This OC Register article from yesterday points out that Sasha Cohen is back with longtime coach John Nicks as her main coach. An excerpt:
She had to pull out of a recent competition because of tendonitis. The ailment, Cohen said, is the reason why in recent days she has shifted her training base from Lake Arrowhead back to her longtime rink in Aliso Viejo. It is also the reason why Nicks is back as her primary advisor, with the Lake Arrowhead-based Rafael Arutunian, who guided the early stages of her comeback, taking a diminished role. Whatever the reason, the switch promises to be the buzz of the sport in the coming weeks.
The switch and the tendonitis, she knows, only enrich her challenge and what is already one of the most compelling storylines of this Olympic season. If she finishes in the top two spots at the 2010 U.S. Figure Skating Championships in Spokane, she will be the first American woman to skate in three Olympic Games since 1936. A victory in Vancouver would make her the oldest Olympic champion since at least 1928 and only the second non-teenager to win the women's gold medal since 1992.
It's vintage Sasha Cohen to be switching coaches, so I am not sure it is as much of a challenge as it might be with other skaters.
Also, I'm going to go ahead and disagree with this statement from the article:
Despite not competing since the 2006 World Championships, she remains the biggest and only transcendent personality in a sport desperate for star power 15 years after the Tonya Harding-Nancy Kerrigan scandal.
Um, has the author of the article ever heard of Michelle Kwan? Because, really? The biggest and ONLY transcendent personality? That's a ridiculous assertion. The biggest name among currently competing Americans, yes. I'll go with that.
Not to pile on...but I also take a bit of offense to the article referring to Rachael Flatt's fifth place world championships performance as dismal. Again, I'm going to assume the author is not familiar with the sport, because fifth place in your first senior worlds at Flatt's age is pretty good.
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