DETROIT — This was going to be a year of transition for reigning world champion and Olympic team bronze medalist Nathan Chen. At 19, he was heading across the country to college. Southern California was behind him. Yale beckoned.
This was going to be a grand experiment: he was trying to be a full-time college student and a full-time figure skater. He would train alone – all alone – without his coach and without his training partners, hour after hour, day after day, on the ice at Yale’s Ingalls Rink. If he ran into trouble, he could pull out his phone and FaceTime with his coach, Rafael Arutunian.