A CRASH COURSE IN FIGURE SKATING.

Byline: KEVIN MODESTI

After a week of watching figure skaters, interviewing figure skaters, listening to figure skating experts, reading a figure skating book and studying an official figure skating glossary, this is what I have come to understand about figure skating:

Falling down is bad.

OK, I knew that going in. Call me a slow learner.

But I'm sure I'm not alone among the people following the U.S. Figure Skating Championships at Staples Center and on TV.

It's like any other sport: Some people go to a baseball game and can spot the difference between a slider and a curve, and others are excited only by strikeouts and home runs. Some people go to a boxing match and thrill to the effective execution of body punches, and others crave blood and a 10-count. Some people go to a car race to note advances in aerodynamics, and others go for the crashes.

Congratulations if you go to figure skating to appreciate the axels, lutzes and salchows, to coo about the grace and to fret over the ordinals. Until further notice, I go to figure skating for the crashes.

Figure skaters don't burst into flames when they wipe out. They can be spectacular when they fall, though. Memorable in ways they never intended.

There was Midori Ito, the great Japanese skater. In the short program at the 1991 World Championships in Munich, Ito's triple-lutz, double-toe-loop combination went terribly wrong. She was too close to the corner of the rink on takeoff for the double toe, and flew over a sideboard that had been chopped low to give television lenses a clear shot.

Some performers will do anything to get on camera. Ito literally landed on the cameramen.

If the sight of Midori sailing out of the rink was amusing, then so was the sight of her stepping back onto the ice after a split second and going on with her performance as if nothing strange had happened.

The mistake cost Ito a World Championships medal. She placed fourth behind Americans Kristi Yamaguchi, Tonya Harding and Nancy Kerrigan.

The following winter, at the Albertville Olympics, Ito fell trying a triple lutz and lost the gold medal to Yamaguchi. The two flops, veteran skating coach John Nicks said this week, ``cost her about 1 1/2 to 2 million dollars in endorsement fees.''

Talk about your economic hard landings.

Janet Lynn, the ever-smiling, five-time U.S. champion, was a gold-medal contender in the Sapporo Olympics of 1972. On a flying sit-spin, Lynn tumbled to the ice. Instead of pouting, she sat for a moment, yes, smiling. Then she picked herself up and went on.

Lynn's pluck made her a folk hero there in Japan. It did not win her the gold, however. She went home with the bronze behind Austria's Trixi Schuba and Canada's Karen Magnussen.

One thing you'll never hear a skater say is, ``I've fallen and I can't get up!''

Skaters and their coaches don't mind talking about falling because everybody goes kerplunk once in a while, even the champions. But they prefer to talk about getting up.

``You don't fall - you bounce,'' said the wry-humored Nicks, who coaches Sasha Cohen, the 17-year-old who is second behind Michelle Kwan after Thursday's short-program phase of the women's competition. ``Because once you've made a mistake, the more quickly you recover, the better, particularly as regards the second mark (for `presentation'). As a coach, you coach recovery and you coach the concealment of errors. That's one of the arts of competitive skating - perhaps a competitor might make a mistake and you won't even see it. Of course, if they're on their behind, it's difficult not to see it.

``I think sometimes when you have a mistake early in the program and come back very strongly, it doesn't hurt you that much. You fall at beginning of long program, but then you come back with a very strong performance, I think you get an emotional high from a judge and admiration from the public. It's the second mistake that hurts you.''

Too many falls, and some pressroom wag is liable to write that you ``Zambonied,'' that is, you polished the ice with the seat of your pants. A competition in which it seems everybody is falling is likely to be labeled a ``splatfest.'' Somehow, these terms do not show up in the U.S. Figure Skating Association glossary.

If you're going to risk your ego - and your tailbone - to attempting triple axels, it pays to have a sense of humor.

Sarah Hughes, the 16-year-old who's third after the short program, can laugh now about a fall during last month's Grand Prix Final in Kitchener, Ont.

``The next morning, I was on the cover of some sports page, on the ice. They had a huge picture of my fall,'' Hughes said this week. ``It was a surprise to see that people were surprised that I fell. (The photo caption) said, 'Sarah Hughes takes a rare fall,' or something like that.

``At first I was kind of hurt (emotionally). Then I thought it was funny. I wound up bringing the paper home. My mom said, 'Someone told me they saw you on the cover of the sports page!' ''

Well, you either laugh or you cry.

Imagine dedicating your life to the once-every-four-years pursuit of a gold medal in Olympic figure skating. Then, on the big night, at the wrong moment, you hit a rut in the ice. Suddenly, you're going for the gold medal in Olympic diving. You and your world are upside down. Tragic.

``You have to be well-trained, mentally and physically, to stand up and go on,'' Kwan said.

Tonight at Staples Center, Kwan, Cohen, Hughes and fourth-place Angela Nikodinov will conclude the women's competition with their free-skate performances. The fight for three spots on the U.S. Olympic team could hinge on which skaters get through four minutes of jumps, spins and fancy footwork without drawing comparisons to the Zamboni.

With the benefit of my long education in figure skating, I offer them this advice as regards falling down:

Try not to.

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Photo:

(color) Tim Goebel takes a spill during the men's short program Tuesday. Falling is just part of the deal in figure skating.

John McCoy/Staff Photographer