READING, PA, — U.S. figure skating champion Evan Lysacek is going classic. He's also going extreme.
The 22-year-old skater who has won two world bronze medals, is skating to Tosca this year. He admits he's not the classical kind of guy, although he skated to Carmen last year. "That's classical?'' he said.
He left the choice of music up to Canadian choreographer Lori Nichol because he "doesn't have great taste in classical music,'' he says. "Nor do I know it.''
Although scores of great skaters have previously skated to Tosca, Lysacek says he remembers only Michelle Kwan doing it several years ago. It's new to him. He's glad he doesn't remember anybody else doing it.
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"I really felt there wasn't anything clouding my brain, in terms of what other people had done to it,'' he said after a practice session at Skate America in Reading, Pa. this week. "I always sort of bring a more modern vibe to it, just because I'm not a classical skater.''
Of Tosca, he says: "It took a lot of work. It's very intense music. You can hear it. It sort of draws you in. It wraps you up in the music. It's hard to think about elements when all you want to do is listen to this crazy, amazing music.''
He said he didn't feel that Carmen was classical because his movements to it were more angular. But he's bringing "a tad more" of a classical feel and emotion to this year's routine, and he promises to wind a big quad combination into it, something that he landed with ease at a rehearsal for Kurt Browning's Gotta Skate a few weeks ago.
"It's been good work, stretching my comfort zone, slowly but surely,'' he said.
Lysacek isn't thinking about any kind of comfort zone with his new venture, trying to get figure skating included as an extreme sport in competitions.
He's sent a proposal to one of the producers of X-Games because he says he sees many similarities between figure skating and extreme sport, which promotes individuality and pushing limits and trying to be creative while at the same time being very athletic.
"It would be awesome if as an exhibition sport at the 2009 X-Games in Aspen, Colo, we had five, six skaters come in, slap us up with brands, put on the billboard chart (music) and whatever is cool. We could do exhibitions between the finals with three or four judges, like American Idol style.''
They would judge things like speed, execution, height, difficulty, and have the skaters do one combination, perhaps even a quad-quad-triple, the adventurous Lysacek ventured. A skater would get three tries, and the best of three counts and the top score wins.
Lysacek said he has heard back from the producers, who want more details, but he hasn't had time yet to pinpoint these specifics and to figure out how to accomplish it.
"I think it would be cool and it would help promote skating,'' he said. There would definitely be music attached to it, although Lysacek said he wouldn't advise Carmen or Tosca. "Something a bit cooler than that,'' he said.
He said the target market would be young folk from eight years old to 21, what he called "the key money spenders.''
"They are extreme sports all the way,'' he said. "Little League has gone down. The popularity of soccer has gone down for kids. And extreme sports has gone up. They can do it for free, their parents don't have to be rich and pay for private lessons. They can grab a skateboard and run in their back yard, and learn how to do tricks.''
Although organized sport is fine, promoting exercise to young kids is so important because obesity rates are rising in the United States, Lysacek said. Young kids need something to attract them to sport, giving them opportunities rather than "having to wait until Tuesdays at four o'clock to go play baseball,'' he said.
Lysacek is a skateboarder, and has just learned to do a full 360. "I'm pretty much close to professional,'' he joked.
He promises to do a quad in the short program tonight (Friday).
