Rising above it all

WASHINGTON -- With the HIV virus running through his veins and two replacement ceramic hips that whistle while he leaps, Rudy Galindo landed a triple toe jump at the Verizon Center. Then he launched his butterfly jump, floating horizontally over the ice in the same arena where Michael Jordan finally came back to earth with the Washington Wizards. The crowd cheered in amazement. The first openly gay man to win a US national skating title (1996) had beaten the odds again.

"I'm going to skate as long as my body holds up," says Galindo, 37, the most flamboyant skater of the Champions on Ice tour, which glides into the TD Banknorth Garden Sunday afternoon. "I am getting older, [but] when you're on a winning streak, you don't walk away from the table.

"That's the No. 1 thing. When you hear that applause, when you're taking your bows, that's the icing on the cake. That's what it's all about, to feel that rush. It's like Sally Field said: 'They love me. They really love me.' "

Galindo has been HIV-positive since 2000, but after doctors diagnosed him in 2002 with avascular necrosis, a degenerative disease affecting both hips -- a side effect, possibly, of HIV medications -- his career seemed over. After all, AVN forced the great Bo Jackson into retirement.

"I was skating on dead bone and it was deteriorating," says Galindo. "It was painful. A doctor told me I would never skate again."

"He was in such agony," says Tom Collins, president of Champions on Ice. "I told him we would have to replace him on the tour."

Instead, Collins and Galindo's sister Laura looked into state-of-the-art ceramic hips. Galindo had operations that fall and was back on the Champions tour in April 2004.

"It's the most amazing thing I've ever seen from an athlete," says Collins. "It's unprecedented."

Galindo paid for his own twice-a-day physical therapy and ramped up his already intense workout schedule. Now he does everything in his skating routine except the triple axel, and he vows that is coming back, too. On this latest 23-city tour, he skates to the music of "Dreamgirls," wears a rhinestone suit -- he sewed on the 17,000 sequins himself -- and works the crowd like a cagey veteran.

"He's the best entertainer," says Claudine Massie, a fan in the front row. "I think all of what he went through helps him stay in shape."

Sasha Cohen, the 2006 Olympic silver medalist and headliner of the Champions on Ice tour, calls Galindo "amazing."

"Rudy's got so much courage and heart and perseverance," she says. "He never gives up."

Galindo grew up in a trailer park, a short, skinny, effeminate Mexican-American. His dad was a truck driver, his mother suffered from mental illness. He started skating at age 8, but his problems began immediately at the rental counter, where boys were supposed to get brown skates.

"I had long hair," says Galindo. "They used to put out the white skates . . . and I was so mad and I used to cry. Kids would say, 'You're gay, you're a sissy.' "

Young Rudy refused to be picked on.

"I used to be short and got into all these trailer park fights," he says. "I was wiry."

Eventually, he earned their respect.

"At 12 years old, I won my first novice national title," he says. "It was all over the newspapers in San Jose and then they were nice to me."

He hooked up with Kristi Yamaguchi, and they were a dream team, winning the 1989 and 1990 US pairs championship. Any Olympic dreams were dashed, though, when Yamaguchi dropped Galindo to concentrate on her singles program. Yamaguchi's mother was upset about the undeniable fact that Galindo was gay and not shy about it.

"She said, 'Oh, you're not gay,' and I said, 'Oh, I am,' " says Galindo, "but Kristi couldn't concentrate on her singles. She was too tired. So we split up and that was it. It's all water under the bridge. Things have changed for the better, and we're friends now."

But at the time, the pain of being dumped hit him hard.

"It hurt a lot," says Galindo. "We were going to be named to the Olympic team. My dad was actually staying alive, holding on, because he wanted us to make the Olympic team. My Dad just dwindled away. I'm like, what am I gonna do?"

Instead of gliding on ice, Galindo crashed hard, doing cocaine, speed, and alcohol in the early '90s. The personal losses were piling up. His father died in 1993. In 1994, he had to deal with the death of his older brother, who contracted HIV while in prison, serving time for embezzlement. Two of his coaches eventually died of AIDS, too.

His sister and coach, Laura Galindo Black, pulled him back up.

"She said, 'What do you want to do -- drugs or skate?' And I said, 'Skate.' "

In 1996, in his hometown of San Jose, he astounded the figure skating world by coming out of nowhere to win the national championships. He says it felt as though his father, brother, and two coaches were lifting him from heaven.

"It was like a dream," says Galindo. "I felt like I was floating through the whole performance. It was so easy."

After he won the bronze at the 1996 World Championships, the media seemed to focus on his sexuality.

"I didn't come out -- I was out," says Galindo. "The media was, 'Oh my God, you're gay,' and I'm like yes -- I've been out my whole life to my family and friends. Everyone in the skating community knew. But just because I won the national title, it's like, 'Oh, my God, you're gay.' "

Galindo says his flamboyance cost him with American judges.

"The judges would say, 'You have to tone down your costumes, your choreography,' and I'm like, 'No . . .' "

Galindo turned professional in 1996. "I wanted to skate for the audiences, not for the judges," he says.

But in January 2000, he had to quit the Goodwill Games after 40 seconds because of labored breathing. After a bout with pneumonia that March, he found out he was HIV-positive. Initially, he thought he was going to die.

Instead, he started medication, plotting a comeback and talking about safe sex.

"It was my stupidity," he says. "I was going through a rough time in my life. I thought that because it happened to my brother, it can't happen to me.

"It happened to me. Don't be dumb to HIV. Take good care of your health. Don't give up. Don't sit on the couch. Don't think you're gonna die. Look at me: I skate and love life. It's not a death sentence, you know. That's what I try to instill in their minds."

He returned to the tour in April 2000. "Everybody on this tour was great," says Galindo. "No one was afraid. They were so educated."

He takes only three pills daily ("The doctor said they now combine nine pills into one") and drinks a high-energy beverage. He works out endlessly.

"You've got to be religious about it," he says. "I get up, do yoga, skate for a couple of hours, play racquetball with my sister, do weights, jumps on the floor, and then right before I go to bed, I do a half-hour cardio."

He does not have a partner.

"People are afraid still, even though there's so many safe ways around it," he says. "I finally just gave up and said I'm going to put all my eggs into one basket helping kids, coaching, being with my family, my niece and nephew."

He also believes there are homosexuals in every professional sport.

"I just think a lot of those athletes can't come out because it's a team thing and they're just worried about endorsements," he says. "I'm not going to say they're cowards -- I don't want people to be mad at me.

"I just think their sexual preference is no big deal. Why do they have to come out? They do their jobs and that's it. Who cares what goes on behind closed doors?"

Galindo has become good friends with Johnny Weir, the three-time national champion who is also touring with Champions on Ice. Weir calls Galindo "inspiring" and "one of my best friends." That may seem like a surprise, since Galindo accused Weir of copying his style during the 2006 Olympics and urged the media to out Weir, who won't discuss his sexual orientation.

"We all say stupid things, getting mad and venting," says Galindo. "You realize you made a mistake. I apologized. Now I'm throwing him in the finale."

Galindo says he is content with his life, except for the whistling ceramic hips.

"I was practicing on the ice one time doing footwork," he says. "We had birds in our arena in Reno and I thought, 'Oh a bird just flew over.' And then one day I was doing jumps on the floor in the gym and I thought, wait a minute, there's no birds in the gym, so I thought it was my shoes. I took off my shoes and did [the jumps] in my socks, and the whistle was there."

It sounds like a hinge on a door.

"The doctor says it's a dry spot in one of the sockets that kind of rubs," he says. "Listen to this, it really bugs me."