What is it about competition? I mean, we humans can be so incredibly competitive. And as the Winter Olympics get underway in a few weeks, we also see how competitive nations are about their athletes as well. The most watched sport of the Winter Games is figure skating. As beautiful as it is, behind the scenes, it has one of the most dog-eat-dog

dynamics of any sport. But we all love the drama, right? I'm Patty Steele. The Drive to Win

on the Ice. That's next on The Backstory. This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed Human.

We're back with the backstory.

First of all, thanks to my pal and Uber skating fan, Sue Aller, for suggesting this story.

Ah, the beauty of somebody flying across the ice, defying gravity, and making it look so effortless.

But that perfection is hard won.

Figure skaters, men, women, pairs spend hours a day, month after month, for years on end to make it look effortless.

It's not unusual for them to train a minimum of 40 hours a week for as much as 15 years before

hitting the elite level. So whenever people want success so much they can taste it, when they

basically give up their young lives to train for it, when their countries see them as a symbol of

their power, you can imagine there's also plenty of behind-the-scenes scandal.

The movie I Tanya, of course, told the story of the lead-up to the 1994 Winter Olympics.

In January of that year, as Tanya Harding and Nancy Kerrigan were getting ready for the U.S.

Figure Skating Championships the next day, cohorts of Tanya's attack Nancy with a pipe

smashing her just above her knee. It was all in an effort to eliminate Nancy from the championships

and the Olympics to give Tanya better shot at the goal. The attack severely bruised Nancy's leg but broke

nothing and both Tanya and Nancy were selected for the

Olympic team that year. Eventually, the attacker confessed and implicated Tanya. While she did

skate in the Olympics, she came in eighth. She later pleaded guilty to finding out about the

attack afterwards and helping cover it up. There were further investigations that

show she probably knew about the attack ahead of time and even helped finance it, but her plea deal

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