Ukrainian teens make their mark in freestyle aerials at Nagano Games (02/22/98)

Ukrainian teens make their mark in freestyle aerials at Nagano Games

by Andrij Kudla Wynnyckyj
Toronto Press Bureau

TORONTO - As the XVIII Olympiad in Nagano, Japan, moved into its second week, Ukraine's aerial wünderkinder took the world by storm. Rarely seen on the World Cup circuit because of their country's lack of resources to cover travel expenses, competitors from Ukraine have made a mark on the esoteric sport of freestyle aerial skiing.

An astonishing contingent of four whirlers qualified for the finals of the women's competition and stayed in the top 10 to the last jump.

Tetiana Kozachenko, Alla Tsuper and Olena Yunchyk were all born in Rivne (although Ms. Tsuper now lives in Mykolaiv), while Yuliia Kliukova hails from Ivano-Frankivsk.

They're also teenagers. Ms. Kozachenko was born December 18, 1981 (her hobby is vyshyvannia, or embroidery) Ms. Tsuper (vyshyvannia as well) on April 16, 1979; Ms. Kliukova (badminton) on January 10, 1982; and Ms. Yunchyk on September 9, 1982.

According to various North American TV commentators, a sage in Ukraine's Sports Ministry decided to apply principles of gymnastics and diving to freestyle aerial skiing and began bringing his country's youth into a burgeoning new program. Ms. Kozachenko, Ms. Tsuper and Ms. Yunchyk all signed on in 1992. Ms. Kliukova joined in 1996.

At Hakuba on February 16, Ms. Tsuper led the pack in the elimination rounds with a head-turning mark of 178.46. In the finals the next day, winds were gusting and treacherous. Ms. Kozachenko's conservative but near-flawlessly executed back double twist earned her a 167.32 point total after two jumps. When U.S. veteran Nikki Stone fought off back problems with a high-difficulty jump, followed by a technically solid effort by Switzerland's Colette Brand, Ms. Kozachenko was still poised to earn Ukraine's second medal, a bronze. It was not to be. The last competitor, China's Xu Nannan, soared up into silver position, knocking the Ukrainian off the podium.

Ms. Tsuper was right behind her compatriot in the standings, fifth with 166.12 points, Ms. Kliukova was eighth with 153.15 and Ms. Yunchyk was 10th with 139.05 - an astounding domination of the field considering that four of the 12 qualifers were from Ukraine.

In the men's event, Stanislav Kravchuk took Ukraine to a ninth-place finish in a strong and daring field led by the classy and elegant U.S. jumper Eric Bergoust, who set a world points record of 255.64. Mr. Kravchuk, 20, was born in Uzbekistan, but now lives in Mukachiv. Not making the cut in elimination rounds were Yurii Stetsko and Serhii But.

In the men's combined downhill, in terms of rankings, Mykola Skriabin continued to pull off an apparent miracle by rising from 16th after the slalom to 12th after two runs of the downhill.

The various Maiers and Aamodts were betrayed by treacherous conditions (with Hermann Maier going for a particularly hair-raising spill) and their headlong self-assurance. Most of the rest erred on the side of caution - the top three positions were within three seconds of each other, but Ales Brezvanek of Slovakia in seventh was already 12.03 seconds in arrears, and Chile's Thomas Grob in 11th spot was a full 20 seconds behind. Mr. Skriabin, wearing bib No.1 came down the hill 22.19 seconds slower than gold medallist Mario Reitter of Italy.

Cross-country skiing

On February 16, the women's 4x5-kilometer relay team held in with the top echelon, finishing in ninth, just behind the Swedes by barely a second, but fell short of the medal performance enjoyed at the Lillehammer games. The highlight was Iryna Taranenko Terelia's third-ranked dash through her segment of the course in 28 minutes and 50.3 seconds.

Earlier in the week, Ms. Terelia narrowly missed the podium in the women's 10-kilometer free pursuit event, coming in fourth, while others managed finishes: Valentyna Shevchenko was 20th, Olena Haiasova 30th and Maryna Pestriakova 36th.

On February 17, the men's cross-country 4x10-kilometer relay team turned in a result that was much better than any of their individual efforts to date. Consisting of Hennadii Nikon, Mykhailo Artiukhov, Oleksandr Zarovnyi and Mykola Popovych, the squad toiled mightily and managed a very respectable 12th position, in a time of 1:44:33.9. Mr. Popovych, 27, of Ivano-Frankivsk registered the 10th best time for his interval in the competition.

In the men's 10-kilometer sprint biathlon Ruslan Lysenko's time of 29:49.6 put him in 30th while Andrii Deryzemlia (who carried the Ukrainian flag during the opening ceremonies) finished 45th in 30:33.6. Both are to take part in the 4x7.5-kilometer biathlon relay.

Both Mr. Lysenko, 21, and Deryzemlia, 19, were born in Sumy and now live in Chernihiv. An interesting sidelight: the younger biathlete listed his languages of proficiency as Ukrainian and English - omitting the Eurasian lingua franca, Russian.

Speed skating

Kharkiv's Yevhen Yakovlev, 19, Ukraine's entry in the short track 1,000 meters listed his hobby as "food," but unfortunately his sense of humor didn't help him qualify, as he came third in his heat, over the 1:35.5 cut-off mark. He is scheduled to compete in the 500-meter event. Lesia Bilozub is more of a cypher in terms of her background, and she finished well back, posting a time that was 27th in the field.

Ukraine's other entries in the sport serve as excellent examples of perseverance despite the odds. Svitlana Konstantinova finished 30th and 33rd in the women's 1,500 meters and 3,000 meters, respectively. Oleg Kostromitin was 39th in the men's 1,000 meters.

Bobsled and luge

In the high-speed insanity department, two Kyiv high school teachers with a decade's difference in their ages, Yurii Panchuk, 33, and Oleh Polyvach, 23, teamed up for the two-man bobsled event. They came in 23rd, just under (0.93) a second behind the gold medal time tied by both the Italian and Canadian teams.

In the men's double luge, Igor Urbanskii, 27, and Andrei Mukhin, 27, both Kyiv-born, hung in with the elite, staying within a second of the gold medalist Germans' times. Ukraine's other luge tandem of Oleh Avdieiev and Danylo Panchenko came in 11th. They're both 24 and live in Lviv.

Figure skating

In the men's singles competition, the two Ukrainians were shown on CBC-TV, but what viewers could see wasn't the prettiest. Some ranked Odesan Viacheslav Zahorodniuk as high as fourth in the world and called him an heir to former Olympic and world champion Viktor Petrenko, but Mr. Zahorodniuk's short program effectively ended any hopes that he could even gain the podium.

A fall on his opening triple-triple combination, followed by another on the attempted triple lutz sealed his fate. A 0.8 deduction was mandatory, and even the hopelessly optimistic 5.8 for presentation from the Ukrainian judge couldn't save him. The 26-year-old skater had dropped to 12th and out of medal contention.

The neo-medieval shoulder-padded costume of Dmytro Dmytrenko, worn to match the "Battle on the Ice: Aleksandr Nevsky" Prokofiev to which music he skated, didn't impress CBC-TV's commentators. Mr. Dmytrenko did some more tangible harm to his own cause by falling while attempting a triple lutz.

Mr. Zahorodniuk settled down for his long program somewhat and lifted himself into 10th position. Mr. Dmytrenko finished 14th.

Apparently, prior to this winter Olympiad, Russia's ice dancer Oksana Grishuk was announcing to anyone who would listen that she'd changed her given name to "Pasha" in order not to be confused with Oksana Baiul. Curiously, however, she adopted a platinum-dyed hairdo quite reminiscent of Ms. Baiul.

While Ms. Grishuk and her partner Yevgeny Platov were at the center of a controversy over fixed judging (the pair was ranked first after the compulsories despite an obvious trip and chronic arrhythmia, eventually winning gold), Ukraine's Iryna Romanova and Ihor Yaroshenko garnered nice compliments from Radio Canada (the French CBC-TV service), whose commentators expressed disapproval of the marks received by the Ukrainian tandem. They soldiered on to a fairly typical ninth-place finish. Olena Hrushyna and Ruslan Honcharov were 15th.

Update: Ukraine at Nagano Games

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