| Jennifer Kirk | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Kirk in 2003. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Born | August 15, 1984 Newton, Massachusetts | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Height | 1.58 m (5 ft 2 in) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Figure skating career | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Country | United States | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Skating club | SC of Boston | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Began skating | 1994 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Retired | September 7, 2005 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Medal record
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Jennifer Anne "Jenny" Kirk (born August 15, 1984) is an American former competitive figure skater. She is the 2000 World Junior champion and the 2002 Four Continents champion.
Jennifer Kirk was born in Newton, Massachusetts. [1] Prior to skating, she was a gymnast until the age of nine. [2] She also studied ballet and once performed with the Boston Ballet. [3]
Kirk grew interested in skating and began training with coaches Evy and Mary Scotvold at the age of 10 [2] at the Skating Club of Boston. She was featured as a young up-and-coming skater on the PBS shows Zoom and Arthur . [4] [5] At 15, a piece of bone tore from her pelvis and jutted into her hip flexor. [6]
Kirk won gold at the 2000 World Junior Championships. In 2002, she captured the Four Continents title. At the 2002 World Championships, she placed 15th in the short program before withdrawing due to a hip injury. [7]
Ahead of the 2002–03 season, Kirk moved to train with Richard Callaghan in Detroit. In addition to single skating, she also briefly dabbled in pair skating with Fedor Andreev in the summer of 2003, describing it as fun but challenging. In the summer of 2004, Kirk moved to the Toyota Sports Center in El Segundo, California, to train with Frank Carroll and Ken Congemi. [2] [8] [9]
Kirk won the bronze medal at the 2004 U.S. Championships. The following season, she withdrew from her first Grand Prix assignment due to an injury. [7] She placed 10th at the 2004 Cup of Russia and won bronze at the 2005 Four Continents.
On September 7, 2005, Kirk announced her retirement from competitive figure skating. [10] She moved to Boston, where she worked as a coach, but later returned to Southern California. Kirk's decision to quit competitive skating the year before the Olympics was profiled on Ice Diaries .
Kirk is a member of the U.S. Figure Skating International Committee. In the fall of 2012, she and her colleague, David Lease, launched "The Skating Lesson", a podcast and website. [11] The two interview current and former skaters, coaches, choreographers and skating officials including Debi Thomas, Frank Carroll, Sandra Bezic, Alissa Czisny, Tiffany Chin, and Rudy Galindo. The web-series has garnered a following of thousands of figure skating fans with its weekly video interviews.[ citation needed ]
In May 1999, Kirk's mother, Pat Harris, was diagnosed with breast cancer. She died in August 2001. The loss of her mother was one of the reasons Kirk decided to retire. "Although I still love skating very much, my passion and love for the competitive aspect of the sport has dwindled following the death of my mother in 2001 and my nagging hip injuries." [10] In 2009, she revealed her career-long struggle with eating disorders and mentioned that it had been a factor in her decision to retire. [12] [13] She also stated that disordered eating was very common among skaters but not enough was being done to address the problem. [14] [15]
| Season | Short program | Free skating | Exhibition |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2004–05 [1] |
| ||
| 2003–04 [16] |
| ||
| 2002–03 [17] |
| ||
| 2001–02 [18] | |||
| 2000–01 [19] |
| ||
| 1999–2000 |
GP: Grand Prix; JGP: Junior Grand Prix
| International [20] | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Event | 97–98 | 98–99 | 99–00 | 00–01 | 01–02 | 02–03 | 03–04 | 04–05 |
| Worlds | WD 1 | 18th | 17th | |||||
| Four Continents | 5th | 1st | 3rd | |||||
| GP Cup of Russia | 10th | |||||||
| GP NHK Trophy | 6th | 5th | ||||||
| GP Skate America | 4th | 2nd | ||||||
| GP Skate Canada | 6th | |||||||
| GP Sparkassen | 4th | |||||||
| GP Trophée Lalique | 3rd | |||||||
| International: Junior [20] | ||||||||
| Junior Worlds | 1st | |||||||
| JGP Final | 2nd | |||||||
| JGP Japan | 1st | |||||||
| JGP Netherlands | 4th | |||||||
| National [7] | ||||||||
| U.S. Champ. | 3rd N | 3rd J | 7th | 4th | 5th | 5th | 3rd | 4th |
| Levels: N = Novice, J = Junior. WD = Withdrew | ||||||||
Joanne Carter is an Australian former competitive figure skater. She is the 1998 Piruetten champion, the 1996 Golden Spin of Zagreb silver medalist, the 2004 Karl Schäfer Memorial bronze medalist, and a seven-time Australian national champion. She reached the free skate at the 1998 Winter Olympics and fifteen ISU Championships – four World, eight Four Continents, and three World Junior Championships.
Tuğba Karademir is a Turkish former competitive figure skater. She won silver medals at the 2008 International Challenge Cup and 2008 Ondrej Nepela Memorial. She qualified to the free skate at two Winter Olympics, two World Championships, and seven European Championships (2004–2010). She served as the flag-bearer for Turkey at the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin and the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver.
Elena Sergeyevna Sokolova is a Russian former competitive figure skater. She is the 2003 World silver medalist, a three-time European medalist, and a three-time Russian national champion.
Amber Corwin Farrow is an American former competitive figure skater. She is the 1999 Four Continents silver medalist and 2004 bronze medalist.
Jamie Silverstein is an American former competitive ice dancer. With Justin Pekarek, she is the 2000 Four Continents bronze medalist, the 1999 World Junior champion, and 2000 U.S. silver medalist. With Ryan O'Meara, she is the 2006 U.S. bronze medalist and competed at the 2006 Winter Olympics.
Morgan Matthews is an American former competitive ice dancer. With Maxim Zavozin, she is the 2006 Four Continents silver medalist and 2005 World Junior champion.
Valérie Marcoux is a Canadian former pair skater. With partner Craig Buntin, she is a three-time Canadian national champion. Prior to teaming up with Buntin in 2002, she skated with Bruno Marcotte. Marcoux announced her retirement from competitive figure skating on April 24, 2007.
Fedor Vladimirovich Andreev is a former figure skater with dual Russian and Canadian citizenship. In single skating, he is the 2003 Canadian bronze medalist and the 1999 junior national champion. In 2010, he switched to ice dancing and competed for Russia with partner Jana Khokhlova for one season.
Rachael Elizabeth Flatt is an American former competitive figure skater. She is the 2008 World Junior champion, a winner of four silver medals on the Grand Prix series, and the 2010 U.S. national champion.
Annette Dytrt, also Dytrtová, is a German former competitive figure skater who also competed internationally for the Czech Republic. She is the 1999 Czech national champion and the 2003–06 German national champion.
Viktória Pavuk is a Hungarian former competitive figure skater. She is a two-time International Cup of Nice champion and the 2011 Hungarian national champion.
Alisa Drei is a Finnish former competitive figure skater. She finished in the top ten at seven European Championships.
Elena Kostantinovna Romanovskaya is a Russian former competitive ice dancer. With partner Alexander Grachev, she won the 2004 World Junior title.
Kristina Alexandrovna Oblasova is a Russian former competitive figure skater. She is the 2001 World Junior champion and the 2004 Russian national bronze medalist.
Candice Didier is a French former competitive figure skater. She is the 2011 Winter Universiade champion and a three-time French national champion. She reached the free skate at five ISU Championships; her best results were 14th at the 2003 Junior Worlds in Ostrava and 13th at the 2009 Europeans in Helsinki.
Jenna McCorkell is a former figure skater from Northern Ireland. She is an eleven-time British national champion and won seven senior international medals, including gold at the Ondrej Nepela Memorial and Ice Challenge. She placed as high as eighth at the European Championships (2008) and 14th at the World Championships, and competed at two Winter Olympics.
Abigail Pietersen is a South African former competitive figure skater. She is the 2010 South African national champion and qualified to the free skate at three Four Continents Championships. She switched to pair skating in 2005, but later switched back to singles. Her younger brother, Justin Pietersen, also competed internationally in figure skating.
Ana Cecilia Cantu Felix is a Mexican former competitive figure skater. She is a four-time national champion and competed at 9 ISU Championships. She is still to-date, the first and only Mexican female skater to qualify to the final segment at the World Figure Skating Championships, in 2009.
Miriam Manzano-Hammond is a former Australian competitive figure skater in ladies' singles. She is the 2003 Merano Cup champion, the 2002 Karl Schäfer Memorial silver medalist, the 2003 Finlandia Trophy bronze medalist, and a six-time Australian national champion.
Hristina Vassileva-Zhecheva is a Bulgarian figure skating coach and choreographer in USA, and former competitor. She is six time Bulgarian national champion and reached the free skate at four ISU Championships. She achieved her best result, 16th, at the 2001 European Championships.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link){{cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link){{cite news}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link){{cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link){{cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link){{cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link){{cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link) 
Media related to Jennifer Kirk at Wikimedia Commons
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link)
