John Misha Petkevich

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John Misha Petkevich is a former figure skater. He won the 1971 U.S. Figure Skating Championships in men's singles and the North American Championship in the same year, and competed at both the 1968 and 1972 Winter Olympics (where he finished 6th and 5th, respectively). His best finish at the World Figure Skating Championships was 4th in 1972.

Petkevich was known as a particularly dynamic free skater for his time. He was coached by Arthur Bourque and Gustave Lussi.

In 1970, while a student at Harvard University, Petkevich founded An Evening with Champions, a long-running annual ice show that raises money to benefit the Jimmy Fund and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.

Petkevich was the recipient of an unusual trophy. At the 1947 World Figure Skating Championships, Ulrich Salchow was particularly impressed by Dick Button's skating, and gave him one of his own trophies. Following the 1972 Olympics, Button passed on Salchow's trophy to Petkevich, who has stated that he also intends to keep up the tradition by presenting it to another young skater someday.

Following his competitive career, Petkevich attended Oxford University as a Rhodes scholar, earning a Ph.D. in cell biology. Later he pursued a career in investment banking.

Petkevich is the author of Figure Skating: Championship Techniques (ISBN 0-452-26209-7), one of the standard reference works on figure skating technique. He has also served as a figure skating analyst for NBC, CBS, and ESPN.

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