Radford hip issue could hurt threepeat
HELSINKI— Hip-hip-hoo-boy.
In a case of worst timing possible, Eric Radford has developed a hip issue just as he and partner Meagan Duhamel launch their defence of the world figure skating pairs title.
“There’s something wrong with my hip,” Radford told reporters following a practice session here Tuesday in which he fell several times.
The problem surfaced over the past week with spasms in Radford’s deep abdominal muscles. “It was bugging me but still I had good control. It was just sort of sore. This morning I woke up and it was so stiff that I could hardly move. Then, when I got on the ice, it’s just . . . I can’t squeeze my legs together.”
It is more numbness than soreness, Radford reported. He would have preferred pain to a dead sensation. “I feel nothing.”
The main consternation is that Radford can’t pull in his adductor muscles when in the air on a jump, specifically the Lutz. There are so many moving parts in the blur of any jump, which have their base scoring value and grade of execution points — up to or minus three, depending on execution.
“I can’t pull in properly,” a frustrated Radford said. “My legs feel like they’re going to fly apart. “Even when I do cross-cuts (basic stroking to gain impetus), I feel like I don’t have a lot of control over my jumps.”
Unless the situation improved dramatically with physical therapy overnight and again Wednesday morning, most at risk are the team’s highvalue side-by-side triple Lutzes, where unison is essential to amplify the scores, much less staying upright.
The Lutz, a counter-rotational jump that takes off from the back outside edge and lands on the other foot front edge — the only jump which turns the opposite way from its entry — requires extreme core strength. “It pivots on the right hip and when I go in the air I can’t squeeze,” the 32-year-old Radford said. “My legs feel so floppy. It’s really difficult.”
He has been able to compensate on the other jumps. “I could feel it but they’re easier to transfer.”
Radford has no intention of withdrawing, even if his hip worsens by Wednesday’s short program. “I feel like my technique is right were it needs to be and I get up in the air and it’s just . . . I can feel it not responding. It’s like a dead muscle.”
The frustration is even more irritating because Duhamel, 31, has been in jump-over-the-moon form as of late. “Oh my God, I haven’t jumped like that in six months,” she crowed after practice. And he’s had a wonky Lutz — singles, not their big-trick throw triple Lutz — in the past.
“Every single thing we’re doing except for one element (the side-byside Lutzes) is at its peak. There are still a lot of things we’re able to do.”
The Canadians skated off with gold at the last two worlds but have experienced puzzling setbacks this past season — third at the Grand Prix final and a hard-fought silver at the Four Continents last month.