I mean if you really think about it, having a champion athlete is actually contributing to the economy. I presume Russia taxes her endorsements, prize money, and money earned at shows (at home and abroad)? In this way it may actually be in the country’s financial interest to pay for foreign training if it provides a better opportunity to win prize money and gain endorsements. Also, the foreign exposure may create more business opportunities. Look how popular Zhenya is in Japan. I’m not sure this will translate to Canadian/US popularity but it can’t hurt.
I think their reluctance with funding her is that at this time Orser is an unproven entity in terms of training Russian figure skating champions. However if he and Zhenya are able to outperform Eteri’s girls in the upcoming years you’ll see a lot more kids undergoing foreign training. But I’m not sure how likely that is.
Actually, her prize money wouldnt cover the full costs of her training in Canada even if rusfed confiscates it all ^^ Just saying.
Basically, the reluctance is kinda simple:
- Orser is an unproven entity. Moreover, he had no star ladies after Yuna.
- There are better coaches in Russia for ladies (Eteri beats Orser by a large margin, and tbh we can say Sotskova currently performs better than Orser's ladies, so add Buyanova too).
- Orser is expensive as hell for Russian standards. Ahen, pensions of USD250/month to a hourly rate of more than USD110.
- The money the team members receive as funding would be pretty much irrelevant to such costs. Also, this funding is mostly not $$$ as people pointed out, but direct investment in rinks and so on.
Last but not least, I will be a bit honest here. Before reading, you may research a bit on what happened during 90s in Russia to understand the logic.
- Mistrust of western methods: we had a lot of experiences with the west making money on russians during 90s, we don't like that. Unlike russian coaches, Orser doesn't get paid for results, but hourly regardless of results. He already stated that the first 6 months will cost more than usual. He already stated that it will take over a year for his coaching methods to lead to visible results. He got nothing to lose if Medvedeva fails, because he can just make a sad face and say she came injured and it was beyond repair.
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