Gracie Gold has had success as a 2014 and 2016 U.S. figure skating champion, earning a bronze medal in the team event in 2014, writes Ellen Dunkel for The Philadelphia Inquirer.
But her success was built on the pressures of expectations, and Gold, 28, was sometimes an unhealthy perfectionist.
For a time, things spiraled out of control until she found her life balance, helped along by Vincent Restencourt, a coach at Aston’s IceWorks, who offered to train her for free, believing she could make a comeback.
Gold’s written about her trauma and redemption in her new book, “OUTOFSHAPEWORTHLESSLOSER: A Memoir of Figure Skating, F*cking Up, and Figuring It Out.”
The title was what Gold named her voice.
“But as stuff started to get worse and fall apart in my life, that voice just became louder and louder. I really started to amp up after that [at] 2016 World Championships,” she said.
Gold’s memoir describes it all–her eating disorders, anxiety, depression, unkind coaches, a complicated family life, rape, and her slow redemption.
Today, she’s a more carefree athlete, training, and teaching figure skating at IceWorks.
She hopes to keep skating and compete again.
Find out more about the difficulties and triumphs in the life of figure skater Gracie Gold in The Philadelphia Inquirer.
