Pechalat trained in Russia for a long time. I bet she speaks Russian. Certainly Fabian does, in any case. And I would not be surprised whether some words spoken in Russian, probably by Elena, reached her ears.
Send them to Shpilband; they need teknik more than anything else, and Zoueva doesn't provide it. Maybe Fabian, now that he is working with Igor, could do their choreo?
I noticed that after Vancouver 2010, no Russian teams trained in the US anymore. Suddenly everyone went back to Moscow or Petersburg. I remember when Linichuk trained Domnina / Shabalin, and the top Russians trained all through the 90s in the US. Now that Sochi is over, I wonder if perhaps the skating federation would be open to sending teams to North America to train once again? They didn't have the resources before but now the country is flush with oil money and it's definitely finding its way into training top athletes. Or would the Russians suddenly call all the coaches back to the old country if they had facilities and funds at their disposal?
And where IS Linichuk these days? Is she grooming junior teams for the next quad and they'll suddenly start winning everywhere on the 2014 GP series?