feel
something, be entertained, or make people smile, then I've done my
job."
The show years have been all about performance. Even when he was
competing at the highest level, Browning couldn't help but
entertain. It came naturally to him. He was graceful and pushed the
limits all at the same time, the first skater to complete a quad in
competition. He was ahead of his time. There are no medals given out
for the years of Stars On Ice: And it's hard to look forward to
retirement from skating - but not retirement from involvement in
skating - without looking back.
Looking back isn't always easy for the greatest of athletes. It can be
more painful than falling after a missed triple jump. Browning holds a
distinction in skating that no one else has or would want. He is the
only men's skater in history to enter two Olympic Games as a world
champion and fail to come away with a medal in either Olympics. For a
long time, with a busy life as skater, husband, father, athlete,
performer, it was easy to dismiss the past.
Then a few years ago he was asked to speak to a large contingent of
teachers in Edmonton, which is almost home for him, and he decided it
was time to address what happened at the 1992 Olympics in Albertville,
France and the 1994 Games in Lillehammer, Norway.
"If you'd asked me about this a few years ago, I would have said I
don't think about it often. Every once in a while on a road trip on an
outdoor lake or something I would do a double Axel wearing hockey
skates and get mad. Because I missed it at the Olympics. How did I
miss a double Axel?
"Well, I was somewhere else. My mind was somewhere else. I was in '92
during the '94 Games. I was whining and complaining in my head about
what happened to me in '92 and then falling on the flip in the short
program. I was so gone that I singled my Axel. I was that gone. And so
occasionally, I'll do a double Axel in practice and just do it
naturally and think, that double Axel might have given me a bronze in
hindsight. How did I miss that?
"In the talk I gave in Edmonton, the whole speech was about
perspective. I decided this was the time to talk about what happened,
being the only world champion not to win a medal. I talk to people
having hard times. I talk about how to get through it. Nobody has lost
bigger than me, I think. But it's all perspective. It's all how you
view it."
Browning has rarely watched his Olympic skates - even this many years
later. In truth, he'd only watched one of the four skates from '92 and
'94 once before the speech. The rest, he couldn't watch. "Watching the
triple Axel and the fall and thinking, you were high enough, you were
fast enough, you were getting into the jump, you had to fight for
it. I didn't fight. I didn't fight hard enough. I told that to the
teachers in Edmonton. It was a great speech."
And since then, in his mid-50s, newly married to Alissa, he is closer
than ever to the Olympics in his mind, even if it happens to be in a
humiliating way. "You know, we favour our memories the way we want to
favour them. Those failures are much closer to me now."
The Olympic moment he will never forget happened in Calgary. He was 22
years old and Canada's No. 2 skater behind Brian Orser. That was the
Olympics of the legendary Brians - Orser and Boitano.
"There was a moment when I was done competing and I had my blue suit
on and I was taking my skates off and I looked up and it was just me
in the dressing room with the two Brians. It was like being around
skating royalty. I'll never forget, the chills starting in my feet and
I got that special feeling. I was looking back and forth and thinking
- this is awesome. I'm here, I'm in the room with them. I don't think
it ever felt bigger than that for me in my entire career."
In three Olympics, Browning finished 8th, 6th, then fifth in
Lillehammer; twice favoured to win, and in '94 close friend, Elvis
Stojko was robbed of gold and presented the silver medal
instead. Browning has an office full of awards and medals from all
over the world. He has been Canada's athlete of the year twice, been
rewarded with the Order of Canada, has membership in the Canada Sports
Hall of Fame, has a star on the Walk of Fame, and has lifetime
achievement recognition from Skate Canada, as well as from the world
body of figure skating.
But since Lillehammer, when most Olympic athletes watch their career
fade to memory, Browning has never stopped. He joined the Stars On Ice
show before his last Olympics and has been entertaining ever
since. There is a coat rack in his basement full of costumes and
hats. He isn't stepping away now because he can't do it anymore. He's
blessed to have a body where his hips are fine, his back is fine, his
knees are fully functional. He just doesn't want to train anymore the
way you have to train to do this work.
His injuries, in recent years, haven't come from skating – but from
shoveling snow. He hurt his shoulder and his collarbone, he hurt his
elbow and his wrist. All that still hurts: So while he won't be
skating anymore in public, he won't be shovelling anymore,
either.
He will be skating in Toronto on May 5 and the last show of the tour
will be held in Hershey, Pa., on June 4. He will be skating with his
buddy Stojko and with former world champion Patrick Chan. He will
actually be doing something of a farewell duet with Stojko, the two
classic Canadian skaters who couldn't have been more different, rivals
performing together.
"Elvis and I were friends from the beginning," said Browning. "Our
families didn't like each other much. Elvis was always respectful to
me. He came up to me once and said 'You were awesome to me when I
started and I want to be like that for those who come after
me.'
"I shook his hand and from that moment on, we've been great friends,
just like we are now. I'm doing a duet with him on this tour. And when
you're way older than everybody else in the cast, we hang out a lot
together. We call it the hot tub sessions. We sit with our feet in the
hot tub and just talk. I hope people like our duet. I think the older
fans will love it.
"Elvis and I bonded very quickly in competition. He came up fast. I
remember him and we would go on long roller blades runs together. At
the Olympics in '92 we'd just find things to do. We were done
competing and we decided one day, let's go find Eric Lindros. So
that's what we did. We spent the whole day filming stuff and looking
for Eric Lindros. I don't remember if we found him."
The last skate is still six weeks away. Browning will be there along
with his wife and he's ready, prepared mentally, for the end to
come. He's not super emotional about it just more realistic that the
time is now.
"I think I'll be very calm," said Browning. "I don't have to be
perfect but I have to be perfect emotionally. I want to do this with
integrity. I've busted my ass to stay in shape. I've earned this
feeling.
"My dad once said to me, if you do as an adult for a living what you
did for fun as a kid - and I think Wayne Gretzky would agree - that's
a gift. But to not only make a living but a good living doing this,
it's lasted years and years longer than I would have believed. The
workload was insane at times but it was all worth it."
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