Some See Patrick Chan as a Work of Art

MOSCOW – There are those who think Patrick Chan's work belongs as much in the Pushkin Fine Arts Museum as it does on the ice at the Megasport Arena.

CBCSports.ca figure skating expert PJ Kwong is one of those.

Kwong, who has a figure skating blog on CBC and wrote the book Taking The Ice, recently described how Chan's intricate etchings on the ice translate to art for her.

“There's the layer of the ice, there's the layer of the skater, there's the layer of the music,” said Kwong. “Every so often, you find somebody where there's no dividing lines between the layers. It's almost like an experience.

“When you're looking at a piece of art on the wall, when you're no longer aware of the edge of the canvas and all you're aware about is how that art makes you feel, then it's art, it's no longer paint brushes on a canvas, it's no longer an athletic experience with jumping, it becomes a stand alone art piece.

“When Patrick starts that Phantom of the Opera program, from that instant I'm hooked. I feel like I'm standing right there next to him. That's magic.”

According to Chan's coach Christy Krall, it's a magic his training mates never tire of at their rink in Colorado Springs. She said everything stops every time he does his long program.

“Even though they've seen him do every move over and over again, he's mesmerizing,” said Krall.

“He's wonderful to watch. He's a breath of fresh air and he's doing the tricks like you can't believe. It's fun for Patrick to entertain his colleagues daily.”

(Photo: YURI KADOBNOV/AFP/Getty Images)

 

One more round on three Cs – CBC, Cherry and Concussion

The blog post “Why is taxpayers money spent ridiculing brain injury?” drew some spirited response on both sides of the equation.

Many argued Don Cherry and Ron MacLean were merely lampooning the NHL's sorry attempts at dealing with concussions with their “Papillon” routine.

Maybe it was satire, but, really, what's funny about brain damage?

That is what we're talking about here. A guy who suffers a concussion in a game has suffered a brain injury. Continuing to play risks further brain injury. That is the situation that Detroit's Johan Franzen was possibly facing last Saturday when he went face first into the boards.

Maybe the place where players are now checked out by a qualified physician for 15 minutes under the new guidelines instituted recently should be labelled the “examination room” instead of the “quiet room,” which was mocked by Cherry, to outline the important nature of what's involved.

As the NHL study released Monday showed, one in five concussed players return to play in the same game in which they were hurt. They're even more succeptible to more serious brain injury once they've been concussed.

What's even scarier is the same thing is happening at an alarming rate in kids' hockey.

I thought the most striking of all the responses received on the blog post came from DB Simon:

“I am among the many that used to agree with Don Cherry, but I now find him so out of touch with what's going on that he is irrelevant. I coach kids hockey (novice & midget) and this past season alone have had 5 players with some level of concussion. All of these players thought they could go back out and play right away because that's the mentality that they see from the pros. Thankfully the parents agreed with me and the players were held out of the rest of the game and subsequent games. Mr. Cherry always says he's so in tune with the current game because he watches midget AAA games in the Toronto area - he needs to spend a year on the bench as a trainer and see what is actually happening to these kids when they get hit in the head and what the after effects are.”

That is the real point here. What these pros do influences kids. What Cherry says influences kids. And according to the coach in the trenches quoted above, the overall message Cherry's delivering is part of the problem. And, yes, we know he says a lot of good things, too.

Former NHL star Keith Primeau, whose career was ended by coming back too soon from concussion, is one of many who's said one of the keys to dealing with the concussion epidemic is changing the culture in hockey that you play through injury.

Jeff Keay, a spokesperson for the CBC, had this to say on the issue:

“Hockey Night In Canada takes the issue of head shots seriously and has frequently advocated for changes to rules and the way the game is played in order to achieve increased player safety.

“HNIC presents a wide range of opinion on the game, much like that of the Canadian public and overall we support a socially responsible position on how the game should be played.

“The segment in question was in no way intended to lessen the seriousness of the issue of head shots and we regret if we created that impression. We would also note that later in that same episode of Coach's Corner, Don spent time offering explicit advice on how to avoid those sorts of injuries.”

 

Why is taxpayers money spent ridiculing brain injury?

Why is public money being spent ridiculing catastrophic brain injuries?

We're talking Don Cherry and his sorry act Saturday night on Coaches Corner on Hockey Night In Canada. You can watch it right here.  The really egregious stuff starts about 3:15 in.

We're not just talking about NHLers' brains here, for which Cherry obviously has complete disregard. Cherry's act has a filter-down effect. He can't ridicule brain safety in the NHL on one hand - and then tell kids not to check from behind.

Saturday's taxpayer-funded rant was about Detroit's Johan Franzen and how he was taken off the ice after crashing face-first into the boards and examined in a quiet room as required under the new NHL concussion protocol before coming back to play.

“He's a pretty good guy, no visor,” Cherry tells his sidekick Ron MacLean. “You know the new protocol, as you call it. They have a quiet room. Now wait a minute. They have a quiet room and they must reflect. ... And here's what they do in the quiet room. They ask them his name.”

Then HNIC cuts to footage of an imprisoned Steve McQueen in solitary confinement in the movie Papillon. He's beaten down, bedraggled and in a dark cell.

Cherry mockingly provides the voice for McQueen, seemingly adopting the voice of a player knocked groggy.

“It's Franzzzen ... It's Franzzzen ... It's Franzzzen.”

You can barely hear Ron MacLean meekly saying what sounds like “You're brutal, making fun of him,” before HNIC then cuts to footage of Franzen on the Detroit bench, his face all cut up, a bandage over his eye and white gauze up his nose.

Cherry then says: “Then he comes back on the bench and he turns to the trainer ... He turns to the bench and he's a little confused. He said 'Who's Franzen?'”

Cherry then laughs loudly and MacLean smiles.

“Steve McQueen, solitary confinement,” adds MacLean.

Cherry then gestures to MacLean with his thumb: “Produced and edited by you know who.”

MacLean adds with a big grin: “I know that's bad. But it did look like that today when he went off into confinement. But he did come back and to his credit was great.”

Dr. Paul Echlin, one of the physicians leading the charge to curb the concussion problem, believes the CBC must take responsibility or it will remain part of the problem.

“It's embarrassing to the CBC, it's embarrassing to anybody who's had a brain injury,” said Echlin, of London, Ont. “It's crazy he'd make fun of the protocol. It's there to protect players. There's nothing mystical about the quiet room. It's a separate dressing room without distractions where you can make a proper diagnosis.”

The fact HNIC used the clip from Papillon to make a farce of the new NHL concussion protocol shows it was a scripted, pre-meditated attemtpt to turn the concusssion catastrophe into a laughing-stock. It's not Cherry acting alone. It took a team of HNIC staffers helping him and obviously MacLean, a former referee who should know better, too.

And this is the public broadcaster? The FAN590 and Global Television are both showing more class. It's taxpayer money supporting the rant and ridicule. Is this what we really want? Meanwhile, at the other end of the public purse, more and more money is being spent dealing with head injuries in sport, particularly hockey.

So much of what Cherry says continues to go against the grain of brain safety and all the public education which is underway. Just before the Franzen thing, he lauded Brett Clark of Tampa Bay for taking a slapshot in the face and going right back into the game.

“Laughs it off like a warrior like we used to,” said Cherry.

“Good Saskatchewan boy, didn't hurt at all.”

Meanwhile, MacLean alludes to it being like the slapshot New Jersey's Scott Stevens took in the face from Pavel Kubina in the 2003 playoffs. Stevens suffered a concussion but kept playing and it effectively ended his career. The NHL recently noted 26 per cent of concussions came from accidental events, including getting hit by the puck.

At what point, does promoting brain injury become unacceptable?

It's past the point where the CBC can keeping shrugging it all off as the rantings of a lovable old coot. The public broadcaster is becoming a danger to young hockey players.

“It's a medical issue,” said Echlin. “You want the best information out there to the public. It's not to be made light of, especially to young players, through a national broadcaster. And MacLean, too. He can't be excused, either. When Cherry said he put the piece together, he was there laughing.”

 

Bonds saga illustrates hypocritical drug testing divide

The Barry Bonds saga once again points out the great divide in today's sports world:

If the American authorities are willing to go to such extremes to nail him for cheating, why don't they exert the same pressure to force pro sports to submit athletes to drug testing of the highest standard?

It just contines to boggle this mind – which may not be a difficult task – that Olympic athletes are subjected to a way higher standard of testing than the pros, many of whom -- such as our beloved NHLers -- aren't event tested in the off-season when they would be most likely to use performance enhancing drugs. (Of course, the lads would never do that!)

Daily on Twitter, you can see Canadian athletes groaning about all the hoops they have to jump through with a World Anti-Doping Agency drug testing protocol that has them declaring their whereabouts 24-7 far in advance. It's a royal pain in the butt to be sure.

But they do it. They have no choice – and, perhaps more importantly, no union. Plus, they agree with the principle of drug free sport and it's a price they're willing to pay.

Obviously the pros don't share that feeling, which is why it's really up to the U.S. government to force the issue.

If they're so concerned about proper role models that they've gone after the likes of Marion Jones, Bonds, Roger Clemens and are investigating Lance Armstrong, then it behooves them to put the pressure on the big U.S. pro sports machine to have the highest standard of testing possible.

Otherwise, it's incredibly hypocritical, which is a perfect description for the current situation.

 

No apologies: Canada Aims to Own The Podium in Sochi

If you were among those offended by Canada's Own The Podium approach at the 2010 Vancouver Olympics, you'd better get over it.

The objective remains exactly the same for the 2014 Sochi Olympics.

Maybe it was no coincidence that on a day where six new events were added to the roster for the Winter Games in Sochi, Russia – including several in which Canada is quite strong – that the Canadian Olympic Committee let it be known on a conference call that the goal there is to be the dominant nation.

And why shouldn't it be.

Canada continues to make a substantial investment in its winter athletes. The point is to try to be the best, not be also rans. If there are some who continue to feel there's something un-Canadian in expressing that desire, then that's their problem.

It's not like Canadian athletes are the in-your-face types when they win -– there really was very little to none of that in Vancouver. If their openly stated goal is gold, people should applaude them for having the guts to put it out there, not cringe in embarrassment.

The COC held a "Call with Champions" on Wednesday featuring world cross country skiing champion Devon Kershaw, world ski cross champion Chris Del Bosco, luger Alex Gough, who ended Germany's 105-race World Cup winning streak this season, and sledge hockey player Ray Grassi.

All four were unequivocal in saying the country should be trying to Own The Podium and they didn't feel any extra pressure because of it.

"There's no reason why we can't," said Del Bosco. "We have the resources that are behind us. We showed a little glimpse of that in Vancouver. We won the gold medal count and that's really what in my opinion matters. We can build the programs. It's definitely not out of the question. I think we should shoot to be No. 1."

Gough noted how the luge team barely had a first-aid kit before Own The Podium started. That's the thing, there's no way the government would have re-invested heavily in winter sport after Vancouver if there weren't clearly stated goals. You can't just say "We're going to do our best." Those days are gone, thankfully.

The new events for Sochi 2014 are women's ski jumping – finally after a lengthy battle – plus men's and women's ski halfpipe, mixed biathlon relay and team events in luge and figure skating.

Canada has a shot in ski halfpipe to do what it did when ski cross was added for Vancouver – and that's to dominate. They already have the reigning world champions in ski halfpipe in Rosalind Groenewoud of Calgary, Mike Riddle of Squamish, B.C. Riddle believes they have enough depth to even sweep.

The key leading up to Vancouver was that Own The Podium was able to help provide the ski cross program with planning and infrastructure that gave it a huge head start on the competition.

Canada dominated again in ski cross this season despite injuries. They truly Owned The Podium.

What's so wrong with that?

 

Proposed Velodrome Not For Butterflies This Time

The last serious velodrome built for a multi-sport event in Canada has been the domain of butterflies and all manner of insects for over two decades now.

So much for that bit of legacy from the 1976 Montreal Summer Olympics, where they turned the Olympic Velodrome into the Montreal Biodome in 1989.

Now, the organizing committee for the 2015 Toronto Pan Am Games is discussing the possibility of turning what was supposed to be a temporary velodrome in Hamilton into a permanent one.

That would certainly be a boon to the Canadian cycling community. Canada has a world class track cycling team headed by two-time world champion Tara Whitten and their training base is in Los Angeles.

"Firstly, there's a need," said Ian Troop, ceo of the Games on a conference call Friday. "There's no such facility in Canada. In fact, there's no such facility in the east of the United States. We've been talking with Sport Canada and the COC (Canadian Olympic Committee) and the importance of it has been talked about a number of times.

"What we're doing is working with our partners to see if we can design and build a facility that can provide a permanent, four-season training facility and event for the Pan Am Games. We think it's great to be working with partners and stretch to see if we can do that."

Troop said a significant amount of time is being spent on it by the Toronto 2015 group and the city of Hamilton and they are down to a shortlist of potential locations. Let's hope that goes better than the mess that occurred with the soccer/football stadium.

"We're working our way through the scope of the facility because the scope drives the cost," said Troop. "It helps us understand funding. We're zeroing in on proposals. We're not there yet."

Troop said they would like to get something setttled in April but don't want "to let timing get in the way of a good decision."

Troop also said they're laying the groundwork for what they hope will be a record number of Olympic qualifiers for a Pan Am Games. They see the qualifiers as strong means of elevating the quality of the overall field, always an issue at the Pan Ams, which are regarded as a second tier event.

Troop said they hope that 20 sports will use the 2015 Pan Ams to decide Olympic qualification, far exceeding the 12 sports and 15 disciplines that will have Olympic qualifiers at the 2011 Pan Ams in Guadalajara, Mexico.