updated 1:15 p.m. ET Feb. 27, 2006

CHICAGO - Back home, Shani Davis’ friends are tired of the talk.

They don’t understand how someone they consider a “pied piper” can be seen as surly, aloof.

They shudder when they see headlines like the one that graced the cover of Wednesday’s Chicago Sun-Times: “Medal Whiners.” They see a controversy between Davis and American Chad Hedrick that could have been squashed before it exploded.

“The negativity, it’s hard to talk about that,” said George Babicz, who manages the Evanston Speedskating Club that Davis joined as a 6-year-old. “I don’t think he deserves all the criticism he’s received this past week.”

Davis is no stranger to the discomfort that comes with confrontation. Poor black kids from Chicago’s South Side don’t succeed in the white world of speedskating without enduring cruelties.

But the controversy is hanging around Davis’ neck like the gold medal he won in the 1,000-meter speedskating event.

The drama has overshadowed his landmark achievement, the first individual victory by a black athlete in Winter Olympics history. Instead, Davis’ Olympic story has played out like a soap opera on ice.

To recap:

Davis declined to participate in the new team pursuit last week, and the U.S. lost to Italy in the quarterfinals.

Hedrick, who had his eyes on Eric Heiden’s record of five gold medals, said Davis’ decision cost the team a medal.

Hedrick did not shake Davis’ hand after Davis won the gold in the 1,000.

Davis gave a series of short answers in an interview with NBC’s Melissa Stark after his victory.

Davis’ mom, Cherie, was criticized for being overbearing.

Friction denied
And Davis and Hedrick denied any friction, a thinly veiled cover-up that unraveled during a 30-minute news conference after Tuesday’s 1,500. They traded insults and disagreed on just about every issue before Davis walked away, grumbling, “Shakes my hand when I lose. Typical Chad.” That episode came after Davis took the silver and Hedrick the bronze.

“We don’t like the media,” said Sanders Hicks, founder and president of the Evanston Speedskating Club. “They’re portraying him as a selfish person.”

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Hicks remembers Cherie Davis showing up with 6-year-old Shani, looking for an outlet for him to channel his energy. Speedskating was it.

But it was never easy.

While most of his classmates were emulating Michael Jordan’s success on the basketball court, Davis’ friends didn’t understand all the fuss about skating.

They made cracks about his sexuality, dubbed him an “Oreo” for taking the long ride up to the North Side to work out with all those white people at the rink. They wondered why an athlete would pass up the chance to shoot hoops or run with the football.

“It was pretty derogatory stuff, especially at that young of an age,” Davis told The Associated Press last year. “But what I was doing was so different. ... I always went against the grade. I didn’t care what people said.”

Hicks remembers making a teenage Shani sprint up a steep hill, walk back down and run to the top again. He would do it 18 times. The boy would tell his mother Hicks was “crazy.” But the coach never heard a complaint.

“It wasn’t long until he saw what the training did for him,” Hicks said.

Selfish? Aloof?

“A pied piper,” said Nanci Fragassi, operations manager of the Robert Crown Center rink in suburban Evanston.

That’s how young skaters view Davis.

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When he enters the building, someone usually shouts, “Shani!” Pretty soon, the kids pile on him.

“He’ll lace up, get on the ice and work with the kids,” Babicz said of Davis, who lives in Calgary. “He will help them and have fun with them. He’s not a guy who comes into the arena with his nose in the air.”

The Shani Davis he knows is nothing like the Shani Davis the world is seeing, a man Babicz believes got hit by a blizzard of overblown issues.

“It’s a 180-degree turnaround from the real Shani Davis,” Babicz said.

The decision not to compete in the team pursuit?

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