Figure Skating: Katarina Witt took her golden place

As beguiling as she is fickle, Bizet's Gypsy Carmen is a temptress whose passions run the emotional alphabet from A to Z. Even on ice. For Debi Thomas, the accent is on P. Her Carmen is usually powerful, plucky, practical and pretty. Katarina Witt's Carmen is a study in S, at once sensuous, seductive, stylish and shrewd. But last Saturday night, when the long-awaited skate-off between the two Carmens got under way in the Olympic Saddledome, America's sweetheart proved an unexpected B: a bobbly bundle of nerves capable only of bronze.

Thomas had aimed to evoke the fiery spirit of the...