Oksana Baiul

After talking with her parents, her coach, her agent and her peers, reigning Olympic women's skating gold medalist Kristi Yamaguchi finally listened to her heart and arrived at the most important decision of her career yesterday.The result: She shut the door on appearing at the 1994 Winter Games of Lillehammer, Norway."I let my heart decide, and this is what I want to do," Yamaguchi said during a conference call yesterday.Yamaguchi, winner of the women's gold at the 1992 Albertville Games, declined to join the rush of professionals who are regaining their competitive eligibility with the International Skating Union.

Voices of 1997:"The Jets." -- Sean Jones, Green Bay Packers defensive end, when asked who he would prefer to play in the Super Bowl, Jan. 12."Her blood alcohol count was .14, .13, .10, .14, and .14 by the German judge." -- David Letterman, after figure skater Oksana Baiul's arrest for drunken driving, Jan. 18."He's always been talkative, but usually it's under oath." -- Sandy Alderson, Oakland Athletics general manager, on Chicago White Sox outfielder Albert Belle, Feb. 24."That's scary. The only thing worse would be if they cloned Joe Oliver."

The violence that nearly redistributed the Olympic Gold Medal in Ladies Figure Skating was the crash in practice Thursday of two 16-year-olds skating backward. But it didn't. Oksana Baiul of Ukraine skated in a bandage and pain, beautifully, last night. The favorite, which she had been all along, won by a narrow margin.Ms. Baiul had stood second after the short program on Wednesday, and Tanja Szewczenko of Germany fifth, when they injured each other. That seemingly opened up the competition, making any outcome possible.

So, now that all the leftover stuffing, cranberry sauce and pumpkin pie from yesterday's feast have been crammed into the appropriate refrigerator spot, you've got three days of free time and more turkey than humans should be allowed to consume.What to do, what to do? Thankfully, wise and knowing sports programmers have been hard at work making sure your Thanksgiving weekend won't be spent in vain, with basketball, football and a wonderful celebration of the Olympic spirit filling the airwaves, from just after dawn to well past midnight.

HAMAR, Norway -- The two policemen followed her into the interview room. The minicams circled her. Fans wanted her autograph. There was always one more interview to do, one more appearance to make.Nancy Kerrigan spent the first day of the rest of her life as she had spent much of the past seven weeks: pursued."What I've been going through is a circus," she said yesterday. "Pretty ridiculous. I didn't like taking anything away from the other athletes. I came here to skate. I didn't ask for the media to come in hordes to the practices.

HAMAR, Norway -- As much as the evidence points to such a conclusion, Nancy Kerrigan didn't get jobbed last night.You just can't say that.Yes, it was true that a clean sweep of judges from old Eastern-bloc nations gave Oksana Baiul of the Ukraine a blade-thin, politically suspicious win in the Olympic skating competition. But to cry foul is to cry that Baiul was the inferior skater, and that simply wasn't the case.Baiul is a skating Amadeus who stole Kerrigan's gold with a performance that will go down among the most remarkable in the annals of the sport, not for its quality so much as its resourcefulness.

From the cover It seems as if we've known her forever: the Olympic gold medal, the wedge haircut, the sweet smile telegraphing a message that life couldn't be better for Dorothy Hamill. But now, at 51, this most private of champions has decided to let us into her life just a little bit with a new autobiography, A Skating Life: My Story. And we learn that being the star girls adored and boys wanted to date wasn't as rosy as her complexion. An alcoholic father. A distant mother. Two divorces.

One of the country's most celebrated point-to-point races, the Maryland Hunt Cup, was held last weekend. And, as always, after the race, members of Maryland's country gentry went from casual race attire to fancy dress to attend the annual Hunt Cup Ball.The ball was held at Stouffer Harborplace Hotel and was a festive occasion for members of a Maryland racing family who owned, trained and rode the Hunt Cup winner, Ivory Poacher.Brothers Redmond and Jervis Finney are two of the owners; their cousin Ann Fenwick trained the horse; and the winning jockey, Sanna Neilson, is a niece.

Nancy Kerrigan beamed. Oksana Baiul bawled. And Tonya Harding took a big wad of gum out of her mouth.So went the Olympic women's figure skating finals last night on CBS.Kerrigan took the ice at 10:38, the same time as on Wednesday. It was good enough for huge ratings that night, CBS must have figured, so let's do it again.Kerrigan skated a fabulous program, and announcers Scott Hamilton and Verne Lundquist gushed."She's grown so much as a skater, an athlete and a person this year," Hamilton said.

In her first performance in three months, figure skater Ekaterina Gordeeva glided across the Hartford (Conn.) Civic Center ice Tuesday night with a fluidity and grace that undoubtedly helped her win two Olympic gold medals and four world championships.But for all its skill and passion, Gordeeva's routine was clearly missing something, namely Sergei Grinkov, her husband and pairs partner, who died of a heart attack during a practice session in November in Lake Placid, N.Y.Gordeeva's triumphant return to the ice for the first time since her husband's death is the emotional force behind tonight's two-hour CBS tribute, "Sergei Grinkov: Celebration of a Life," (Channel 13, 9 p.m.)