READING, Pa. (AP) - Lisa Cervantes will treasure the moment forever.
It was Jan. 5 at the U.S. Olympic Trials in Kearns, Utah, and her son Kyle Carr had just made the speedskating team that will compete next month in the Winter Games in Sochi, Russia.
“To see the joy on his face when he knew that he had a spot on the team, my heart just burst,” said Cervantes, whose maiden name is Godown and who grew up in Hunterdon County.
“It’s what every mother wants for their kid, to see that joy and his dream realized,” she continued. “Everything that he has put his feet on the ice to accomplish, everything that he has done, has led up to this point. There’s no other feeling like it on Earth.”
Carr, 27, was born in Hunterdon County and still has family there and in the Lehigh Valley. His father, Chris Carr, lives in the Nazareth area.
Kyle Carr and family lived in Holland Township but moved to the Reading area when he was 11.
He is one of two members of the U.S. speedskating team with ties to this area and roots in the Frenchtown Roller Rink in Kingwood Township. The other, 27-year-old Chris Creveling, is a 2005 graduate of Palisades High School in Nockamixon Township, Bucks County.
Carr and Creveling - both from roller-skating families that flourished in this region - are set to compete at the Winter Olympics on the 5,000-meter speedskating relay team. The games run Feb. 7-23.
Carr’s grandfather, George Carr, served for 30 years as a floor guard at Frenchtown Roller Rink. He helped paint the new rink when it moved from Frenchtown to its current place off Route 29 in Kingwood Township in the mid-1970s, said Kay Pinkerton, whose family started the rink and still runs it today.
That this area can now lay claim to two Olympians is nothing short of mind-boggling, Pinkerton said.
“The only thing I can say is our little rink produced very good skaters just because of the love of the sport. It’s what we do,” Pinkerton said.
For Carr, making the Olympic team caps a years-long odyssey that began when he suffered a severely broken wrist as he climbed the ranks of inline skating when he was 13, according to his mother.
Soon after, skating coach Shawn Walb took Carr under his wing and introduced him to speedskating. Walb coaches the East Penn Speed Skating Club, which trains in Bethlehem and Reading.
“He got on the ice and he never looked back,” said Cervantes, who grew up in Alexandria Township and is a 1983 graduate of Delaware Valley Regional High School. “It wasn’t very long before Kyle hung up his inline skates for good.”
Carr left Gov. Mifflin High School in the Reading area after his junior year and moved to Marquette, Mich., to focus on becoming a world-class speedskater. He suffered a broken ankle in November 2005 that set him back and then failed to make the cut for the Olympic team at the 2010 Olympic Trials at Marquette.
“Kyle’s comeback story is beautiful,” said his mother, who now lives in Peach Tree City, Ga. “He always said, ’If I ever put my foot on the ice and I don’t love it, it’s time to stop.’ Through all the setbacks, all the trials, he’s done it for the love of the sport.”
Sister Bethany Camp, 25, said Carr hit a low point after returning to Georgia for surgery and rehabilitation on his ankle.
“Just talking to him - I remember the frustration,” Camp said. “He had to overcome a lot mentally. Guys he was beating before were skating circles around him.”
That’s why the feeling was so sweet as his family witnessed his triumph last month at the Olympic Trials. He fist-pumped as he crossed the line to win a 500-meter semifinal race, and his family beamed.
“I was reminded then, this is why he sacrificed so much,” Camp said. “It’s because of the passion he has for what he does, the drive. The joy was just so awesome to experience this with him.”
Carr lives in Salt Lake City and plans to get married in September. U.S. teammate J.R. Celski, also on the relay team, will be in the wedding party.
Cervantes, who skated with the quad speedskating team at Frenchtown, said the U.S. teammates are a close bunch who have known and competed against one another for years.
She and daughter Emily Abraham, 22, will travel to Sochi to watch Carr hopefully earn a medal, Cervantes said. Getting there has been a wild ride made possible by Carr’s determination and skill that all sprang from a corner of Hunterdon County that many relatives still call home, Cervantes said.
“I want him to just soak in every moment, to enjoy it, to love it - to savor every Olympic moment,” she said. “Obviously, we want him to bring his best and represent his country and be the best that he can be.”
___
Online:
https://bit.ly/1ddRRv2
___
Information from: The (Easton, Pa.) Express-Times, https://www.lehighvalleylive.com
Please read our comment policy before commenting.