Doronina Wants to Lead Russian Ladies Back to the Top

[feraina]

One would have thought for instance that China would have by NOW had a more prominent crop of ladies skaters after Chen Lu's success.

Well, China had no skating tradition nor good coaches until very recently. Chen Lu and her coach Mingzhu Li were pioneers for ladies skating, and once Mingzhu Li moved to the U.S. and Chen Lu retired, the budding tradition was lost. In contrast, Yao Bin stayed, and his skaters stayed loyal to him to the end of their careers, and now there are some very good senior and junior pairs teams.

Ms. Li had to learn a foreign language, a completely new way of doing things, and develop a new following, which is probably we didn't hear from her for a few years after Chen Lu. But she has been doing pretty well with Caroline Zhang recently, so probably she will continue to see future success.

Chen Lu and her husband opened a new rink and skating school in southern China, the first commercial skating school I believe. Traditionally, all the more promising athletes (and best known coaches) go into the state system in China, so Chen Lu had to start with very young skaters, new coaches. A friend of mine skates there and says there are some promising youngsters, so maybe in a few years we'll see some good skaters coming out of there too.

[Mathman]

Well, China had no skating tradition nor good coaches until very recently. Chen Lu and her coach Mingzhu Li were pioneers for ladies skating...

Thanks for the excellent and informative post!