She is equal parts charm, grace, athleticism and beauty.

Carolina Kostner, it seems, is destined to turn heads. Whether it is with the speed and power that she displays on the ice or the new heights to which she takes figure skating in her homeland, the 22-year-old Italian star is not easily ignored.

When Kostner climbed to the second step of the 2008 World podium in Sweden, it put her ever closer to a date with history.

A BRIGHT LIGHT

Her beaming smile lit up the opening ceremony at the Olympic Winter Games in Torino just two years prior. Kostner’s mere presence as the host nation’s flag bearer was deemed a symbol of everything that is good and right about sport in Italy today.

Yet there is something so natural, so "girl next door" about a young woman who seems content far beyond the glare of the spotlight, but who has learned to embrace it when it shines the brightest.

"She has something as a skater that makes her special for our sport," said coach Michael Huth, who guides Kostner’s fortunes from his base in Oberstdorf, Germany. "A champion needs something like this."

Four-time World champion Kurt Browning, one of Kostner’s skating idols, sees a much simpler person when she performs - even as her amazing talent shines through.

"So far, her choreography choices have been traditional, but that’s her," said Browning, who helped Kostner craft her programs for the 2005-06 Olympic season. "She wants to be pretty, but she doesn’t mind if another girl walks into the room and takes the spotlight. She’s very content with herself and is a lovely, lovely soul."

DEVELOPING MOMENTS

Almost eight years later, Kostner’s modesty is such that she still wonders what made Huth take her under his wing when she was in need of a new skating home. Her burgeoning talent, combined with the fact that the rink in her tiny hometown of Ortisei in the Dolomite Mountains in northern Italy was destroyed by a landslide, meant it was time to move on.

"I would love to ask him one day what made him take me," said Kostner, who attended one of Huth’s summer camps before the duo joined forces. "I was just 14. I did my first [junior] Grand Prix and had three triples. I had no good spins, no big steps, no good programs. I was really lucky that he took me. He really pulled out what [talent] I had and taught me how to skate and prepare."

Under Huth’s tutelage, Kostner has risen to the elite circle of women’s skating. A two-time World medalist, Kostner made history when she won the 2007 European title, the first Italian woman ever to do so. The two-time European champion (2007-08) had to settle for silver place this year. Kostner has also won bronze medals in the last two ISU Grand Prix Finals, winning her second bronze last December in Korea.

"She was a junior skater and went into the ladies senior competitions when she was 15 years old," Huth said about the prodigy he quickly realized he had on his hands. "She ranked behind (Irina) Slutskaya and (Elena) Sokolova, but she was really close to them already."

ON THE EDGE OF HISTORY

Today Kostner stands on the brink of giving Italy something it has never had - a World or Olympic champion in a discipline other than ice dance. Much as either distinction would fill her with great pride, it doesn’t consume her.

"Honestly, it would be a great honor, but I don’t care so much about records or being the first Italian [champion]," she said. "It doesn’t matter too much to me. It would matter more the fact that I could be the best I can be, and the work [I have done] is paid back and that you win honestly.

"You really win because you were the best that day, and that’s what matters the most to me."

Indeed, tales of Kostner’s sportsmanship are legion throughout the skating world. In a book about Japanese ladies skaters released in Japan, former World champion Miki Ando tells a story about the 2003 World junior event, in which she was downcast after a poor short program. Kostner would not let Ando stay down for long.

"You will do wonderfully in the long program," she told Ando before giving her a supportive hug. Ando went on to win the silver medal; Kostner, the bronze.

ADMIRABLE TRAITS

Browning speaks with amazement about a day when the choreographer of one of Kostner’s major competitors arrived at their training rink in Toronto, still desperately in need of the right piece of music for a program.

Almost without hesitation, Kostner turned to Browning and offered to give up music she loved but did not plan to use that season. "That’s Carolina," said Browning with a smile and an exclamation point.

It is not just her way. She believes it is the only way. "I think [sportsmanship] is one of the most important things because if you respect them, they respect you," Kostner said. "We all respect the sport so much. The traditions are kept well in the sport. ... I think as an athlete, you have to be humble. It’s very important because otherwise, you could lose your temper, and you need that strength to go back to the rink every day."

But can nice translate into popularity?

"Only if [the fans] get to know her," Browning said. "Scott Hamilton always told me it’s important to skate well, but it is more important to do a good interview afterward. When a skater’s personality becomes a part of their skating, then it allows people to forgive. It just starts to be a relationship back and forth.

"It’s not just, ‘Oh, remember that girl from Italy?’ Then she becomes a person skating. It takes time to do that, and it takes interviews. She loves interviews, and she’s really good at interviews."

She eagerly tackles them in any of the five languages she speaks - Italian, German, English, French and Ladin, the local dialect Kostner speaks at home. "Being able to talk to a person in their own language makes you feel so much closer to them, rather than not being able to understand," she said.

OLYMPIC REFLECTIONS

Kostner’s grace faced its supreme test in 2006, when she was asked to carry the Italian flag into Stadio Olimpico during the opening ceremony at the Olympic Winter Games in her homeland. It remains one of the proudest moments of her life, but at the time it was something much, much different.

"I was a little bit intimidated by that," she said. "We had so many [World] champions in Italy, and I was not yet a champion. It was intimidating. I asked, ‘Why would they want me?’ On the other hand, I thought it was such a great honor that they put that trust in a young girl.

"It was quite difficult to accept afterward that I couldn’t keep up with their hopes." Kostner, the reigning World bronze medalist at the time, knew that at least that much was expected in her home Olympic Games. There was no hiding from the pressure or the expectations. They were in her face at almost every turn.

"It was palpable. It was tangible when I was working with her," Browning said. "You could feel it. I think there were massive expectations on her, and they were vocalized to her. I don’t think it was subtle. It was, ‘You have to do this.’"

Huth, who watched his pupil finish ninth, said, "She was not ready for this situation and tried her best, but she could not enjoy those Games."

"There was a lot of pressure," Kostner admitted. "It was not normal because I hadn’t been confronted by something like that before. Yes, I did interviews, but I never had to deal with a thing like that before in any competition.

"It just came all at once, and the big life lesson came all at once. It was just to accept your fate and accept that in the end, victory depends on the four-minute skate, but [your life] cannot depend on a four-minute skate.

"There is so much more than a victory, and so much more than a moment. You can’t give up on your dreams. There are many more chances you can take, and there may be better chances."

Perhaps that is why the opening ceremony remains at the forefront of her Olympic memories. "When I walked in there, I think I just felt very happy," Kostner said. "We had so much fun, and you try to enjoy each moment because you know it will never come back. You know it is a once-in-a-lifetime experience. It was just breathtaking. I would never want to trade it for a medal."

Huth firmly believes the Torino experience - both the good and the bad - has made Kostner stronger in sport and in life. Or maybe, it just reinforced everything that Kostner is about.

"I usually see the glass half full, not half empty," she said. "You have to. You have to because you have to know that an athlete’s world and life are not always going up. Actually, it needs to go down first to go up again. That’s just how it is. That’s what I learned from the Olympics.

"You need to love what you do, and I am sure the work will be rewarded one day."

LOVING HOME LIFE

Then again, all of this is just a testament to the sporting family that raised her and the environment in which she grew up. Kostner’s father, Erwin, is a former Olympian in ice hockey. She is the godchild and cousin of Isolde Kostner, a silver medalist in alpine skiing at the 2002 Olympic Winter Games in Salt Lake City.

"She’s been frustrated at points in her career by her inability to seize the moment," said Browning, now a figure skating analyst for CBC television in Canada. "It’s been hard, but at the same time she’s got a great family life. She comes from a sporting family, and her siblings are doing big things, so the whole family isn’t just looking at her.

"I just think that she’s a well-rounded enough person to be able to watershed that sort of thing."

Kostner hopes to use her fame to help inspire further growth in a sport that has seen its popularity in Italy boom since Torino. "I have to say I’m really proud of what it has become since the Olympics," she said. "Now people from the south and people from the islands know what figure skating is. When it comes on TV, so many people write on my website, and they say, ‘Finally, they are showing figure skating again. It’s such a nice sport.’

"It was never like that before. Of course, the first step was Barbara (Fusar-Poli) and Maurizio (Margaglio, the 2001 World champions in ice dance). Then through the Olympics, the interest grew so much and that is what I’m really proud of."

Though she spends little time there these days, Ortisei will always be a part of Kostner. When she goes home after her biggest triumphs, the town of approximately 4,500 people bursts with pride.

"It’s a lovely town, and it has many traditions," she said. "The people stick together. Whenever I come back from the World Championships, many people put banners out on their balconies to welcome me back. That’s what they do when any athlete comes back after having success at a competition. It’s a nice feeling."