Certain things spring to mind when one thinks of figure skating.
Elegance. Grace. Precision. Sequins? Why not.
But sabotage? Assault? Hired goons? Surely not.
There is no doubt that figure skating is one of the most aesthetically remarkable sports on the planet.
Acrobats dance their way across the ice, weaving impossible, magical shapes in gorgeous outfits, spinning and leaping and throwing and skipping across the treacherous surface in a way that seems almost otherworldly.
It is a highlight of the Winter Olympics for many.
But even this most ethereal of sports has a dark side, just like any other.
Throughout figure skating's history, there has been a veritable cesspit of controversies, whether it be the judging scandals of 1998 and 2002, racism storms — both explicit and implied — doping scandals and questions over athlete welfare.
The latter of those two issues was laid bare in Beijing in 2022 as 15-year-old Kamila Valieva became the poster child for the sport's issues after testing positive for a banned substance in the lead-up to the Games and then competing anyway.
Her tears after the painful disintegration of her routine in the individual final in Beijing were a sickening reminder of the worst examples of the sport's exploitative practices.
But controversies on ice go back a lot further than that.
Today in 1994, the skating world was thrown into the spotlight by one of the most egregious acts of sabotage in sporting history, an assault that put figure skating on the front pages and ended up with one of the sport's stars banned from the ice for life.
Nancy Kerrigan was the golden girl of American figure skating.
A picture of effortless grace on the ice, her balletic precision and all-American smile ensured that she would command a special place in the hearts of figure skating aficionados.
Her unquestioned brilliance meant that she was a favourite for gold at the Lillehammer Winter Olympics, set to be held in February 1994.
Tonya Harding, on the other hand, was slightly different.
No less brilliant on the ice, Harding's style was built on athleticism and strength, taking the sport to completely new heights by becoming the first woman to land a triple Axel in competition.
Yet there was always a lingering suspicion that her tomboy approach clashed too jarringly against the socially conservative figure skating authorities, a clash that could never quite be reconciled.
Was it that the authorities had an inherent distrust of any athlete who dared challenge the rigid gender norms of a sport obsessed with grace and beauty?
Perhaps the fact that Harding choreographed her skate routines to rock music was upsetting?
Or maybe it was simply that she was from the wrong side of the tracks, a blue-collar girl wearing home-sewn costumes daring to challenge a glittery, perfect world.
Harding had no doubt done things tough in her life. In later years, she would detail physical and mental abuse from her mother, sexual abuse at the hands of her step-brother and allege yet more abuse at the hands of her first husband — a glimpse into the world that she inhabited that was far removed from the glitz and glamour of the figure skating scene.
Whatever it was, the two women's contrasting styles and backgrounds ensured that theirs was a rivalry for the ages.
However, any fierce rivalry left unchecked can beget bitterness and envy, perhaps in rare occasions, sliding inexorably towards hatred.
What happened at the United States Figure Skating Championships in Detroit was one of the stories of the year, leapt upon by a rapacious press corps intoxicated by its stunning brazenness.
Seven weeks before the 1994 Winter Olympics, Kerrigan was shockingly attacked by a baton-wielding assailant after training at the Cobo Arena just days before the US championships.
The golden girl was whacked in the knee, jeopardising her career and certainly her appearance at the next month's Games.
Adding a soap-operatic degree of drama to proceedings, a nearby film crew was on hand to capture a stricken Kerrigan crying, "Why? Why? Why?", as she processed the horror of what had happened to her.
Fortunately for Kerrigan, the assault was largely botched. Instead of breaking her knee — which could have ended her career — the assault resulted only in bruising to her knee and quadriceps.
It ruled Kerrigan out of the national championships, but she would recover in time for the Olympics.
Suspicion immediately fell upon Kerrigan's bitter rival, Harding, who won gold in Kerrigan's absence at those championships.
As Harding was interviewed by police and the FBI, debate swirled over the degree of her involvement, but the USA still named her to the Olympic team — alongside Kerrigan.
This was the stuff of dreams for a voracious public desperate to live every moment of the scandal.
The publicity and vicarious interest around the assault and rivalry between the two Americans ensured that the women's singles figure skating was must-watch television.
And a whopping 48.5 per cent of all American TVs ended up tuning in to the women's short program at those Games — an estimated audience of about 79 million people whose insatiable appetite for scandal ensured it would remain a pop culture phenomenon for decades, even continuing to this very day.
That rating is the sixth highest ever for any TV show in the US, behind two Super Bowls, the M*A*S*H finale, an episode of historical drama Roots, and the Dallas episode where it was revealed who shot JR.
Unlike in soap opera land, the big reveal in this unedifying saga had already occurred, though.
In a twist worthy of the most outlandish of Midsomer Murder scripts, Harding's live-in ex-husband Jeff Gillooly and her bodyguard Shawn Eckardt admitted to hiring Shane Stant and his uncle, Derrick Smith, to assault Kerrigan.
All were charged, with Gillooly later sentenced to two years in jail, and the other trio 18 months for the part they played.
But the big question was, had Harding known about the assault?
Harding said she only found out about her former husband's role after the event, but admitted withholding information which, in her home state of Oregon, was not an offence.
After the Games though, a grand jury in Oregon found there was evidence that Harding had participated in the plot, but she was not charged.
Both women competed at the Olympics, with Kerrigan, in a theatrical act befitting the story, wearing the very same dress she had been assaulted in.
Unfortunately for her, it did not help her win gold, as she claimed the silver medal behind Ukraine's 1993 world champion Oksana Baiul.
Harding, hampered by needing to restart her free skate after a lace broke on her boot, went on to finish eighth.
The crowd at the Hamar Olympic Amphitheatre let its thoughts be known though, booing the anointed villain of the piece, who left the ice in tears.
Harding was banned for life from ice skating by the United States Figure Skating Association.
