Born in Worcester, Massachusetts, Frank Carroll’s father introduced him to figure skating on an outdoor pond. Early in his youth, an indoor ice rink was built across the street from his home - a love affair with a sport that compired artistry, athleticism, dance and theater was born.
Frank Carroll was twice a national bronze medalist at the junior level and a New England champion before he turned professional and toured with the Ice Follies. He even had a brief stint in acting, which he remained deeply private about until the end of his days.
The son of a professor, Frank was a strong student and graduated on the Dean’s List from the College of the Holy Cross with a B.S. in Sociology. Though he initially intended on attending San Francisco Law School, he was spurred to enter the coaching realm after his beloved coach, Maribel Vinson Owen, and his dear friends and peers perished on the plane crash of Sabena 548 - taking the lives of the entire United States team heading to the 1961 World Figure Skating Championships.
The excellent student proved to be a master teacher. In 1968, he had his first national medalist. A year later, Frank coached Jimmy Demogines to the novice national title. In 1972, he coached Robert Bradshaw to be the Olympic alternate. Four years later, he had his first Olympian with Linda Fratianne. Linda went on to win the world title in 1977 and 1979 and finished a controversial second at the 1980 Olympic Games.
He soon coached Tiffany Chin to gold at the world junior championships and guided Christopher Bowman for eighteen years. Frank is best known for changing the sport when he teamed up with Michelle Kwan. Early in Kwan’s career, Carroll began a collaboration with choreographer Lori Nichol that elevated the art form of figure skating and transformed the long program into a choreographic work of art. Together, Carroll, Kwan and Nichol redefined excellence and were the epitome of class, elegance and grace during the height of figure skating’s popularituy.
Carroll coached students to countless titles at the national, international and Olympic levels. His pupils include: Michelle Kwan, Linda Fratianne, Christopher Bowman, Evan Lysacek, Denis Ten, Tiffany Chin, Mirai Nagasu, Gracie Gold, Tim Goebel, Karen Kwan, Joanna Ng, Beatrisa Liang, Jonathan Cassar, Robert Bradshaw, Yebin Mok, Angela Nikodinov, Jennifer Kirk, Danielle Kahle, Carolina Kostner, Silvia Fontana, Nicole Bobek, Daisuke Murakami, Carly Gold, Scott Dyer, Doug Mattis, Craig Heath, Jeri Campbell, Ellie Kawamura, Kristiene Gong, Luis Hernandez, Todd Sand and Tessa Hong.
Frank Carroll is a symbol of resilience, discipline, hard work and doing things the right way. Despite losses at the Olympics that broke of the heart of the teacher for students Linda Fratianne and Michelle Kwan, Frank Carroll persevered and never gave up. When pupil Evan Lysacek won gold at the 2010 Olympic Games, the skating world erupted - equally as delighted for Frank as they were for Evan.
Despite all of accomplishments of his famous students, Frank considered his happiest coaching moment to be guiding Robert Taylor to win the novice men’s national title against all odds by sheer hard work and discipline.
Carroll will be remembered for his wit, wisdom, intelligence and love of the sport. He coached three world champions, six Olympic medalists, six U.S. senior champions and had the honor of coaching at 10 Olympic Games.
Frank is predeceased by his mother, Agnes, father, Thomas, and sister, Rosemary.
He passed away peacefully in the morning hours of Sunday, June 9, surrounded by friends and loves one. Frank Carroll made figure skating better.
Philip Hersh spent 28 years as Olympic sports writer for the Chicago Tribune and has gone on to write about the Olympics and figure skating for icenetwork and NBC Olympics. He has covered 20 Olympics -- 12 Winter and 8 Summer -- seven soccer World Cups (four men, three women), 35 U.S. Figure Skating Championships, 20 World Figure Skating Championships, 12 World Track and Field Championships, two Pan American Games and more than two dozen other national championships in Olympic sports.
As an internationally recognized expert in the field, Hersh has appeared on the NBC Today Show and Nightly News; NBC's "Winter Olympics Daily" show in 2010 and 2018; the ABC Evening News; CBS Sunday Morning and CBS Olympic coverage; ESPN’s Sportsweek; CNN; Chicago Tonight; Monitor Radio, PBS Radio and NPR.
Hersh was born in Boston and graduated from Yale University with a B.A. in French and did advanced study in Spanish and Italian.
He has been a four-time nominee for the Pulitzer Prize and a winner of multiple Associated Press Sports Editors annual writing awards, Chicago Headline Club awards and Chicago Society of Black Journalists award.
N.Y. Times columnist George Vecsey wrote that "among the qualities of an ideal journalist is the international vision of Phil Hersh."
21 окт 2024
