Michelle Kwan

Leaning against the cinder-block wall of a small locker room, their skates at their feet, the two women chatted as if they had been friends all their lives. They talked of small things and big dreams, of dreams delayed or denied and entwined in the thread that united them at East West Ice Palace in Artesia last week.

Most of the coverage of the World Figure Skating Championships this week at Staples Center has been hidden away on the Oxygen Network where even the most ardent of fans have had trouble locating the broadcasts. But finally, on Saturday for the women's finals, Channel 4 is taking the broadcast and bringing out the stars.

Too nervous to sleep in the hours before his youngest daughter made her debut last winter among the "senior ladies" in the U.S. figure skating championships, Danny Kwan decided that pacing was preferable to tossing and turning and had almost worn a path in the hotel carpet when he heard mumbling coming from Michelle's bed. Stopping to listen, he heard his still-sleeping daughter reminding herself, "It's nothing. It's nothing."

As U.S. figure skater Michelle Kwan takes to the ice in pursuit of Olympic glory today, viewers around the world will finally have the long-awaited answers to their questions: How well did Kwan skate? Did she land the triple lutz that cost her the world championship last year? And, as if this were prom night instead of the Olympics, what did she wear? Few people understand the importance of that last question better than Mare Talbot.

Despite the occasional appearance of a sequined lad tumbling across the ice as if falling off a bar stool, there are no drunk skaters here. Advantage, ski team. Unless gobs of gel count, there are also no competitors here being busted for using anabolic hair replenishment drugs. Advantage, skeleton team. The U.S.

Sasha Cohen slipped back into town Friday night under the cover of darkness. Quick! Lock up the women and children. Cohen stands 4 feet 11 on her tiptoes and weighs 90 pounds, but before the Winter Olympics opened nine days ago she was casting a giant shadow over the figure skating competition. "Queen, Sweetheart, Villain," shouted the headline in one newspaper over a story featuring the three women representing the United States. The queen, of course, is Michelle Kwan.

Michelle Kwan made it perfectly clear Friday that she has lost none of the elegance that has made her a three-time world figure skating champion. The 20-year-old Torrance native took a decisive step toward her fifth U.S. title when she earned seven perfect 6.0s for the presentation of her short program, a spellbinding performance to the orchestral suite from the remake of the movie "East of Eden."

Michelle Kwan's Olympic quest will continue at the Turin Games if she can prove to a panel of judges that she has recovered from the pulled groin muscle that prevented her from competing this week at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships. Sasha Cohen of Corona del Mar will go to the Olympics as the U.S. champion, having won her first title on Saturday after four runner-up finishes, and 16-year-old Kimmie Meissner of Bel Air, Md., will get her first Olympic experience.

Michelle Kwan doesn't wear blue and gold when she competes. Nothing on her costume says "Bruins," but Kwan has won the 2000 world figure skating championship and which other UCLA student-athlete can brag of such an accomplishment? Not that Kwan will brag. She laughs when the question is posed. Is Kwan the most successful UCLA athlete of the year? "Well, maybe I did better than the basketball and football teams," she says. "But the [1999] softball and [men's] volleyball teams won NCAA titles."

As she walked past a line of TV cameras and clusters of spectators to reach the glass doors at the entrance of the East West Ice Palace on Friday, Michelle Kwan tried to tell herself it was just another day. She didn't quite succeed. "It was intense this morning at the rink," she said. "This was a situation I'd never been in before. I was thinking, 'This is a normal practice. You can do it. You've done the jumps before.' " But rarely had she done them with so much at stake. Kwan missed the U.S.

Most of the coverage of the World Figure Skating Championships this week at Staples Center has been hidden away on the Oxygen Network where even the most ardent of fans have had trouble locating the broadcasts. But finally, on Saturday for the women's finals, Channel 4 is taking the broadcast and bringing out the stars.

Leaning against the cinder-block wall of a small locker room, their skates at their feet, the two women chatted as if they had been friends all their lives. They talked of small things and big dreams, of dreams delayed or denied and entwined in the thread that united them at East West Ice Palace in Artesia last week.

Sitting in a circle with her University of Denver classmates before her final exam in international studies, immersed in analyzing turmoil in Iraq and North Korea, Michelle Kwan discovered something about herself that a lifetime of figure skating hadn't taught her. "We were talking about a certain issue and somebody would jump in and then somebody else would jump in, and it was very interesting, very stimulating," she said.

Torrance native Michelle Kwan, who won nine national championships and five world titles in figure skating, is about to become a nonsalaried U.S. diplomat. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice plans to name the 26-year-old as a public diplomacy ambassador today, said a senior U.S. official who spoke anonymously pending the formal announcement. Kwan will represent American values and is expected to travel widely, the official said.

Michelle Kwan left Turin for Los Angeles on Monday, declining an opportunity to stay at the Olympic Games as a figure skating commentator for NBC. Kwan withdrew from the women's competition Sunday, a day after she'd strained a groin muscle during her first practice in Turin. She moved out of the athletes' village Sunday night and spent the evening in a hotel with her parents before all three began the trip home. NBC had made the job offer before a test skate Jan.

When Michelle Kwan struggled to land a triple flip Saturday during her first Olympic practice session, Randy Gardner winced from 6,000 miles away. As the U.S. and world pairs champions, Gardner and partner Tai Babilonia were favored to finish in the top three at the 1980 Lake Placid Games until Gardner injured a groin muscle and the duo had to withdraw. When Gardner learned of Kwan's difficulties, he expected the worst.

Michelle Kwan always followed her heart, outlasting most of her figure skating contemporaries on sheer will and an unshakable love for a sport whose new judging system didn't love her back. Her body, however, did not serve her as well. On Sunday, with the pain of a day-old groin injury slowing her step and sorrow searing her soul, the five-time world champion ended her epic gold-medal quest with teary eyes and a clear head.

It was a day for red, white and ewww. Under glorious skies whose silver linings perhaps hid an oncoming storm, the torch borne by the symbol of the U.S. Winter Olympic team was formally passed. From class to crass. From royal to rude. From Kwan to Miller, which doesn't Bode well for anyone. Shortly before noon here, injury-twisted skater Michelle Kwan wisely announced her withdrawal from the Games.

Michelle Kwan listened to her body, and it told her no. And if her sore groin continues to hamper her as much as it did Saturday, when she was driven to the verge of tears before she curtailed her first Olympic practice session, the five-time world figure skating champion said she would consider withdrawing from the Turin Games.

Michelle Kwan listened to her body, and it told her no. Kwan, the Torrance native who was hoping to add a gold medal to her stellar figure skating resume, withdrew from the Winter Olympics early today because of a groin muscle injury she sustained during a practice session Saturday afternoon. The U.S. Olympic committee has submitted a Late Athlete Replacement form to organizers and proposed replacing Kwan with Emily Hughes of Great Neck, N.Y., sister of 2002 gold medalist Sarah Hughes.