After Contemplating Retirement, Gracie Gold Returns to Grand Prix Circuit at Skate America

At the 2022 Toyota U.S. Figure Skating Championships, we saw a glimpse of the Gracie Gold of old.
 
Gold finished sixth in the short program, not falling once and performing all but one element with a positive grade of execution. She received a standing ovation, taking a moment to compose herself behind her hands before grinning broadly as she bowed.
 
"I probably more frequently have had not so good short programs at Nationals before. Pretty famously, I guess you could say," Gold said. "So to have a really good one, [and] get that standing ovation, was a really special moment for me."
 
However, she placed 12th in the free skate, dropping her to 10th overall – her highest placement since 2017, yes, but still a disappointment for the two-time U.S. champion.
 
Gold says she didn't plan to continue skating after that competition.
 
As she was feeling out what she wanted to do next, she began preparing for the Ice Dreams Tour, which kicked off in April. It was her first tour since Stars on Ice in 2017 and put her back in the company of old friends Polina Edmunds, Max Aaron and Jeremy Abbott (who's also one of her choreographers).
 
"Since skating is an individual sport, it can feel a little bit lonesome at times, so to have the camaraderie and to be around other people that love and appreciate the sport as much as I do, I think was really cool," the 2014 Olympian said. "What's really fun about shows is that there aren't any rules. You get to do what you want to do, when you want to do it and you can skate to what music you want to do, and the group numbers, of course, are fun as a singles skater. I don't want to say light-hearted, because we did take it seriously. Most, if not all figure skaters, are perfectionists, so we wanted every show to go perfectly, but if it didn't, if it did, it was all the same after and onto the next city.
 
"And slowly but surely, I fell in love with skating again."
 
So Gold decided … well, why not continue?
 
"I still love skating, and I still have some things that I want to do out there on the ice at a competitive level," she said.
 
Gold started dipping her toe back into things. She skated a few hours a day, started working out more and building her strength back up. She kept her short program from last season, and her new free skate choreographed by Michael Solonoski came together easily. She signed up for the Philadelphia Summer International Competition at IceWorks, her training facility, and placed third.
 
From there, it was onto Champs Camp in Detroit, where, thanks to the potential she had shown, she competed in a skate-off for the open spot on the 2022 Skate America roster.
 
"The skate-off portion was a little bit stressful, because normally you can't win Champs Camp, so to speak," Gold said. "But I was skating really well that week, and it was nice to see a lot of people I knew, but also some fresh faces, and just kind of be back in the higher level."
 
Gold was indeed skating well, and secured herself the berth at Skate America Oct. 21-23 in Norwood, Mass.
 
Other than a trip to Skate America in 2020, when it was an all-American field of competitors due to the COVID-19 pandemic, this is Gold's first Grand Prix assignment since the Rostelecom Cup in 2018.
 
"Oh, I'm really excited," Gold said. "It's been a while, and for it to be in Boston, it's a beautiful facility. And just to have a Grand Prix again is really, really cool.
 
"Skate America always has a TBD spot, but I wasn't sure if I was someone that would even be considered for it. Not on my radar at all. So for them to invite me to the skate-off at Champs Camp and to win the skate-off, definitely not what I was expecting at the beginning of July."
 
At this point, Gold's story is well-known. After two U.S. titles and a medal in the team event at the Olympic Winter Games Sochi 2014, she stepped away from the sport to receive treatment for anxiety, depression and an eating disorder. She worked her way back to the U.S. Championships in 2020 and has been making steady, if slow, progress ever since. In September, she finished 12th at the Nebelhorn Trophy in Oberstdorf, Germany – her first competition on foreign soil since that last Grand Prix in 2018.
 
"I guess I'd always hoped (to get back to this level), but I didn't necessarily expect to," Gold said. "There's a lot of stuff in and out of our control in skating, so I was just trying to focus on the stuff that was in my control, which is just working hard, training hard and then trying to perform to the best of my ability."
 
Gold isn't focusing on placements at Skate America or the rest of the season – those are part of the aforementioned stuff not in her control. What she does hope for are two clean programs at Skate America, and then to skate lights-out at the U.S. Championships.
 
Her circumstances may have changed, but Gold, fundamentally, has not.
 
"In a sport like skating, there's always more," Gold said. "You can always do more. And as a perfectionist by nature, it could always be better. It could always be more perfect. Jumps could always be higher. Spins could always be faster. Programs could always be performed more emotional, more riveting. And so I'm just taking (getting a Grand Prix assignment) as a big victory, but of course, I'd love two Grand Prix assignments. It's not how Grand Prix assignments work, but now I'm like, 'Oh, I want another senior B. I want another international outing.' Now I don't just want a perfect short at (U.S. Championships), I want a perfect short AND a perfect long.
 
"In some ways, it's just a step along the journey for the season, but to acknowledge it, it's a pretty good one. It's a pretty big one."