Ice dancer born in Michigan returns to Olympics after 16 years, skating for Lithuania

From being treated like "cattle" as a young girl to sleeping in her car off a Polish highway, Allison Reed has taken a long, hard road to follow her Olympic ice dance dream.

Born in Kalamazoo, Michigan, Reed has traveled the world just for a chance to compete. After representing Georgia and Israel, Reed is back at the Olympics for the first time since 2010, skating for Lithuania with a partner who's taken her to the next level.

With Saulius Ambrulevičius — Saul for short — who'll be at his first Olympics in Milan Cortina in February, Reed brings dramatic flair to programs themed around pop and electronic hits from the 1990s.

That 16-year gap between Olympics is an eternity in the world of figure skating, and Reed often competes against skaters who were toddlers when she made her Olympic debut aged 15 in Vancouver.

On the way, she's experienced personal tragedy, the "out-of-body experience" of a breakthrough medal, and a sport which doesn't always live up to its glamorous image and reputation for inclusivity.

Unequal relationships

Ice dancers are meant to move as one, gliding through routines in perfect synchronicity. Off the ice, teams can be far from equal.

Far more girls aspire to ice dance careers than boys and male dancers are expected to be tall athletes capable of lifting their female partners with ease. Reed recalls attending tryouts as a young skater with four boys taking their pick of 25 girls at a rink.

"These four boys would just go about choosing whatever girl that they wanted to skate with and they would go and skate with them, they'd say thank you, then they'd pick another girl," she told The Associated Press. "I remember standing there feeling like, 'What is this? Like, this feels like almost like cattle.'"

Reed grew up in a skating-mad Japanese-American family with brother Chris and sister Cathy. She woke up at 4 a.m. as her "absolute super mom" ferried them all to practice before school.

Her brother and sister skated together for Japan, but Reed's seach for a male partner led her to Otar Japaridze of the ex-Soviet nation of Georgia. The pair placed 22nd at the 2010 Olympics. She didn't manage to contend for major medals with him or with Vasili Rogov for Israel.

The "nomads" on ice

After her partnership with Rogov ended in 2015, Reed recalls "floating for about two years, almost aimlessly" as she coached and considered college.

Her brother's recovery from repeated injuries inspired her to return.

"It just filled me with this feeling of dread, like 'I am going to regret it if I don't at least try one more time and see what happens.' And it's the best decision I've ever made," she said.

Ambrulevičius trained with Reed for a while after an injury to his then-partner. When that partnership later broke up, he asked Reed to join him over a coffee. She says it's been a team of equals.

"We lived out of a car. We were nomads for a while," she said, recalling that on trips back from a training rink in the German Alps to Lithuania, a distance of over 800 miles (1,300 kilometers), "we'd sleep at a rest stop in Poland somewhere and continue on our drive back. We road-tripped around Europe and slept in our car more times that I'd like to remember."

Reed and Ambrulevičius have waited more than eight years to reach the Olympics. Unlike most skating events, the Olympics require both skaters in a team to have citizenship of the country they represent,. They could have qualified but Reed was twice refused in applying for a Lithuanian passport and found it "devastating" to be the one holding back her partner's career.

The breakthrough

The moment it all came together was last year, with a European championship bronze medal in front of Reed's adopted home crowd. In a packed temporary rink set up in a basketball arena, Reed and Ambrulevičius rode the crowd's energy to their first major medal.

"It was almost like an out-of-body experience," she said. "After that competition was over, I was like, 'I've peaked.'"

There was still the small matter of her passport, which had become a political hot topic in the Baltic nation of nearly 3 million.

"Is this real life?" Reed thought when she saw a TV poll on her citizenship. Lithuania's president signed the papers in Nov. 2024, opening Reed's way to Milan Cortina. She and Ambrulevičius qualified in September. Placing fifth at the Grand Prix Final in December underlined their status as potential medal contenders.

Despite Reed's previous Olympic experience, the opening ceremony in Milan Cortina will be a first. Back in 2010, her Georgian team left early in mourning after luge athlete Nodar Kumaritashvili died in a training accident.

Remembering her brother

At every competition, Reed holds up a picture to the camera. It's a photo of her brother Chris, who died of a heart attack in 2020, aged 30. Since then, every time Reed skates in competition, it's in his memory.

"My brother means everything to me. I'm introducing my brother to someone new every time I hold that photo up," Reed says. "I know he's always watching and I know he would be just so proud that we're going to the Olympics again."

Reed's already left ice dance with regrets once. Whatever happens in Milan, that won't be the case again.

"This Olympic run was the last thing that I wanted for us, that I wanted for Saul and for myself, and so we'll see what happens," Reed said.

"I am a bit more excited for the future than I was the last time I quit. And I think in that there's a sense of ease, a sense of confidence, in the fact that I know that I was ready and that I can focus on whatever else I would like to do with my future. But it'll be my decision and my choice."