By Christie Sausa
Actress and Miss America program participant Elizabeth Gibson thought she was done with figure skating forever. Now, after an eleven-year hiatus, she has competed at the 2023 US Adult Figure Skating Championships and will make her National Showcase debut in Boston later this month.
Her comeback was inspired by a rewatch of the 2005 Disney film Ice Princess, which she describes as one of her favorite movies growing up. The film stars Michelle Trachtenberg as Casey Carlyle, a brainy high schooler who decides to apply her understanding of physics to pursue competitive figure skating.
“I couldn’t watch the Olympics or figure skating competitions anymore after I stopped skating because it made me sad,” Gibson said. “This is one ice skating thing I still felt like I could watch because it just brought me joy. It wasn't a competition, it was about competition, but it was more about the love of skating.”
She was half-watching the movie while writing emails a few days before the new year, and halfway through, she said to her mom, “I wish I could start taking lessons again.” Her mom immediately responded, “Well, why don’t you?” Gibson texted her former coach Jackie Brenner and started 2023 back on the ice, having her first lesson in 11 years on January 2.
Like Casey Carlyle, Gibson was determined to learn how to skate and pursue the sport she loved; but unlike Carlyle, she was re-learning the skills she thought she had left behind for good after injury forced her to stop.
Unfortunately, around the time Gibson started landing her Axel and training three hours a day, she also started experiencing pain in both ankles. A visit to the doctor revealed that she had coalitions, abnormal connections between two or more tarsal bones. The doctor recommended she stop skating which was understandably devastating for Gibson.
“It was really hard for me to quit because I loved it so much,” Gibson said. “And I really thought, you know, in my 11-year-old brain, that I'd be doing it forever, and it was difficult to think about anything past that. I was like, well, we're done, I guess.”
She still heeded the doctor’s advice, stopping skating and getting ankle surgery over the next year.
Also a family tradition is participation in the Miss America program. Gibson’s mother, aunt and grandmother participated in the program on behalf of Oklahoma, making Gibson a third-generation Miss America contestant. In less than two weeks, she will compete in Miss Oklahoma for the fourth time; in the last two years, she has placed in the top 10 and was people’s choice in the pageant.
“It was another one of those things where I grew up around it,” Gibson said. “And like when I was younger, I would go and pull out my mom's crown and watch Miss America wearing her local title sash. My mom was the second runner-up to Miss Oklahoma her last year before deciding to stop competing.”
“You have to learn to speak well in front of people and have a community service initiative,” Gibson explained. “But you also have something that you raise awareness for. That's like volunteerism and everything, which is pretty great; actually, I got back into teaching Learn to Skate lessons because I needed a volunteer aspect [for Miss America].”
That opportunity to coach Learn to Skate resulted from a chance meeting with her then-former coach two years ago; Brenner encouraged her to coach at her local rink, and she accepted. At that point, she hadn’t been involved in skating for years, but all her endeavors seemed to point her back to skating.
She credits skating with giving her confidence and fearlessness - valuable qualities to have in demanding careers like acting and beauty pageants.
This sense of confidence helped her get back into skating. Some skaters might be nervous about re-entering the skating world after a long hiatus. But for Gibson, it wasn’t a big deal.
“Within five minutes of my first lesson, my coach said you should go to National Showcase. And I just kind of went, okay, and then I didn't really think that much about it. I love jumping into things and performing. So, it really wasn't that big of a stress, especially because within all of the things that I'm doing, this was purely for me, and I didn’t feel outside pressure.”
Gibson didn’t perform perfectly at her first US Adult Figure Skating Championships but took it in stride.
“I did fall in my free skate because my skates were really old and broke down, and we didn't realize it until it was too late,” she said. “But (I knew) if I were to fall, it's not going to be the end of the world. If it happens, I get back up. The fun thing about that was that even in that program, I still placed fifth out of twenty-four skaters (in Adult Bronze).”
Despite the problematic free skate, she didn’t let it affect her other performances. She won gold in two showcase events, Showcase Emotional Performance, and Character Performance, which qualified her for National Showcase.
As an actress who nearly majored in musical theatre, the Showcase categories are clearly a strength, and Gibson looks forward to making her National Showcase debut. In addition to the above categories, she competes in Lyrical Pop and Interpretative, in which skaters are given a piece of music on-site and must create a program on the fly. She’s looking forward to the event.
“I mean, obviously, everyone wants to go in and win. But in general, I just want to have fun skating and performing.”
She continues acting, film production, modeling and social media work and recently started to coach figure skating. As such, she has advice for skaters coming back to the sport.
“You can't judge yourself by the standard of where you finished when you were, however old you were when you had to quit or decided to quit…be open to anything I know, especially as an adult because I teach adults as well, is that there's a lot of hesitancy to giving new things and feeling like you're gonna fall and that's okay.”
No matter what happens, Gibson is grateful to honor her younger self by returning to skating.
“You know, when I step out on the ice, I like to think that I'm making my 11-year-old self proud because she was devastated that she had to stop skating,” she said. “I love being back on the ice, and I genuinely never thought I would get to skate anymore past teaching learn to skate. It’s been a blessing I am beyond grateful for.”
