COLORADO SPRINGS — At one point, figure skating coach Tom Zakrajsek wanted to be on the other side of the notepads. He dreamed of winning a Pulitzer Prize. Like any fledgling scribe, he would’ve settled for a great story, a story about getting knocked down, perseverance, a little luck and in the end, recognition.
Kind of like the Tom Zakrajsek story.
Zakrajsek is the behind-the-scenes guy of one of the great stories in this year’s Winter Olympics, which start Friday. He’s the coach of national champion Rachael Flatt, the Cheyenne Mountain High School senior who’s sweeping her way to Vancouver on a wave of straight A’s and perfect jumps.
Flatt is going to the Olympics in her first year of eligibility. Zakrajsek is going in his 21st year of coaching, Flatt being his first Olympian. A year ago, he thought he’d be in Vancouver coaching Jeremy Abbott. That was until Abbott upped and dumped him and Colorado Springs’ Broadmoor Skating Club to move to Bloomfield Hills, Mich., and rookie coaches Yuka Sato and Jason Dungjen.
If Flatt’s rise to international prominence was big for her and Colorado Springs, it was nearly as big for Zakrajsek, a University of Denver honors graduate and former journeyman skater.
Sitting in a Mexican restaurant near the World Arena a few days after Flatt’s winning long program last month in Spokane, Wash., he was asked if it had sunk in yet.
“It absolutely has,” Zakrajsek said. “Halfway through last week, I started to hear from kids I went to grade school with, and high school. Some of my high school friends remembered I was voted most likely to succeed my sophomore year.
“Then I started to go, ‘Wow! This isn’t just big in the figure skating world.’ “
Zakrajsek, 46, is a disciple of John Wooden’s Pyramid of Success. The pyramid was the foundation of Wooden’s 10 national basketball titles at UCLA, and how he lived his life.
Zakrajsek had the success stories off the ice. In Flatt, he finally has an Olympic success story on it.
“It’s his world,” said his wife, Susan. “It’s been his goal since I met him. We’ve been married 10 years, and because he himself did not make the Olympics as a skater, it is what has driven him. He is driven beyond anyone I know.”
When Flatt stood at the Spokane Arena basking in the glow of her first national title, her coach had his own share of flashbacks. The shortened skating career. The career switches. The juggling of more than a dozen skaters. It probably didn’t help much that Abbott won the national title the weekend before. But more pleasant flashbacks came to mind.
“When I saw her finish her (long) program and she had that big smile in the kiss-and-cry (booth), that was the smile I saw when I gave her her first lesson when she was 8,” Zakrajsek said.
He remembers it well. She came right up to him and said, “I’m Rachael, and I’d like to learn a double loop today.”
Nine years later, she landed seven triple-triples to win nationals. Risky? Yeah. Then again, so is doing a double loop at age 8.
Ever since Zakrajsek started coaching, he’d get calls from parents saying their daughter will some day skate like Michelle Kwan. It never happened. Until Rachael showed up. “After that first lesson, I remember thinking, ‘Yeah, this mom’s right,’ ” Zakrajsek said.
Said Flatt in a recent e-mail: “Tom is an excellent technical coach! He has a critical eye for technical detail and is able to help the skater make corrections in their technique . . . jumps, spins, etc. He also knows the (International Judging System) and during the construction of new programs, plans out the technical content.”
This is heavy praise for a suburban Cleveland native who rarely placed in the top 10 nationally. Zakrajsek was about to give up skating when DU told him his application for a Rhodes scholarship would look more impressive with “figure skater” on it.
He didn’t go to Oxford but his extended skating career led him to St. Joseph, Mo., where a mother asked him to coach her son, Ryan Bradley, who blossomed into a world-class skater. He moved with Zakrajsek to Colorado Springs in 1997. Bradley and teammate Brandon Mroz have had their share of glory, but Abbott became Zakrajsek’s best Olympic hope. Then he left.
“One of the reporters asked me before the (men’s) long program who I was rooting for,” Zakrajsek said. “I said, ‘I’m rooting for Jeremy.’ How could I not? Jeremy had a lot of success last year too.”
True. Abbott won nationals and the Grand Prix finals, and Zakrajsek won national coach of the year. Then Abbott flopped to 11th at worlds and soon after bolted for Michigan, saying he needed to be out on his own.
Zakrajsek finally understood, thanks to his wife, a teacher at Ruth Washburn Cooperative Nursery School and long-time elementary school teacher.
“My wife basically said, ‘Look, you’re fortunate. You’ve had Jeremy for 10 years as the main coach, maybe a total of 12,’ ” Zakrajsek said. ” ‘That’s like having him through elementary school, middle school and high school. I get my favorite student for a year!’ “
Now Zakrajsek gets his prize student for the Olympic Games.
John Henderson: 303-954-1299 or jhenderson@denverpost.com
