The Freeway Face-Off is known for bringing out the best in Southern California's on-ice action, maybe never more so than Friday night at Honda Center when the Ducks welcomed four Olympic skaters from The Rinks and Great Park Ice for a pre-game ceremony.
Newly crowned Olympic champion Nathan Chen joined a pair of SoCal stalwarts, captains Ryan Getzlaf and Anze Kopitar, for an incredible meeting of world-class athletes and to drop the ceremonial puck in front of a sellout crowd.
For Chen, it was the latest stop on a crowded dance ticket following his return from the 2022 Games in Beijing and, standing alongside two fellow legends of their craft, somewhat of a full circle moment reminiscent of what brought him to Orange County in the first place.
Olympian Nathan Chen Drops the Puck, Discusses Gold Medal Journey
Originally captivated by a hockey goaltender's equipment, or "the sickest thing I had ever seen," the skating phenom first laced up his ice boots at the ripe age of three, in 2002 in his hometown of Salt Lake City. Eventually his parents, Chinese natives Zhidong Chen and Hetty Wang, realized their son had a special gift, and he soon began competing in organized figure skating tournaments.
"I asked my mom if I could skate, and she ended up taking me to the rental counter," Chen remembered. "We compared the blades and the figure skate was a little flatter with a toe-pick. Probably easier and better leverage for a three-year-old kid to walk on. I put the skates on and honestly, the rest is history."
Over the past decade, Chen has established himself as one of the greatest and most decorated American skaters of all time. He's now a three-time Olympic medalist, a three-time world champion, three-time Grand Prix Final champion and six-time U.S. national champion. He's known as the "Quad King" for his proficiency at landing incredibly difficult quad jumps with seeming ease and is also the first Asian American man to earn an Olympic medal in single skating.
It's hardly been all smooth sailing on that ride to the top though. By 2018, Chen was already seen as one of the leading contenders for gold at the Olympic Games in Pyeongchang, South Korea, but a disappointing performance in the short program zapped any chance of an individual medal.
The crushing setback on the world's brightest stage forced Chen to take stock of everything in his training regimen - from his diet to his on-ice workouts - and potentially most importantly, his mental approach to the sport to which he had dedicated himself.
"I think having the intent in 2018 to just focus solely on trying to medal and trying to win was honestly detrimental to my goals," Chen admits. "That also becomes something that I can't control, and it makes me focus on things that I can't control. Whereas heading into 2022, my objective was just to focus on things that I could control - my training, trusting the people that I work with and just getting the work in every day."
Armed with a new approach and a redetermined attitude, Chen and his team, led by coach Rafael Arutyunyan, faced just one more logistical challenge to take their training regimen to the next level - securing a permanent base of operations suitable for Olympic training following stops in Lake Arrowhead and The Rinks - Lakewood ICE. So, Chen and his team jumped at the chance to relocate to Irvine and lay their roots at Great Park Ice in Irvine, a state-of-the-art four sheet facility opened to the public in 2018.
Since then, Chen has made Great Park his home away from home, spending hours upon hours on Rink 2, one of just two Olympic-sized ice sheets in Orange County. He believes the structure and support he's received there played an instrumental role in his success at the Beijing Games.
"We needed the facility with the arena sort of feeling, things that you would normally see in competition to get comfortable with that sort of training atmosphere," Chen said. "It was perfect for us. And we're just very grateful.
"The Rinks have contributed so much to our success. Simple things from logistics and being able to plan our days and just be able to have solid ice time that we know consistently we can go into the ice and have ice time financially. They've supported us immensely."
But for Chen, maybe the greatest benefit and motivating factor of training at Great Park Ice is being a part of the community of elite athletes who flock to the facility year-round in hopes of taking their game to the next level.
"Immediately just being around high-class athletes, you get this sense of inspiration, ambition and desire," Chen said. "You want to be a part of that and want to feel like you belong in that environment. Coming here, you get that same exact feeling. You're surrounded by NHL players, NFL players, NBA players, and of course Olympic athletes. So it's just amazing to be able to have that amazing world elite class of athletes that is really difficult to find elsewhere."
Chen dropped the puck alongside a few of those athletes, U.S. pairs team Brandon Frazier and Alexa Knierem (who earned a silver medal in Beijing) and the Czech Republic's Michael Brezina, whom he describes as some of his best friends.
"It means the world," he said of Friday's moment and their shared rollercoaster ride. "It's not often you get to go to the Olympic games with your best friends and the people that you've become so close to over the years. It's just the shared passion got us so far and to be able to share moments like this, things that we normally would never have been able to do, is just really cool. It's amazing."
Chen remembers being on the other side of the coin, sitting in the stands or watching on TV as a fan and marveling at the skill and grace of his idols. Ever-humble though, he isn't sure what to make of now being one of those heroes celebrated by a new generation of skaters.
"I do hope that being in this environment everyone recognizes that there's a huge support team around me. I'm not doing this by myself," Chen said. "All of my coaches, my family, my friends are all supporting me. So certainly these athletes don't have to do it by themselves, but to trust the people around them, to trust the team around them."
Chen now sets his sights on capturing his fourth world championship next month in France. He will also participate in this summer's "Stars On Ice" tour, an exhibition-style showcase which will come to Honda Center in May.
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