Ouch - but that's life. So says Mandy Woetzel, the petite German who was carried off the ice by her partner in Tuesday's Olympic pairs after slamming onto her face 187 seconds into their free program.
Three stitches later, nursing painful bruises to her face and chest, the 20-year-old who brought home to millions of television viewers the hard facts of pirouetting's perils said Wednesday she was OK."A bit of shock, and of course I was a bit down about it all," she said. "But now I'm all right again."
Ekaterina Gordeeva and Sergei Grinkov of Russia won the gold in pairs figure skating for the second time. Gordeeva-Grinkov also won the gold in 1988. Natalia Mishkutienok and Artur Dmitriev of Russia, the 1992 gold medalists, placed second, followed by Canadians Isabelle Brasseur and Lloyd Eisler, who also won the bronze in 1992.
The fall which left the 6,000 Hamar Amphitheatre crowd aghast was, in fact, nothing unusual.
"Nearly everyone in pairs has a scar on their chin," said Peter Krick, German Figureskating Union sports director. "It could have been a lot worse."
For Woetzel's partner, Ingo Steuer, this sort of thing is becoming painfully routine - hence the cool reaction as he carried his partner to the rinkside doctor after Tuesday's accident.
"She snagged the ice with the point of her blade doing a forward spiral," he said. "It wasn't a technical error - it had to do with the quality of the ice."
The 27-year-old who with his partner was runner up in both the world and European championships last year added: "We've had nothing but bad luck lately. I just hope it's over now."
It began in the Skate Canada competition, when Mandy knocked him out cold during practice. Then followed more accidents - including Mandy being hit in the face by her partner's blade during a pirouette in pre-Olympics training.
"Just a normal accident," said Steuer. "Nothing to develop a syndrome about." Now it's pick yourself up, dust yourself down and start all over again - in four weeks' time, for this year's world championships in Japan.