DALLAS (KRT) – The only Dallas resident who will compete at the Turin Olympics says he owes his coach, big time.
But that coach is not welcome at the Turin Games. For an athlete with a special bond with his mentor, the Olympic dream takes something of a powder when one man’s coach is another athlete’s tormentor.
Dallas accountant Kevin Ellis, a former track star who took up skeleton, had trouble paying his bills because of his commitment to the sliding sport.
While Ellis was splitting his time between his real job and his Olympic quest, help came from a man Ellis said was his lifeline to his dream.
Help came from a man who probably will stay home in Lake Placid, N.Y., because of alleged indiscretions that made U.S. Olympic Committee leaders balk about keeping him on as the program’s head coach.
By now, most winter sports fans have heard of Tim Nardiello, the U.S. Skeleton program’s former head coach. Nardiello, a former luge athlete, was rejected for credentials by the USOC after an arbitrator found no evidence of his alleged sexual harassment of athletes.
The accusations came from athletes who had not amassed the results necessary to make Team USA, according to the U.S. Bobsled and Skeleton Federation’s rules.
But choices by Nardiello that the USOC deemed ethical violations cost him a chance to coach some who admired him, including Ellis.
“Tim is the one person who kept me in the sport,” said Ellis, a former Stephen F. Austin track standout. “He and I had a bond that helped me grow. He gave me confidence.”
Allegations against Nardiello included his penchant for making explicit comments.
“He does make comments,” Ellis said. “It’s part of his personality. To some people, it’s hilarious. It rubs some people the wrong way. I’ve never seen any advances toward anybody.”
Ellis, one of the three men who made the U.S. team for Turin, said he has tried to focus on his performances.
The U.S. skeleton program began to collapse last October, when World Cup overall champion Noelle Pikus-Pace suffered a broken leg. With her chances to be a force in Turin compromised, the women’s skeleton program, which had produced two medals at the 2002 Games, began to look as if it would not be a Turin hot topic.
Then the top male skeleton athlete, Zach Lund, had to endure a doping hearing that ruled he deserved a warning for use of a banned substance that the athlete had confessed was for hair replacement. Ellis has not had a trouble-free Olympic prelude.
“I’m having to switch gears a lot,” he said. “We’re doing a really good job of staying on target.”
The personal sense of loss has infiltrated Ellis’ psyche to some extent. The coach he had come to trust will not get to see what happens at the Games this year.
“I’d really have liked for Tim to have been at the Olympics,” Ellis said. “He adapts to people’s personalities. He kind of has his own style. He doesn’t bark at people. It’s very hands-on and animated.”
Nardiello’s “hands-on” style did not appeal to skeleton athletes such as longtime team member Felicia Canfield. Her complaint probably helped the USOC leaders decide that the coach was not an appropriate USA representative in Turin.
Canfield reportedly said Nardiello tried to kiss her and touch her inappropriately.
At least six individuals had filed grievances against Nardiello. USOC leaders cited Nardiello’s lapses in good judgment.
Reports that the coach had a relationship with a New Zealand skeleton athlete did not help Nardiello’s cause.
Ellis will suffer because of matters that were entirely beyond his control. He would have wanted his first and probably only Olympics to be free of controversy.
“It’s unfortunate that I’m here and Tim won’t be here to see me compete,” Ellis said. “We kind of operate as a family.”