Ever see the internet photos of the cats curled up with canaries, cozy and all? Fawns and owls cavorting happily with dogs? Chimpanzees stroking kittens? Heifers licking up turtles with long tongues, happy as clams? Count Nam Nguyen, the son of Vietnamese boat people and Keegan Messing, man of the north woods, in with those […]
Donald Jackson
Donald Jackson and the Maltese Cross
Donald Jackson is many things: the 1962 world champion; the first man to land a triple Lutz in competition; and a 76-year-old show-off. Furthermore, he’s a painter on ice. That’s because he’s one of the few skaters in the world who knows how to do a Maltese Cross, a “special figure” that harkens back to […]
Trixi Schuba: World champion without compare
Trixi Scuba is skating’s calmest perfectionist, a scientist on blades, probably the best female tracer of compulsory figures that ever lived. Yet, she’s perhaps the least-known world and Olympic champion on the planet. Forty-five years after the Austrian won her first world title in 1971 in Lyon, France – largely because of her utter dominance […]
Donald Jackson: there's only one
It started out as a tantalizing little secret. “I have a BIG surprise for skating fans,” bubbled Kurt Browning on twitter several days before the Toronto stop of the 2016 Stars On Ice tour in Canada. He started dropping hints. “Don’t Get Around Much Anymore?” King of Blades? The special guest would show up only […]
Sheldon Galbraith: a man ahead of his time
A link to an obituary that I wrote for my old mother ship, The Globe and Mail, on mastercoach Sheldon Galbraith, who died on April 14. http://www.theglobeandmail.com/sports/sheldon-galbraith-brought-out-the-best-in-his-skaters/article24322979/