The Road to Gold, Part 4
by Laurie Nealin, Special to U.S. Figure Skating Online |
| Emanuel Sandhu Photo by Paul Harvath |
Can Sandhu Do It Again?
(12/13/05) - Emanuel Sandhu oozes talent. The former student of Canada's national ballet school is one of the most gifted figure skaters on the planet today. Perhaps, ever. When he won his first Canadian title in 2001, he skated a finale that had future World champion written all over it.
But in four global outings since then, the frustratingly inconsistent Sandhu has failed to capitalize on his immense promise on the World Championship stage, finishing seventh last season and eighth, eighth and ninth prior to that. Sandhu was in Salt Lake City for the 2002 Olympic Winger Games, but he withdrew with a knee injury before his event began.
Predicting whether it will be the can-do or no-can-do Sandhu who shows up on any given day has proven a daunting task, even for Joanne McLeod - his lifetime coach, before whose name the descriptor "long-suffering" has sometimes been inserted by sympathetic journalists.
Canadian media reporting on the three-time national champion have been painfully frank in documenting his unsuccessful on-ice exploits, while heralding his intermittent flashes of brilliance. This season, however, Sandhu's self-destructive alter ego has been noticeably absent.
Sure, the ability to put together two stellar performances in one competition continues to elude him, but adequate showings in the opening round combined with great performances in the finale have earned him two gold medals on the Grand Prix circuit, not to mention top-dog status in the standings heading into this weekend's Grand Prix Final in Tokyo.
At Skate Canada 2005 in St. John's, Sandhu catapulted from sixth after the short into first place with a superb free skate, relegating reigning Canadian champion and World silver medalist Jeff Buttle to second. It was a carbon copy of Sandhu's win at the same event a year earlier.
At Cup of China a week later, Sandhu came from fourth after the opening round to win it all, leaving reigning World champion Stephane Lambiel in his wake.
With a pattern apparently developing, the media has labelled Sandhu "The Comeback Kid."
"I have been called a lot of things. Comeback Kid? I'm fine with that," Sandhu smiled as he savored his second, consecutive Skate Canada victory.
He will meet Lambiel and Buttle again this week in Tokyo, as well as the one-two punch from Japan - Nobunari Oda and Daisuke Takahashi. With American Evan Lysacek's withdrawal due to a hip injury and Frenchman Brian Joubert, Russian Evgeny Plushenko and U.S. champion Johnny Weir declining invitations to fill-in, it will now be a five-man field.
"Each time I go out there is another experience under my belt," said Sandhu, who is of Italian and East Indian descent. "The focus is certainly on the nationals and the Olympics and this (the final) is another chance to go out and compete."
Sandhu, who lives and trains in Vancouver, B.C., attributes his early season success to maturity.
"Just being more aware of what makes me tick and what my weaknesses are, if I am heading down a path that will affect my training, for example, I am much quicker to respond to that," offered Sandhu, who celebrated his 25th birthday in mid-November.
The self-described perfectionist also noted that he has become more accepting of mistakes which had previously proved his undoing. In the past, if Sandhu misfired on a jump early in his program, it tended to deflate his spirit and his competitive mindset, causing him to bail on subsequent jumps.
At Cup of China, Sandhu notched a respectable 212.66 points, but he will need more in the bank if he aspires to give Olympic gold medal favorite Plushenko a run for his money in Torino. At Cup of Russia, his one and only GP event, the three-time World champion posted an amazing 241.80 points.
Part of the reason that Sandhu has been back in the pack after the short program rounds is his insistence on risking a quadruple-triple jump combination rather than going for the safer triple-triple as many of his rivals have done.
Although he has yet to pull off a completely successful quad combo in the short, Sandhu is convinced he needs that jump to challenge the heavy hitters like Plushenko and Lambiel.
He also attributes the flawed short program outings to the fact more attention had been paid to training his new free skate in the early going.
"It is a different style. Somebody else was involved in the choreography. (In the past, he and McLeod designed his programs.) It was much more complicated, complex, difficult and intricate than any of the other long programs that I've done in the past," said Sandhu of his routine set to music composed especially for him.
"We knew it would take much more time to get that ready than the short," he said. "I did have a chance to skate some clean shorts, but I wasn't quite there yet. I was OK with that."
For that reason, Sandhu said, his comebacks in St. John's and Beijing might have looked dramatic but, for him, were not completely unexpected.
Prior to his back-to back wins right out of the gate this season, Sandhu had climbed onto an international podium just six times in seven seasons of senior competition.
He settled for fourth at last season's Grand Prix Final after winning that title in 2003 over Plushenko. Sandhu performed exceptionally well at that event but, in reality, Plushenko would have taken gold if not for his miscalculation regarding the number of jumps allowed under the then-brand-new scoring system.
While it would be somewhat premature to suggest that Sandhu has completely turned the corner in his competitive career, previously exasperated supporters can't help wondering if the enigmatic athlete has finally bought into the recipe for success.
"If I focus too much on the outcome, that's when I trip myself up. It's more about focusing on the in-betweens -getting from A to B. There are all these steps that I need to do to ensure I am as ready as I can be," said Sandhu, who speaks English, French and Italian and aspires to sing professionally.
Certainly, at this point in the season, the intriguing Sandhu does have the look of a legitimate contender for a medal at the 2006 Olympic Winter Games.
Only time will tell which Sandhu will compete in Italy.
