But I never really thought that I would be extraordinarily successful at skating, it's just something that happened, you know.

Everything that I've ever been able to accomplish in skating and in life has come out of adversity and perseverance.

Without strength and courage it's really hard to perform at the highest levels of international figure skating, because you're alone on the ice and you only have seven minutes over two nights to prove yourself.

From the fall of October, 1980 to March, 1984 I never lost a competition.

When you're expected to win and you have the press saying that you are going to win the Olympic gold medal, and you're the only sure thing in the Olympics, it can undermine your confidence.

I started skating and I kind of liked it because I could run circles around the guys that wouldn't pick me to play baseball.

And so figure skating was a great vehicle for me to kind of be competitive at something, without having to be big.