Scott Hamilton skates a farewell at the Palace

He may have founded Stars on Ice, but the skating show won't be stopping in Scott Hamilton's hometown of Bowling Green, Ohio - not even on this, his final tour after 14 years with the show.

So if it's OK with Detroit, the four-time World Champion and 1984 Olympic figure skating champion would like to claim us as his hometown when the show hits the Palace of Auburn Hills on Saturday.

"If you stand on a chair in Bowling Green, you can see Detroit," the skater says. "Detroit is the closest I get to Bowling Green, so a lot of friends come up to see me. And the Palace is one of my favorite places to skate. It's the way you step on the ice, the grade of how the seats go up, the backstage areas are nice, and the food backstage is great!"

Hamilton still has the legs to skate, and the sheer nerve to perform a back flip on the ice, but at 42, decent food and a comfortable backstage isn't enough to offset the rigors of touring.

"After 15 years, my body doesn't recover the way it used to," Hamilton says. "And, I need some balance in my life. Most people have families and pets. I've put everything into the skating for a long time. The skating is very physical and great, but part of being on the road is being in hotels, having a lot of downtime between shows. If I were in one place, I could be doing a lot of other things."

Some of those things include his charity work with St. Jude's Hospital, as well as golf and socializing with friends at his Colorado and California homes. Among those friends; Saturday Night Live comedian Kevin Nealon and Angie Dickinson. Yes - Police Woman herself.

"Angie likes skating a lot, she's been coming to shows for years," Hamilton says. "Kevin and I hang out a lot, we're like Mutt and Jeff, since he's about six foot five."

Stars on Ice runs through Portland, Maine, in April, but then the Canadian leg starts up, so Hamilton won't be skating his last show until later in the year. And even then, 42-year-old bones or not, this isn't a retirement. Hamilton hopes to launch a skate show on Broadway.

He still skates with youthful elan, a smile of pure joy on his face as he performs to the soulful music he loves - Stevie Wonder's "If It's Magic" and James Brown's "I Feel Good" in the current tour.

The James Brown song is apt, considering Hamilton's quick recovery from the testicular cancer doctors discovered in 1997. After five months' treatment at the Cleveland Clinic and a lot of yoga, he was judged to be in remission.

The skater's tough-minded approach to his illness may have been forged as a child. Adopted by Bowling Green State professors, he endured a four-year period from the age of 5 until he was 9 when he stopped growing. Although he was in and out of hospitals for years, Hamilton says there never was a set diagnosis.

Frail and small for his age, Hamilton took up skating as a sport he could do on a level with other kids. As his skating improved, he started growing again.

"Everybody's health is challenged, but for me it's been throughout my life," Hamilton says. "I think it took away a lot of the shock factor of the illness away.

"So it's like, OK, I've been there before."

There have been a lot of changes in championship skating since Hamilton started in the '70s. "It's become so athletic now with the quads and everything," he says. "But people are also looking at the sport differently, the professional side of the sport is smaller.

"Look at Todd Eldridge, he's been around forever, and now he's going for his fourth Olympics. A lot of skaters are staying in it just to be competitive. Before, you'd do your competitive time, then you'd turn pro."

While he hastens to explain he's not talking about Eldridge, Hamilton says he believes that many skaters are letting their professional window of opportunity slip away.

"There's a lot of people eligible who should have turned pro a long time ago," he says. "Youth rules, but you get a lot of guys in there who want to see about the next big one, instead of saying, 'OK, I've reached my peak as a competitor, it's time to move on.' "

Hamilton has been such a mentor to younger Stars on Ice skaters, such as Tara Lipinski, that it would seem then to be a natural progression to become a coach himself.