We’ve only heard about scandal prone former Olympic skater Tonya Harding a couple of times in the past few years, and I have to admit to being fascinated by her. Tonya is best known for allegedly having her ex husband cap rival skater Nancy Kerrigan in the knee in 1994, something Tonya denies having any prior knowledge of. She did a book tour in 2008 in which she claims that her ex husband, Jeff Gillooly, planned the attack without her knowledge and then raped her at gunpoint along with two other men to prevent her from going to the FBI to proclaim her innocence. Tonya has had multiple run-ins with the law in the past few years and spent a year touring as a professional women’s boxer from 2003-2004. I’m not sure what she’s done recently other than a 2009 interview with Real Sports, in which she got offended and defensive after President Obama used her name as a synonym for dirty tricks. That video is below and it’s super entertaining.

Anyway Tonya is pregnant with her first child at 40! I could have sworn she already had a bunch of children by different men, but apparently not.

The former figure skater, 40, is expecting her first child with husband Joseph Price, her attorney confirms to PEOPLE.

“Tonya is pregnant and very happily married,” Linda Lewis tells PEOPLE. “She wants her privacy, but she is very happy.”

The baby — reportedly a boy — is said to be due “any time,” notes the Portland Tribune.

Harding, who rose to prominence in 1991 after winning the U.S. Figure Skating Championships, became notorious in 1994 after her ex-husband and bodyguard hired another man to injure her competitor Nancy Kerrigan‘s leg, an attack which caused her to withdraw from the national championship that year.

She later pleaded guilty to hindering the prosecution after denying foreknowledge of the plot but admitting that she had not come forward once she found out. Harding, who was banned from amateur skating and completed probation, now lives in southwest Washington.

[From People]

Congratulations are in order I guess. From what I can find, Tonya hasn’t had any incidents with the law since 2007, so maybe she’s cleaned up and is ready to be a mom at this point. For all you can say about her, she hasn’t neglected any kids yet.

Tonya Harding is shown in 2007 in the header and in 2005 below. Credit: WENN.com

Former US figure skater Tonya Harding put out a book last spring in which she claimed that she had no part in the 1994 clubbing attack of her rival, Nancy Kerrigan. 38 year-old Harding said that the incident was a plot planned by her ex husband, Jeff Gillooly, and his conspirators. When she found out that they were behind the knee beating she said she planned to go to the FBI with the information but that Gillooly and two men she did not know raped her at gunpoint to keep her silent. It took her 14 years to go public with this information because she was scared, she claimed. Many people doubted her account of the long-over attack, but I watched her tell her story on the Today Show and found her very believable.

In a recent interview with HBO Real Sports Tonya was asked about the fact that President Obama brought up her name during his 2007 campaign, saying he wasn’t going to “knee cap” his then-opponent Hillary Clinton and “do a Tonya Harding.” Harding got visibly upset when she was asked about it, and seemed incredibly pissed off that Obama used her name, which has become synonymous with dirty tricks. (This story is a little old and you may have heard it already, but it’s news to me. )

In a recent interview for HBO’s “Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel,” Oregonian and infamous figure skater Tonya Harding lashed out about President Obama’s use of her name in a past speech.

Back when he was still on the campaign trail in 2007, Barack Obama talked about how the pundits said he should “knee cap her” or “do a Tonya Harding on the front runner,” referring to his main contender at the time, then U.S. Senator Hillary Clinton.

“He has this country to think about, he has the candidacy to think about, he has the war to think about, and he has to bring me up? What the hell is important in this world today?” she responded.

“But guess what, I get jobs because he used my name on national television, because people forgive who Tonya Harding is. All publicity is good publicity.”

Harding went on to say that she doesn’t care what other people think. But visibly, she did seem to care what the President thought, as she grew more agitated over the questioning.The interview clip quickly made its rounds on YouTube as yet another entertaining example of Harding not being afraid to say exactly what was on her mind.

“It sounds really harsh, it sounds like I’m being a backwoods hicks girl, but you know what, that is who I am,” she said. “If you like me, great. If you don’t like me, that’s okay, that’s your opinion. But I betcha, you’ll still pay money to come and see me.”

[From KGW Portland via Gossip Rocks]

Tonya still has the 90s bangs and she still has the defiant attitude. She’s had a rough life and she obviously resents it when people bring up her past, even though she keeps emphasizing that she doesn’t care. Some of her attitude might be attributed to a bad rapport with the interviewer, Bernie Goldberg, who called her a “piece of work” and probably had some few choice words for her before she gave this sound bite. If the 1994 attack did happen without her knowledge and she was raped at gunpoint to keep quiet about it you can understand why she gets so upset when people still bring it up and use her name as if she’s solely responsible.

Harding has been touring the US and Canada in extreme boxing exhibitions.

37 year-old former US figure skater Tonya Harding was on the Today Show this morning in a somber interview with Meredith Viera to promote her new book. In the book, called “The Tonya Tapes,” she says that she was not involved in the clubbing incident of her rival, American skater Nancy Kerrigan, in 1994, and that her ex husband, Jeff Gillooly, planned it without her knowledge. Viera read an excerpt from Tonya’s book that said that she did plan on going to the FBI once she learned that they attacked Kerrigan, but that her ex and two guys she didn’t know raped her at gunpoint to keep her silent. This is the first time she has come forward with this news:

On being raped at gunpoint to keep silent about Kerrigan attack
Viera: “In this book, you reaffirm that you weren’t involved with the actual attack, but you say that you did plan to go immediately to the FBI when you found out that your ex husband was involved, until this happened, I’m going to read to you, this is the quote from your book:

‘Jeff and two other guys – don’t know who they were because I couldn’t see who they were – they were in a different car – decided to drive me up to the mountains, put a gun to my head, and take themselves upon me. They told me, this is what you are going to say, this is what you are going to do, and if you don’t you are not going to be here anymore.’

What you’re saying, Tonya, is that these men raped you and threatened to kill you.”

Harding: “Yes.”

Viera: “Why have you waited 14 years to tell this story?”

Harding: “Ashamed. Scared. There are so many people out there who have had bad things happen to them and they can’t tell anybody because they’re afraid to tell someone. It’s just time.”

Viera asked if she told anyone, and she said she told her godmother, the author of her book, and one other person.

On being beaten by her mother throughout her childhood
She said that when she didn’t skate well, her mother would drag her off the ice by her hair, take her to the bathroom, and beat her butt black and blue. For Tonya, the rink was the place she could feel in control and safe.

After the break they read a statement by her mother, who denied hitting Tonya except for one time with a hairbrush. She said “I will always love her. I am her mother.”

Tonya says she has forgiven her mom but that they are estranged and she does not think they will ever reunite.

On her troubled past and people questioning her credibility
Meredith reminds us that Tonya has been arrested for DUI and for attacking her boyfriend with a hubcap, and that people may question her credibility and wonder if she is trying to cash in with a book.

Tonya was kind of heartfelt in her response and said “I wrote the book to just be able to lift my spirits and also help other people out there… [who] don’t get their voices heard. Life is too precious to just throw it away. And I just want people to realize… talk to somebody. It’s not shameful… If you need help, ask for help. It’s ok.

“Life… has ups and downs. When you go to hell and come back, there’s always light at the end of the tunnel.”

Tonya said that success to her is having inner peace and being happy. She says she wants closure and a new beginning.

When she talked about how she was raped she got quiet and upset and it definitely looked like she was telling the truth. Tonya came off as a woman who was wounded and vilified, who is now trying to get her dignity and life back on track. She’s made a lot of bad choices since she was barred from figure skating, and maybe she’ll be able to regain some sense of self worth along with the closure on her terrible childhood that she says she’s looking for.

Considering that her mom was beating her throughout her childhood and her ex husband and his friends ganged raped her, It makes you look at the whole situation and all the press coverage that followed in a much different light.

Tonya Harding on The Today Show, 5/15/08, Part 1:

Tonya Harding on The Today Show, 5/15/08, Part 2:

Former Olympic figure skater Tonya Harding is best known for hiring a thug in 1994 to take down one of her opponents, Nancy Kerrigan, by striking her in the knee during practice for the U.S. Figure Skating Championships. She went on to win the U.S. Championship, but was subsequently stripped of her title by the US Figure Skating Association, which banned her for life from all events and from being certified as a skating coach. She did participate in the Olympics at Lillehammer that year, placing eighth while Kerrigan won the silver medal behind fellow troubled skater, Oksana Baiul.

Harding went on to a mixed career as a boxer, starting out by whomping Bill Clinton’s sexual harassment accuser Paula Jones on the Fox Celebrity Boxing show in 2002. She was not as successful in her brief subsequent career as a professional boxer, and abandoned her ambitions in June, 2004 after getting beaten and booed in a match in Alberta, Canada by boxer Amy Johnson.

There’s a sex tape between Harding and her ex-husband, Jeff Gillooly, on their wedding night in 1990. I watched it for research purposes back when it came out and she sure had some athletic sex. It is thought that Gillooly sold the tape to get back at Harding for implicating him in the plot to whack Nancy Kerrigan’s knee. [All details from Wikipedia]

Now she’s back in the news briefly for having made a call to 911 on March 11th claiming that people were trying to steal her car and were hiding guns on her property.

At first she called 911 from a Vancouver, Washington tow truck company near her house. Somehow she convinced the tow truck driver to give her a ride, and that’s where police were called to the scene. That call was just released to the public and I was surprised how normal-sounding she is. I was hoping for some more obvious paranoia from Tonya. Although her tale is outrageous, she’s speaking normally and doesn’t sound agitated enough to make it interesting.

Harding points out her broken skate lace at the 1994 Winter Olympics.

The incident, which did not generate an official police report, was outlined in a Clark County sheriff’s dispatch log detailing two separate calls relating to Harding’s erratic behavior early Sunday.

The log did not indicate that Harding was on any medication, Sgt. Tim Bieber said Thursday.

“I don’t know from the call whether she was hallucinating,” he said, noting that if that had been the case, deputies typically take people to the hospital involuntarily.

“There’s no indication in the log that she was on any medication,” he added.

Harding called authorities around 4:50 a.m. Sunday from Yacolt Towing to report that there were possibly four men and a woman trying to break into her residence northeast of Vancouver, Bieber said. She also said they were trying to stash weapons on her property.

It’s unclear how Harding got to the towing company, although notes in the call log indicate a tow truck driver had given her a ride, Bieber said

“She was thinking the suspects followed her and the tow truck driver” to the business, he said.

A person answering the phone at Yacolt Towing would not comment Thursday.

Deputies arrived within a half hour, Bieber said, reading from dispatch notes that said the report appeared to be very implausible.

“It says she was agitated, glancing everywhere. She seemed frustrated that people can’t see the people that she sees,” Bieber said.

Then she ended up at her friend’s house, who placed another call to 911 saying she was “tweaking out, seeing things.” Tonya’s rep says she was on no illegal drugs and chalks it up to a new over the counter asthma medication she was on.

She has a long history of paranoid calls to police involving far-out scenarios though, and this type of thing seems all too common for the fallen figure skater.

On May 25, 1995, it was reported that Harding claimed she was being stalked by professional golfers driving a white Lincoln Town Car, resulting in a car chase involving Harding, her ex-husband Gillooly, and the police.

On February 12, 1997, Harding claimed that she was abducted at knife-point outside her home by a bushy-haired man who forced her to drive to a rural area, where she rammed her truck into a tree and escaped by running into the woods. Police found no evidence of an abduction. This incident happened on the opening weekend of the 1997 U.S. Figure Skating Championships.

On October 16, 1997, Harding reported that her truck had been stolen from a shopping mall parking lot.

On January 6, 2000, six years to the day after the attack on Kerrigan, Harding was in the news again after she lost control of her truck on an icy road and landed in a ditch. She and a male companion then allegedly made threats against a press photographer.

On February 24, 2000, Harding was ordered by a Clark County judge to stay away from alcohol and her former boyfriend, Darren Silver, after being booked on fourth-degree Domestic Violence assault charges for punching Silver and throwing a hubcap at him at their Camas, Washington residence. Harding was also sentenced to 3 days in jail and 10 days of community service on a work crew. Shortly before this, Harding had been attempting to make a comeback as a professional skater, but the hubcap incident effectively put an end to her skating career.

On April 20, 2002, Harding was involved in another accident with her truck. She was cited for drunk driving and a violation of her probation agreement from her 2000 conviction.

On October 23, 2005, Harding, apparently again under the influence of alcohol, was involved in a fight at her home in Vancouver, Washington with Christopher Nolan, a man she described as her boyfriend. Initially, she made a 911 call claiming to have been assaulted in her home by two masked men. For his part, Nolan claimed that Harding attacked him after having too much to drink. In the end, Nolan was charged with assault and ordered to stay away from Harding and to avoid alcohol.

What’s an asthma-suffering girl to do after a failed skating and boxing career? She’s way out of shape at this point. Maybe she can be the new Trimspa spokesperson now that Anna Nicole has passed. They seem to have relaxed standards and would probably welcome the notoriety. I’m sure she could figure out a quicker way to lose weight than popping those horse pills.