Kathy Casey story

Kathy Casey story
Great Falls 02/14/2010, Page P20

Skating coach Kathy Casey has roots in Great Falls
Just 18 days before the opening ceremonies of the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics, Spokane hosted the National Figure Skating Champi­onships, filling the city with elite skaters and coaches.
The athletes performed dizzying spins, triple Axels, twizzles, and a few quad jumps, while thousands of fans looked on in awe.
One of those on hand was Kathy Casey, a world-renowned coach and past president of the United States Figure Skating Professionals. Casey has served on the board of directors of the United States Figure Skating Association and on the U.S. Olympic Coaches Committee. She has been the official figure skating coach for three Olympic games and conducts semi­nars all over the world.
She’s also a Great Falls native.
Between commitments in Spokane, Casey remi­nisced about her early days in Great Falls and her first moments on ice.
“The Sieben family took Terry and I to a public session on rental skates,” she said of an outing with her brother.
Casey was hooked from her first wobbly glide and came home to tell her mother that she wanted to take lessons.
At the time, she was 12, “already, over the hill,” she said.
Yet, she entered some competi­tions, making it to a sectional event.
Her ultimate goal was to become a coach. And it wasn’t long before her dream came true.
In 1962, she became the assistant coach at the Lakewood Winter Club in Tacoma, Wash. In 1990, she was offered the posi­tion as skating director for the Broadmoor Skating club in Colorado Springs, Colo. She directed that pro­gram until 2000.
During her years in Tacoma and Colorado Springs, Casey coached many famous skaters, including Great Falls’ own Scott Davis, who went on to become a United States National Figure Skat­ing Champion, World Figure Skating Champion and Olympic silver medal­ist; Rosalynn Sumner s, Nicole Bobek, Scott Hamilton, and the reigning U.S. Senior Ladies gold medalist, Rachel Flatt.
She said she taught Davis through trial and error.
Casey could see other countries were way ahead of the United States then, through weight training and exercise. Casey had little information on the biomechanics of jumping so she went to the Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs and enlisted their help.
Collaborating with the research team — they rewrote how to do a triple Axel 18 times — they came up with excellent results. Her studies helped her earn the 2005 U.S. Olympic Committee Sports Science Coach of the Year.
Today, skaters learn to jump using a pole harness, a pole with a contrap­tion that wraps around the skater. Holding the pole, the coach skates along with skater, preventing serious falls during an attempted jump.
Another innovation is the dart fish, a machine similar to a video camera that replays the skater’s jump, detail­ing how long they have to be in the air to reach the desired number of revo­lutions.
Casey’s coaching colleagues nomi­nated her for the 2009 Sonja Henie Award. She received the honor at a dinner. As her name was announced, Casey came down the aisle dressed as the legendary Norwegian figure skat­ing champion in high top skates and vintage costume.
Today, after some 35 years as a suc­cessful coach, Casey conducts skat­ing seminars in Canada, Sweden, Great Britain, Norway, Scotland, Switzerland, Australia and the United States. She has given presentations for the International Skating Union and conducted developmental ice skating camps in Finland, Slovenia and China.
While she will have no official duties at this year’s Olympics in Van­couver, she will be on the sidelines cheering on skaters she knows through her years of coaching.
When not traveling the world, Casey ofte n comes back to Great Falls to visit her 98-year-old mother.
➤ For full coverage of the Winter Games:
www.gftribune.com


On the Road
— Polly Kolstad


TRIBUNE FILE PHOTO
Kathy Casey

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