So You Want to Be a Star?

So you want to be an international star in figure skating.

Simple--Just get up every morning at 6:30 and practice for six or seven hours (with your internationally known coach). Do a year's worth of school work during the three months of spring when you're away from the skating rink. Learn to live and breath the rigors of figures, and in eight or ten years you might be on your way. Then again, you might not.

It's not exactly your leisure-class schedule, but it has been the road to the top for 18-year-old Kriistina Wegelius, in Boston this week for her first appearance in Eliot House's Jimmy Fund benefit, An Evening With Champions. Since she left her home in Helsinki, Finland three years ago to begin intensive training in Denver, Colo, Tintti, as her friends call her, has lived the life of an ice skating addict.

Under the tutelage of Carlo Fassi, the Italian who coached Dorothy Hamill and John Curry to zeniths on the ice, Tintti has gained a mastery of compulsory figures and a style and grace that have moved her very much into the international picture in Senior Ladies competition.

But why come to America for ice skating when you live in a country like Finland?

Simple, Tintti says. "There still isn't much figure skating in Finland. Hockey is the big sport there. It's like football in America, and it takes up all the ice time."

So after spending her earlier years--she started skating when she was six--fighting the slapshots for ice time and training in Copenhagen and Switzerland during the summers, Tintti headed for Colorado, the center of American figure skating.

And since the 1976 Olympics, the lone member of the 1978 Finnish World Team has immersed herself in practice. She writes for a skating magazine in Finland and does some exhibitions during her short trips back to Helsinki, trying to promote the sport to her countrymen; but in pursuit of a spot on the 1980 Finnish Olympic team, Tintti can afford little time away from the ice.

"I'm working on triples now. I don't have a triple yet, and I really need one," she says. "But figures still take up a lot of time. I spend four hours a day on them."

That's the kind of perseverence it takes to win the silver medal in the 1978 Skate Canada Competition or the Richmond Trophy in a competition for Senior Ladies held annually in England.

But along with her skating, Tintti has gained an international perspective on life--through her travels--and a close look at the United States. She has lived with a family in the mountains outside Denver during her training and seems to like the U.S., but she admits, "Sometimes it scares me--it's so big."

And the American ways have rubbed off on her. She tried skiing last year in Colorado and says she loved it. "I want to ski again if I just get time," she says. Tintti has also picked up on the recent racquetball craze and plays tennis on the weekends--when her schedule permits.

Then, of course, there's disco, a natural extension of Tintti's love for jazz dancing and ballet. But dancing is one of the luxuries that has to take a backseat to off-ice jogging and exercising, activities she says American skaters don't do enough.

"You know why the Americans and Russians are so good?" she asks. "The countries are so big and they have so many good skaters you can just pick the best. In Finland we only have one or two to choose from."

But Tintti says she hopes to help improve the Finnish skating picture. She says she eventually would like to coach after her competitve days are over.

"I like to help little kids and would like to teach in Finland," she explains. But for now, her mind is more set on the upcoming European championships in January.

Except for this weekend, which is a break from the routine. "I like doing exhibitions," she says. "They're more fun. I like skating to people rather than for judges."

And then, as a smile breaks across her face, she admits, thinking about the post-show parties, "Besides, I've heard a lot about this show--everyone says it's really fun."