Frozen in Time. Nikki Nichols
was the golden girl of the Broadmoor. Despite this, she must have felt like an underdog. The Boston club members stormed into the rink with a confident swagger. They were fully aware that Boston’s skating scene was synonymous with winning championships.
Laurence had a slight advantage over Steffi. She had, after all, already appeared in one Olympic Games and one World Championships. Laurence finished sixth at the 1960 Squaw Valley Olympics, and ninth at the World Championships (at Worlds, she was skating on an injured knee). Sports reporters at the time felt Laurence’s dance elements were so modern the judges did not know how to score her in the Olympics. Laurence was not a skater to simply jump and spin to music. The music took hold of her soul and she interpreted it with an unabashed joy. The judges were not accustomed to this type of exuberance. Laurence’s sister and pairs partner finished tenth in both the 1960 Games and Worlds.
The 1960 Squaw Valley Olympic Team included two members of the Owen family. Mara is second from left, and Laurence is third from left.
In the 1960 Olympics, Laurence had her fair share of admirers. Carol Heiss, en route to her gold medal, shared a room with Laurence in the Olympic Village. Heiss recognized the younger skater’s potential and knew she was on the cusp of a magnificent career.
Heiss told Laurence affectionately, “My time is over. I’ll be looking forward to seeing you on the podium in the future.”
Laurence, like Steffi, was a perfectionist, and a stubborn one, too. Laurence’s reflections of how she viewed her own drive to succeed, and how skating shaped her life, appeared in a school essay saved by a classmate.
As mum has often said, my determination is fine just so long as I use it in the right direction, but use it in the wrong way …. This stubbornness is curiously mixed. Although I enjoy being independent and often resist control, I went through a stage of longing for protection from the world’s realities. I resented and enjoyed responsibility at the same time. As I see it now, this resentment was a childish dream, merely a longing for that which I didn’t have. However, I feel that it is good to have a bit of the romantic thrown in with the realistic. Otherwise my outlook might too easily become cynical and any creative impulse be stifled.
As a corollary to this romanticism, I am very inclined to over-dramatize myself. I often build up a pleasant fantasy over my “deplorable” position when it is anything but that. I also attach too much importance to a relatively minor catastrophe, such as “B” on a composition for which I confidently expected an “A.” My instantaneous reaction is complete disappointment, sometimes even to the point of despair. Such a reaction is slightly ridiculous to many people. Certainly to me, also, in the clear perspective of later reasoning. Perhaps this poem states my feelings better:
Ah despair, what are you?
A sinking of the heart, of hope?
You are many things but mainly
Loss of clarity, of perception.
Nevertheless, I will probably go on being disappointed when I fail to do as well as I feel I should, or could, have done. This feeling is part of the influence which skating has had on me.
All my life I have Figure Skated, an exacting sport at the least. The older I have grown, the higher the standard of perfection in this pastime has become. Now, at the top level of international competition, I must constantly strive to keep my average of performance between 86 percent and 100 percent. Consequently, my standard of perfection has also risen in other fields. I cannot be content with a mediocre piece of work, or with one that a few years ago might have seemed quite good. I’m used to comparing my skating with the best in the world; thus I do the same everywhere. For instance, in comparison with Margot Fonteyn, I am not an exceptional ballet dancer, nor even a good one. Yet I feel that with work I could compare favorably to her standard. Often people mistake this self-confidence for conceit. Nothing could be farther from the truth, for usually conceit is a sign of insecurity. However, I must constantly guard against over-confidence. Realizing one’s own potential is a great aid to success, but unless you support your talents with good solid work, such a realization does [a few illegible words]. This is a lesson which I feel I have learned well—that there is no substitute for work, work, and still more work. Ability without effort is worthless. Before learning the true meaning of this moral, though, I wasted a great deal of time.
Laurence Owen placed sixth at the 1960 Winter Olympics.
As a child of seven entering my first Figure Skating competition I had been a hard worker, taking pleasure and pride in the results of my efforts. Not being too concerned with the business of competing, I skated as well as I could and came in sixth in the juvenile class …. “She skated well and the audience loved it. The only thing she muffed at all was her camel spin, which is usually a real highlight. Anyway, for seven she is terrific ….” Apparently I thought so too because the next year I didn’t work at all. When mother reprimanded me for my lack of concentration, I (still confident) blithely replied, “Oh, don’t worry about me, mother. When the time comes I’ll be all right.” After I had failed my third test three times and was thus unable to compete, I realized how foolish this attitude was. Still, even today, I must constantly remind myself to concentrate on the job at hand.
Above all, skating has taught me the power of the mind. How easily the mind can control nervousness or hesitancy. If only everyone realized the power of positive thinking. I firmly believe with Dr. Norman Peale that a positive mental approach can accomplish twice as much as might otherwise be expected. Certainly, this has been my experience. In 1958 before the Eastern Championships I decided that I was going to win them. I felt that I was capable of winning; thus why shouldn’t I? Accordingly, I wrote first place in my engagement calendar, then won the championship.
Many times, however, this formula doesn’t work. Hard work, positive thinking, and ability are not enough; at such moments I feel very depressed. Will I ever succeed? These thoughts are usually short-lived because my optimism is quick in returning. Although nothing succeeds like success, I have found (even in these few years) that one actually learns more from failure. Moreover, I feel that every failure must have some purpose, that God does help those who help themselves.
To me, God is a nebulous concept. Just what is He? So far my life has not given me a definite answer to this question. I do think that God, in relation to people, must be a symbol of the conscience. His purpose is to help each human being lead a better life. Thus I recognize failure as part of His purpose: to make us realize the true value of success. Consequently, I feel it is right to maintain an abiding sense of optimism.
Before she could skate her way to the podium in 1961, Laurence would endure a week of practice, final coaching sessions with her mother, and plenty of glares from other competitors who, underneath the polite smiles, wondered if they could overtake Laurence when the competition got underway.
Laurence and Steffi certainly knew of each other, and must have considered themselves the top two skaters, based on their finishes at the championships of the previous year. In an odd twist, both Laurence and Steffi almost didn’t make it to the 1961 Nationals. A few months before the event, Laurence slipped, fell forward, and badly banged up her knee during practice. This was the same knee she’d hurt during the 1960 World Championships. For several weeks, the knee was swollen and bruised. She was beginning to have doubts that it would heal for Nationals, and to fear that she’d miss the chance to secure the family legacy that was so important. Finally, the swelling subsided and Laurence regained her jumps—and her confidence—just in time.
Steffi almost didn’t make it to Nationals for other reasons. Her virtuoso skills at the piano had earned her first place at the Colorado State Piano Competition. She was asked to represent Colorado in the National Piano Competition. The timing could not have been worse. The piano event was happening the same week as Nationals. Steffi’s goal was to be a concert pianist, and most agree she loved playing piano just as much, if not more, than skating, but she chose to skate at Nationals instead.