Naperville native Lysacek returns home Saturday with 'Stars on Ice' tour
Life after the Olympics has been an adjustment for Evan Lysacek, the gold medal-winning figure skater from Naperville.
Now that he's no longer training for the Olympics, Lysacek said he's been trying to figure out what he wants to do, career-wise. The 29-year-old recently started working full-time for a commercial real estate company in New York City.
"I like all the different facets of my life right now," Lysacek said. "I hope I can be patient enough to explore multiple interests before I make a final decision."
In the meantime, he's been lured back for a short, one-month tour with "2015 Stars on Ice: Dancing for Joy," which stops at Rosemont's Allstate Arena Saturday, March 21.
Lysacek, who had to drop out of the 2014 Olympics in Sochi because of hip and leg injuries, said he trained hard to get back in shape for the show, which co-stars fellow Olympic medalists Meryl Davis, Charlie White, Patrick Chan, Ekaterina Gordeeva and others.
In the show, Lysacek will perform the short program he planned to do in Sochi.
"It means something to me. I don't know how many more skating shows I'll be able to do," he said. "Every single step that I'm doing took serious practice. It's almost like I'm relearning a lot of it."
Now in his fifth tour with "Stars on Ice," Lysacek says that for some unexplained reason, their Rosemont show is always the best one.
"I get nervous still, because it's my hometown," he said. "I remember being the kid in the crowd, and it made me be a skater. And look where I wound up."
Lysacek saw "Stars on Ice" when he was 9 years old in the same arena, then known as the Rosemont Horizon. He had just started taking skating lessons, thinking he'd be playing hockey eventually. But he was impressed with the show, and after his skating lessons at Center Ice of DuPage in Glen Ellyn, he went over to the rink to watch the serious figure skaters practice. He remembers seeing a male skater barrel toward him at high speed, like he was going to slam into the wall.
"Then, at the last second, he dug toe in ice and jumped into the air for a triple. I thought, 'Yep, I'll be learning that,'" Lysacek said. "Once I could go fast, then I really loved skating. That's all I ever really wanted to do was go fast."
Lysacek did go fast - right to the top of the men's figure skating world. He won multiple national and world competitions, and took the gold medal in the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver.
"I'll always love (skating) til the day I die. I think it is one of the most unique and sophisticated sports," he said. "People have no idea what goes into it. They say, 'Oh, it looks so nice,' or 'I like your outfit' ... but that kind of discipline, to be an Olympic athlete, and to sacrifice basically your entire life ... it's not like the fake world of reality TV."
He knows about reality TV, having been a runner-up on ABC's "Dancing With the Stars." But Lysacek now spends his time in the real world, helping charities everywhere from Harlem to Russia. He's also part of a U.S. State Department envoy that promotes international diplomacy through sports.
"I go to Chicago as much as I can. It'll always be home for me," he said. "I would love to get back there some day, and see (if) maybe I could find a career path that would lead me back to Chicago."
'2015 Stars on Ice: Dancing for Joy'
Who: Olympic skating medalists Evan Lysacek, Patrick Chan, Ekaterina Gordeeva, Meryl Davis, Charlie White and others
When: 7:30 p.m. Saturday, March 21
Where: Allstate Arena, 6920 N. Mannheim Road, Rosemont
Tickets: $25-$85
Info:
Rosemont.com/Allstate or (847) 635-6601