She finished third in the nation.
Then she finished third in the world, exactly a month later.Now she's on a 25-city exhibition tour with the world's best amateur figure skaters, who proved themselves, like she did, by medaling in the 1990 World Championships March 6-10 in Halifax, Nova Scotia.
But Bountiful's unassuming 19-year-old Holly Cook, until two weeks ago pretty much an unknown internationally, still says she feels a little out of place in the company of those who expect to go on to medals in the 1992 Olympics.
"I still feel like they're a little more experienced," says Cook from her hotel room telephone in San Francisco, which is the exhibition tour's western base of operations. They performed in Tacoma Sunday and will go up and down the West Coast before heading to points east.
The tour runs through April 22; perhaps after 45 days traveling with the sport's biggest current names, Cook will feel like she's on a first-name basis with them.
But for now, she's still the same shy personality as she was on March 10, when she stunned the world and especially herself with that bronze-medal finish in Halifax that brought her the Deseret News Athlete of the Month honor for February and March. As she skated around the ice picking up balloons and real bananas thrown as a reward to her by the Halifax crowd following her freestyle routine, which was somewhat flawed, as were all the others, Cook prepared herself mentally for disappointment.
"I thought maybe I was going down to fourth or maybe fifth," she says.
"I still wouldn't have cared," she adds quickly, "although it would have been hard going from second (after the original program) to fifth (overall)."
She was so certain of the tumble that when her therapist told her as she stepped off the ice that she had retained third place for the competition, "I said, `You lie. Shut up.'
"I looked down at the (TV) monitor, and my name was third," she recalls. She still didn't believe it. "I was still waiting for another skater; I forgot I was last."
Last meant she was, indeed, third. There was nobody left to bump her out of a medal. It was hers.
And it was an even bigger third than a month earlier, when she surprised the national skating community by taking third place in the U.S. Championships in the Salt Palace to make the World Championship team and win Deseret News Athlete of the Month for February.
That third in the nationals left her light-hearted and happy: She would go to the World Championships, but nobody would expect anything of her; she could skate the way she wanted, with no pressure.
Before she left for Halifax, she was talking about next season.
The third in the World Championships changes things: She's now a name.
Should she prepare to defend that name, maybe all the way to the '92 Olympics, knowing that compulsory figures, one of her strengths, is now officially jettisoned from all future skating competitions? That would mean more money, more time, more diets. More to lose.
Or should she trade on that name now - try the pro ice-show circuit and make some money, or retire on top with her bronze medal and go on to college and a normal life?
"I've given it some thought, but I'm not going to answer now," Cook says. "It can go both ways."
Mother Margie Cook doesn't know what her daughter, the youngest of six children, will do. If Holly continues, Margie envisions stepped-up training sessions and more specialty coaches to help Coach Kris Sherard, who has other students to tend to.
Sherard, however, says Cook can progress by doing "pretty much what she's been doing."
Sherard hasn't discussed things with Cook much yet; this has all happened too fast.
When they do sit down, Shereard will tell Holly of her prospects as a pro, but she'll also point out that those who finished above her - American Jill Trenary and Midori Ito of Japan - "are at their peak; they don't have any place to go. Holly's going to do some more. She's still rising. She's just coming along at her own pace."
Going on would mean improving the technical merit of her freestyle and a change in her original program, the one she likes because it's over quickly and the one others hate because every mistake is magnified in the judging. Without figures, the original program will be even more important because the finish there will determine who gets into the last rotation of skaters for the freestyle. Judges open up the scoring for the final group since they've seen everybody else.
"I definitely would have to have a harder combination (two jumps, usually a triple and a double) for the short program," says Cook.
For the next five weeks, though, Cook won't worry much about those things. She'll get to know the other skaters and enjoy the exhibition tour, which legally pays her $270 a performance plus per diem and some clothes but gets in return the first extended period of time Cook's ever been away from home without Margie to help her.
After Worlds, "I wanted to come home," Cook admitted. "I miss my friends and my family.
"I miss my bed," she says.
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(Additional information)
Cookin'
World Championships at Halifax, Nova Scotia
March 7 - Fourth in compulsory figures, fourth overall
March 9 -Third in original program, second overall
March 10 -Fourth in freestyle, third overall (bronze medal)
U.S. Championships at Salt Lake City
Feb. 6 -Second in compulsory figures, second overall
Feb. 8 - Fifth in original program, fourth overall
Feb. 10 - Fourth in freestyle, third overall