Karen Magnussen

Karen Magnussen
Personal information
Full name	Karen Diane Magnussen
Country represented	Canada
Born	(1952-04-08) April 8, 1952 Vancouver, British Columbia
Height	1.60 m (5 ft 3 in)[1]
Former coach	Linda Brauckmann, Frank Carroll, Hellmut May
Skating club	North Shore Winter Club
Retired	1977
Medal record Competitor for  Canada Ladies' Figure skating Olympic Games Silver 1972 Sapporo Ladies' singles World Championships Gold 1973 Bratislava Ladies' singles Silver 1972 Calgary Ladies' singles Bronze 1971 Lyon Ladies' singles North American Championships Gold 1971 Peterborough Ladies' singles Silver 1969 Oakland Ladies' singles

Olympic medal record
Women's figure skating
Competitor for  Canada
Silver	1972 Sapporo	Singles

Karen Diane Magnussen, OC (born April 4, 1952) is a Canadian figure skater. She is the 1972 Olympic silver medalist^[2] and 1973 World Champion.^[2]

Magnussen was Canada's Female Athlete of the Year in 1971 and 1972, and was made an Officer of the Order of Canada in 1973.^[3]

Personal life

Magnussen was born into a middle-class family with a Swedish mother and Norwegian father in Vancouver, British Columbia.^[1][2] She has two sisters, Lori, three years younger, and Judy, six years younger.^[1]

Magnussen studied kinesiology at Simon Fraser University.^[1] In 1978, she married Tony Cella, the lead singer of a band.^[4] They lived in his hometown, Boston, for eleven years and then moved to Vancouver.^[5][6] They have two sons and a daughter.^[7]

Competitive career

After being introduced to the ice at age six and a half when her mother, a recreational skater, brought her to a general skating session, Karen Magnussen then kept asking for more opportunities to skate.^[1] Recalling lessons on pebbly curling ice at the Kerrisdale Arena, she commented, "The ice was anything but perfect, but I think that made you tough."^[5] Her first coach was Hellmut May.^[8] Linda Brauckmann became her coach in 1965.^[1][9]

Magnussen's career at the elite level of skating began when she won the Canadian national junior title in 1965. Moving up to the senior level the next year, she became known for her strong free skating ability, and was even compared to then-reigning world champion Petra Burka.^[10] Her march upwards in the rankings continued as she qualified to compete at the World Championships for the first time in 1967 and won her first Canadian title in 1968. She was sent to the 1968 Winter Olympics in Grenoble, France, and placed seventh.

In 1969, Magnussen lost her Canadian title to Linda Carbonetto. She was diagnosed with stress fractures in both legs in February 1969, spent three months in a wheelchair, and returned to the ice in mid-May.^[1] Though she watched the 1969 World Championships from a wheelchair, she said, "I was planning for next year's competition. I never considered giving up; I always knew that I'd be back."^[11][10] She won the Canadian Championships four more times, from 1970 to 1973. At the World Championships, she won a bronze medal in 1971 and then silver in 1972.

Magnussen was granted free early morning ice time at Vancouver's Coliseum before the hockey players arrived.^[5]

Like her American contemporary Janet Lynn, Magnussen was stronger in free skating than compulsory figures. In the early 1970s, both were competing against the Austrian skater Trixi Schuba, who excelled at figures and often built a huge early lead under a scoring system which heavily valued those skills. Schuba's strength in figures allowed her to win the gold at the 1972 Winter Olympics despite placing seventh in the free skating segment, while Lynn and Magnussen (first and second in the free skating) took bronze and silver, respectively. Since most audiences found compulsory figures unexciting, the International Skating Union reduced their value and introduced the short program in the 1972–73 season. Combined with Schuba's retirement after the Olympic season, this development encouraged both Magnussen and Lynn to stay in competition another year. At the first World Championships under this system, in Bratislava, Czechoslovakia in 1973, Magnussen produced a strong short program (which included a double axel)^{[citation needed]}, while Lynn fell twice in that portion of the competition. Although Lynn came back to win the free skating segment, her problems in the short cost her the title. Canadian sports broadcaster Johnny Esaw, concerned that the satellite feed would end before Magnussen's free skate, paid the Zamboni driver to work faster.^[7] In the final year in which solid gold medals were awarded in figure skating,^[7] Magnussen added a gold to complete her World medal collection.

Later life

Magnussen retired from competition and turned professional, saying in October 1973, "I'm glad my folks don't have to worry now about paying my bills. They gave up so much for my lessons, and they never said one thing about it, for which I love them so much. I can help them out now, and help my two younger sisters."^[1] She performed with Ice Capades for four years.^[6]

Magnussen coached for eleven years in Boston before returning to the North Shore Winter Club in North Vancouver, British Columbia.^[6][12] In addition to teaching figure skaters, she has also worked with hockey players to improve edges, power, balance, and stops and starts.^[5][6]

Despite the elimination of figures by the ISU, Magnussen considers it beneficial to learn them in some form, saying in 2009, "Instead of doing figures on a patch of ice we do it in a more free form, but we still have to get skaters back to basics."^[6] The Karen Magnussen Community Recreation Centre^[13] in North Vancouver is named after her. To assist young skaters, Magnussen established the Karen Magnussen Foundation.^[14] Although Canada has gone on to produce many notable female skaters, such as Elizabeth Manley, Josée Chouinard and Joannie Rochette, no other Canadian has claimed the world title since Magnussen.^[12]

In November 2011, an ammonia leak occurred at the North Shore Winter Club where Magnussen was working; she said it caused her breathing problems, hampered her ability to speak, impaired her vision, and left her chronically fatigued.^[15] WorkSafeBC inspectors cited the club for twelve health and safety violations.^[16] In May 2012, it was reported that Magnussen continued to suffer serious health problems and it was unlikely she would be able to go into a rink again.^[17] Following her ammonia exposure and treatment with the powerful steroid prednisone, she gained 60 pounds and developed rheumatoid arthritis, temporal arteritis (swelling of blood vessels to the head), and central sensitivity syndrome (affecting the interaction between the brain and vocal cords).^[18][5] Interviewed by the CBC in December 2013, she said compensation benefits ceased when WorkSafeBC realized her disability was permanent.^[18] Magnussen had hoped to coach into her 80s or 90s.^[5]

Results

References

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