CHICAGO--Olympic and world champion Shani Davis is noticeably absent from U.S. Speedskating’s media guide, except for in the small type in the records section. He is not among the eight athletes picture on the cover. His biography is omitted inside.
All by his choice.
Three of Davis’ four main sponsors are European companies virtually unknown in the United States.
Team Davis, as his Website refers to its endeavor, is an exclusive club.
It’s, essentially, Davis and his mother, Cherie Davis, who serves as his manager.
On the ice, he is, essentially, his own coach, an unparalleled strategy at the elite level.
More than any other racer in his sport, Davis does not skate in other’s tracks. And, if it is, indeed, Shani Davis against the world, this speedskater is winning.
The three-time Olympian is well-positioned this month to become the first American in 16 years to win two speed skating gold medals in one Olympic Games, the first man to do it since Eric Heiden won five in 1980.
Davis, 27, is the overwhelming favorite in his signature races, the 1,000 and 1,500 meters, and is considered a long shot in his other events, the 500 and 5,000.
He passed up his best chance for a third medal by declining to enter the pool for the team pursuit.
At the 2006 Torino Olympics, he became the first Black athlete to win an individual gold medal in a winter sport when he earned the 1,000-meter title.
He also won silver at 1,500 meters, all in the midst of a headline-grabbing feud with teammate Chad Hendrick over Davis’ decision not to race in the team event.
His accomplishments as a Black in virtually all white sport are not all that set him apart, however.
Davis’ unconventional training regime, highly analytical approach and history of being drawn into Olympic controversies will make him the most compelling international athlete at the Richmond Olympic Oval this month.
Davis trains mostly with the United States short-track team. Maintaining a connection to his roots in the rough-and-tumble sport in which skaters race in a pack against each other instead of the clock.
He refuses to partner in workouts with anyone he might compete against. He keeps a detailed notebook of his practice sessions and races, recording everything from training logs to how he felt physically after each workout.
But the go-it-alone approach in coaching is the most unusual.
“I don’t know if there’s anybody else who coaches himself at an elite level, in really any sport,” said Heiden, now an orthopedic surgeon in Park City, Utah, and the U.S. Speedskating team doctor.
“It’s unusual that somebody can have that sort of feedback from their bodies, that they know how to put together a training program.”
Davis explained it simply as the product of a lifetime on ice.
“I’m experienced,” he said. “I’ve been skating since I was 6 years-old. This is my 21st year skating and I’ve really developed a good relationship with my body.
“I listen to it and I just kind of confide in certain people and I mush together everything. The past couple of years, it’s worked.”
There’s no arguing the results--Davis was unbeaten in four international races in the 1,000 meters this season and won four out of five 1,500’s.
But one of his former coaches thinks Davis could be even better.
“Dead wrong,” Milwaukee based Bob Fenn said of the approach. “It tears me up inside to see him out there just by himself.”
Davis, who watches video of himself and opponents extensively, does receive some technical and staff support from United States sprint Coach Ryan Shimabukuro on the road and shot-track Coach Jae Su Chun when he trains with that team.
Former Olympian Kip Carpenter, now a coach, also provides logistical support, and Fenn said he has talked to Davis regularly the last two weeks in the final tune-up for Vancouver.
“He does get a lot of training feedback,” Shimabukuro said. “We’re not there to get in his way. We’re there to aid him.”
Canadian Denny Morrison, who trained with Davis in Calgary for two years before the Torino Games, said the solo approach works for the American because “he takes full accountability.
“If he doesn’t win, he blames it on himself. He gets mad at himself and motivates himself.”
For the last several years, Davis has kept detailed training diaries that form a personal encyclopedia about what works and what doesn’t.
“After each workout, he sits down and writes down a full page about what he learned from a practice, what he can do better,” said Bart Veldkamp, former United States national team coach.
“He’s really a student of the sport.”
“I have many notebooks,” Davis said. “I guess they started in about 2004. I bring the most current ones. I have other ones that are on file, just in case I need to reference.”
The Chicago native, who uses Milwaukee as the base for his long-track work, trained for more than two months with the short track team last summer and again for about five weeks this winter after the World Cup season.
“It’s refreshing,” Davis said of the crossover. “It’s not the same thing over and over again. It’s not as repetitive. Short track is a little more thrills and spills, so, its’ more fun for me.”
He began his career as a short track racer, making the 2002 Olympic team. He seems to find kindred spirits in the roller-derby-like sport and is good friends with Apolo Anton Ohno.
“He loves short track. He’s told us before, short track is his passion and long track is what he’s really good at,” short-track Olympian Katherine Reutter said.
It also is cited as a major factor in his greatest technical asset--his turns on the corners of the oval are the world’s best among long-track competitors.
“He is exceptionally powerful in the turns,” said Johann Olav Koss, a five-time Olympic medallist for Norway.
“He burns the turns Veldkamp said. “If you were in a car, you’d smell rubber.”
