Coaches' Corner | Golden Skate

Coaches' Corner

Skatesocs

Final Flight
Joined
May 16, 2020
Davydov's recent interview
Have not read it yet. But just to continue where I left that, I have hated nearly every interview and tweet from a skating personality about skating, even appreciative ones. They seem vapid at best, a bacchanalian fantasy at their worst. And I want them to stfu whenever they complain about something. But yes. One day, someone will say something that doesn't make me want to rip the foundation of my house and throw it into oncoming traffic, and I will like them for it.

(Tom Dickson accomplished it with TSL once).
 

NAOTMAA

Medalist
Joined
Nov 9, 2014
If Sasha told Plushie to bring Rozanov, he got a new superior post which Sasha provided for him. Maybe she expected loyalty. Maybe there were implicit conversations and Sasha shared that she wanted to leave her rivals. But in a way it was kind of a scenario of her action biting her in the back as he brought Kostornaia along with him. Now she doesn't even work with Rozanov, but shares a school with her rival again. It would be better if Rozanov wasn't even recommended in the first place. Who knows, maybe Ilinykh would still be working with her then.
Lesson:

Unless its written on paper never expect anything. Especially when it comes to all things competitive

And even when it is on paper you still can't fully trust :slink:
 

mdl

On the Ice
Joined
Mar 17, 2018
It's funny to see a chorus of voices here condemning a person who has expressed an opinion that is different from what they like. What happened ? Has he insulted your favorite skater? Humiliated him or their family? A little more and these people will wish Plushenko death here.
When your favorite “Great Coach” and her team were literally wiping their feet about little girls who dared to think about leaving for another coach, you were either modestly silent or justified her.
Duplicity does not paint anyone.

And I say Bravo to Plushenko!

It was about time somebody to speak loudly about the violation of the scoring rules by the judges, of the clear favoritism that is reigning over there and unfair judging.

Only by that the things might start to change. Keeping silence and accepting the status quo is not helping at all the sport.

Pointing out the technical mistakes of skaters? If the judges don't do it, why not? Does he insult someone? And not that we didn't see insults from Sambo's side - towards skaters and towards Plushenko

Bringing Alina? The interviewer asked him and he replied.
And at first place Alina brought herself alone in it, giving their correspondence to be published.

Luring skaters? Once again he explained the events with the transfers.

".....
Sasha Trusova came herself and said: "Yes, I want to skate with you." I just want people, sofa (critics), to understand once and for all, but so far it is very difficult for them to understand. Because there (in "Sambo-70") they claim that they were lured away: how poor and unfortunate we are, the girls were taken away from us, but they did not tell us anything. You must already be a little more courageous, more confident in yourself and understand that they have left you. Left. And they are not pots of flowers to be stolen at night. Living people. Each with its own character, its own history and its own soul!..."

He said he tried to reconcile with ET and Sambo, but he was denied.
But this alone shows quite a maturity from his side.

The interview is very interesting and gives some light to some things, including the training of Sasha and Alena.
 

Edwin

СделаноВХрустальном!
Record Breaker
Joined
Jan 5, 2019
If Sasha told Plushie to bring Rozanov, he got a new superior post which Sasha provided for him. Maybe she expected loyalty. Maybe there were implicit conversations and Sasha shared that she wanted to leave her rivals. But in a way it was kind of a scenario of her action biting her in the back as he brought Kostornaia along with him. Now she doesn't even work with Rozanov, but shares a school with her rival again. It would be better if Rozanov wasn't even recommended in the first place. Who knows, maybe Ilinykh would still be working with her then.
Plyushchenko promised them separate chalet cottages, didn't he?
 

Edwin

СделаноВХрустальном!
Record Breaker
Joined
Jan 5, 2019
It would be nice when Trusova or Kostornaya's parents were properly interviewedon behalf of their daughters.

But that might be forbidden under contractual obligations.
 

Alex65

Final Flight
Joined
Aug 11, 2018
Country
Russia
Plyushchenko promised them separate chalet cottages, didn't he?
Yes. Plushenko wants to create the best and most comfortable conditions for training and living for the best skaters of his school. In order not to waste time on the road every day there and back. A new skating rink was built near the city. It can be a long journey there. This concern for athletes is definitely commendable.
 

lesnar001

Record Breaker
Joined
Jan 19, 2005
And I say Bravo to Plushenko!

Pointing out the technical mistakes of skaters? If the judges don't do it, why not? Does he insult someone? And not that we didn't see insults from Sambo's side - towards skaters and towards Plushenko

Bringing Alina? The interviewer asked him and he replied.
And at first place Alina brought herself alone in it, giving their correspondence to be published.
I guess you belong to the "Two Wrongs Make A Right" school of thought.
Or is this more to do with "Whattaboutism"?

Gee, why am I not surprised that you would automatically "blame" Alina.
Not even knowing exactly what her role was in that fiasco.
But you word it as such to make it seem she gave it to them so they could publish it.

But hey, let's continue to play the "blame game" and go back to the beginning.
Who done who wrong first???? Plushy - by publicly stating how Alina sought out his advice on quads.
Surely he must have known that would cause grief for Alina with a coach who doesn't like "betrayals".
 

Edwin

СделаноВХрустальном!
Record Breaker
Joined
Jan 5, 2019
"I offered Tutberidze peace, but she is more satisfied with war." Plyushckenko - on judging and conflicts between trainers

Exclusive interview by SE with the two-time Olympic champion.



This week is still under the sign of Aleksandra Trusova and Yevgeniy Plyushchenko's school. First, the skater won the Russian Cup stage in Moscow, bringing the Angels their first big victory in women's single skating. Yesterday she laid down a successful attempt at a quadruple Rittberger - so in the quads, now only the Axel remains unconquered, which no man or woman in the world can do.

Trusova and Kostornaya will live in a chalet

The correspondent of "SE" on Wednesday managed to attend the training session of the 16-year-old figure skater, which takes place near the metro station "Michurinskiy Prospekt". During the hour that I stood at the boards, Sasha made several triple axels, quadruple Lutz and 4 + 3 Toeloop cascades. Trusova is generally such a skater who talks little, but tries to do a lot. Silent and concentrating on herself. In some ways, her approach for some reason reminded me of another successful representative of the winter sports for Russia - skier Aleksandr Bolshunov. Simple Russian character, few interviews and constant plowing.
Plyushchenko personally gave Trusova's instructions - the other part of the group, together with Dmitriy Mikhailov and Sergey Alekseyev, practiced rotations and choreography on the other half of the rink. And for him personally, the victory of Trusova, and now the Rittberger, is also a coaching success. However, Eteri Tutberidze's team will surely have something to respond to at the next stages of the Cup. And this is great - the competition between the two rinks moves the sport forward.

After training, the two-time Olympic Champion spoke about the plans for his academy, claims to refereeing, the proposal of peace to to Tutberidze and what happened between Trusova and Sergey Rozanov and Elena Ilinykh.

- Yevgeniy, we are now at the site of the Plyushchenko Angels, you recently announced the imminent opening of a new skating rink. How is the work progressing there?
-- Business is progressing great, construction is coming to an end. We are planning a test opening for my birthday on November 3rd. It will be a private skating rink, since now I rent a site. Finally, we will have our own base, I will show you where Sasha Trusova, Alyona Kostornaya and our other collections will live and train. For those of my athletes who show super results, there will be free tuition and accommodation. And they will live in separate chalet cottages, we are building them now. In order not to travel anywhere and immerse yourself in the workflow. Because we will skate a lot, three to four workouts a day. There will be halls for choreography, working out, a spa. In general, my wife and I are opening a full-fledged sports base in the Moscow region. In February, a second skating rink will appear in Moscow. Me and my wife, we decided to invest in sports, figure skating. There will also be a large playground, halls, and a restaurant. There are a lot of people willing to learn figure skating. Here, on Lobachevskiy, we no longer fit.

It's time for justice. Schools should be judged the same

- Last weekend, the Russian Cup stage was held, which was nevertheless won by Aleksandra Trusova. Are you happy with how it went?
-- The very atmosphere - yes, finally there was a sporting struggle. I want to congratulate the girls, and Kamila, and Dariya with their second and third places. They are strong skaters, they have a great future. And they have a good team. But I'm not happy with the short program grades of all three girls. Having read a lot of comments - why? Here is the answer.
To skaters the age of 14, you cannot give "tens" for components. This is junior skating, and no matter how beautiful they skate, no matter how beautiful the lines and spins are, this is not "ten" quality. Under the previous system, this is 6.0. This is a priori wrong. Where should they grow further? Some judges, coaches, and the leadership of the federation have already agreed with me - there was somewhat wrong. I'm telling you honestly. Let this truth be harsh. Valiyeva's 10 points are impossible.

- How do you explain this?
-- Judging errors. I will not go into details, we talked about this topic and figured it out. But I want to say one thing - there are athletes for whom I will drown myself. And I will not allow any judge to do the wrong thing against my athletes. I love justice. Sasha didn't win the short program, that's true. But she took not third, but second place, and lost not 10 points, but 5-6. I agree with this scenario, Valiyeva was higher. But why do they need to overestimate one and decrease points for my skaters?
I understand that the judges wanted to create a safety cushion for the free program. I know these judges, I even know where they are and whom they represent. But I don't want to go into specifics. Let's all understand that the time has come for justice. There is one school and there is another. You need to treat everyone equally. I had a substantive conversation ...

- With the leadership of the federation?
-- Let's confine ourselves to this wording - I think they heard me. However, our result does not mean that we need to hang the crown. They are very strong rivals, and we didn’t succeed in everything. We went for the triple Axel for the first time, a really difficult element. Without belittling anyone's merits - Sasha generally skated with a cold. But this is our problem, we dealt with it.

- What's next in Sasha's planned programs?
-- We are preparing for the fourth stage of the Cup, I would not like to reveal all the secrets. The program will definitely be strengthened. In general, I want to praise and thank Sasha. I have not seen a single athlete who would give her best and treat her profession this way. She plows, works hard, wants to learn new things. Her task is to learn how to skate well, add choreography, improve rotations. A lot of work. If we all had athletes with such dedication, it would be cool.

It's time for the head of "Sambo-70" to pack his suitcase

- One of the branches of discussion in social networks is whether the whistling from the stands and discontent in social networks helped her into victory. What do you say?
-- I want to thank the people who do not hate this story, but treat it professionally and talk about it. Look, Chen and Hanyu don't get tens, Costner didn't always have them. So what do we make a circus out of figure skating? Specially heat up the confrontation. Maybe all that happened is some kind of contractual history on the part of some people. Why then? Let's work and win fairly. Let's stop talking that someone has lured someone for "money". It's already up here with me (points to the throat).
How much nonsense can you talk about outbidding? The athlete moved on herself. If the athlete is doing well, it is extremely difficult to entice her for money. Impossible. We don't have soccer or hockey with a club system. They also tried to entice me at one time, but I believed Alexey Nikolayevich Mishin. Although he was eager to leave for America. So stop talking nonsense - it's me both to the trainers and to the fans. Take it for granted. And figure it out in yourself - why this is happening. I don't want to argue with anyone. We even had a conversation at the end of the competition - I suggested a peaceful truce, they say, there is no need to quarrel. Do your job, and we do ours.

- Have you approached Eteri Georgiyevna?
-- We talked with her staff, yes. Me and Yana (Rudkovskaya, Plyushchenko's wife). She now, like me, invests a lot of money in our schools, in sports and helps athletes with sponsors. And so we said - no need to invent some things, stop. We were in favour of peace.

- What did she answer?
-- So far we have not found understanding from that side. But I had this idea that we need to communicate normally. But the peace with Eteri did not work out. She is more satisfied with the war.

- In general, we are waiting for the continuation of Instagram battles.
-- Yes ... Their director (Renat Layshev) is giving word. In general, I think that as a civil servant he has no right to make such statements at all. Who skates worse, that Trusova will not be able to show the result with me? I have information that in the near future he will leave his place and it is time to pack his suitcase. A pity, he is very cheerful. Every interview is a masterpiece! Just what is this "Plyushchenko is a bum". He sincerely believes that he understands more than me about figure skating. So let's play along, okay? You ask him questions about figure skating with a blue eye, and he answers importantly. And then the whole world laughs. But we have such a character. I really like everything, let him be in our life.

- Eteri Tutberidze recently announced a collaboration with Mariya Shashina, who participated in organizing your shows. Are you ready for the fact that "Khrustalniy" will pull increase its PR?
-- Great, let it increase. Of course I'm in favour! Let them move too. Mariya worked for us as an administrator. She said she represented our show. This is ... an exaggeration. My wife does not need anyone, she is a pro, and she has a super team. Yana, in my opinion, does not even know what this Masha looks like. Masha only helped Arik (Ari Zakaryan, agent and director of the ice shows) to book tickets and hotels for our athletes, that's basically all her promotion of the show. I have a very positive attitude towards her, but, probably, when people start working with big stars, a little dizziness begins. Nevertheless, she's done well, she found a team. God grant that they succeed.

- Why did I ask about the audience. You interacted a lot with the stands, got turned on, played with your eyebrows during the announcement of Usachyova's assessments. Spontaneously or deliberately?
-- I excited the stands, of course. I was in a good mood. And the audience was a little heavy, you know, there was such an oppressive atmosphere. Everyone was waiting - well, who, who? You can already see how the fans split into two camps. And more and more people come over to us, I am sure that whole sectors will root for us. I just wanted to cheer up the audience. In my opinion, everyone appreciated me. Or not? The main thing was that it was interesting. Look at the numbers on television. In terms of the number of spectators, the Russian Figure Skating Cup has overtaken the soccer league.
I think such numbers were unrealistic before our team appeared. So much for the impact of the Plyushchenko-Tutberidze confrontation. Figure skating is returning to the status of the main and most popular sport in Russia, which it once was. It's time to regain our position, overtake Conor, Khabib and others. If there are high ratings, advertising contracts and fame will come, everyone needs it. Therefore, I work, I follow social networks, I read the opinions of fans.

- Do you personally run Instagram? All these "Lyosha, sit down, high five" - is this yours truely?
-- Personally. Of course - Lyosha is great. Merited "fiver". But I don’t think about Lyosha, and he, apparently, is all in thoughts over me and my school! Maybe he is really looking for an alternate airfield? Well, either it’s just a lack of attention, and neither television helps, nor “teasers” in a female guise.

- There will be no spectators at the Russian Cup in Sochi. Is our situation so difficult to close the stands? The ice hockey league in Sochi plays with several thousand spectators at their matches.
-- I don’t understand this at all. Yes, skating without spectators is very difficult, we need fans and support. But this is the present. You have to be ready.

Trusova no longer works with Rozanov and Ilinykh

- We talked a lot about Trusova, let's continue with Alyona Kostornaya. How is she doing with the same triple Axel, programs?
-- Alyona is all right. The only thing is that she broke her boots, and the day before yesterday she began to break in new ones. It takes time. But we are also preparing for the fourth stage, we are finishing the free program, it is ready.

- The program was made via video link?
-- Yes, via Skype, videos were exchanged.

- Do you believe in technology? There is no skepticism that it is unrealistic to stage a top program by video?
-- We have Seryozha Rozanov, who transferred it all to the ice, Alyona is not a little girl after all. I had a big dream that Shae-Lynn would stage the program, it costs a lot of money. We know each other, we skated in the show together. The main thing is that she said "yes", that she would be happy to work with Kostornaya.

- Alyona is comfortable at school, is she comfortable?
-- Alyona is comfortable at school. She has her own ice, very few athletes skate in her training session. Why complain? Choreography, dancing, massages. You have to work, that's all.

- There is a lot of information in the media and social networks about conflicts within the school. For example, Sergey Rozanov does not work with Trusova, only with Kostornaya. State your position, is this true and why it happened, if true.
-- Sergey has not been working with Sasha for a long time, it's true. He guides Alyona. Sasha and Alyona have separate teams, in both choreographers and coaches. There are two different teams. The only thing is that I work with both of them. It was Sasha's decision, I supported it. Seryozha had no questions. It happened.

- Does it bother you that the people who came to your school together broke up almost immediately?
-- Let's do it this way - Sasha came separately. Nobody arrived together. I say it as it is - Sasha came herself. And her dad invited me to take Sergey. I answered: "Why not, he is a good specialist."

- But they had a good relationship.
-- Yes. He gave Sasha her short and free program, this is his great merit. Over time, we began to improve and refine them. But Sergey now has his own work, he is working with Kostornaya, he has two groups.

- Okay, let's talk about the role of Yelena Ilinykh. Are there also no conflicts there?
-- Lena stopped working with Sasha, Sasha stopped working with Lena. They tried, looked at each other, felt, one might say, but did not grow together.

- How long ago did this happen? Yelena took Sasha to the Test Skates.
-- Somewhere just after the Test Skates. Sasha has new gliding specialists, we are still hiring other trainers. Lena works with other athletes, Kostornaya. In general, we have a lot of students: Titova, the Sarnovskiy's, the Zhilina's. Ilinykh does not go anywhere.

- Do they have a conflict with Trusova?
-- She has no conflicts with either Rozanov or Ilinykh.

- You talk about the new coaches. Do you have other acquisitions?
-- Acquisitions? I'm thinking of buying a car. Now I have to choose. (smiles)

I want my school to become the best in the world

- How are you now with harmony in life? A large school, many coaches and skaters with their own interests, already more offspring, not just one child.
-- There would be a desire. Live on, work, create. Probably, everything in my life worked out and is working out, but it throws up new challenges. But I have a very good, close-knit team. You can rely on them. It was not for nothing that I fired 17 specialists at one time. I have a faithful and beloved wife who is always with me and helps me. Lovely sons.

- Isn't it difficult to keep up with everything? Is there enough time for a family?
-- Everything is fine, Arsyusha is growing, we are very happy. How to keep up? Wake up at 6 in the morning, at 7 at work, until 17-18 work in the "Angels", then all the other things. Mom told me: "Slowly, but hurry." I set the tasks, they must be fulfilled.

- And how do they sound?
-- To make my school the best in the world. We will work hard to make this dream a reality.

(c)
Дмитрий Кузнецов
 
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NAOTMAA

Medalist
Joined
Nov 9, 2014
What exactly does Plushkenko think he's gaining by doing all of this? Beyond stroking his ego I mean. These aren't his competition days when he was personally going head to head with Yagudin. This now directly involves and affects other people beyond himself, his students. It's not just unprofessional, it's pathetic.

And dragging Alina into it is just :palmf: She's not even competing anymore!
 

Alex65

Final Flight
Joined
Aug 11, 2018
Country
Russia
"This is to help prevent derailing of current national threads."

I wonder which national thread this is referring to...
I really hope that this will work and that the topic of RL will talk about athletes. There is something to talk about without all this.
 

peepsquick

Final Flight
Joined
Oct 26, 2016
Different coach: Zhulin
Is no one worried about the fact that Zhulin seems to push his trainees beyond their physical abilities?
I get that he wants to cash in on the momentum of S/K this past season but isn't it going to be counterproductive in the end? Is he not endangering their longevity in the sport ?
 

NAOTMAA

Medalist
Joined
Nov 9, 2014
Different coach: Zhulin
Is no one worried about the fact that Zhulin seems to push his trainees beyond their physical abilities?
I get that he wants to cash in on the momentum of S/K this past season but isn't it going to be counterproductive in the end? Is he not endangering their longevity in the sport ?
Yes it it counterproductive but in Zhulin's defense it feels like the main blame goes on the federation and the powers in charge. It seems all Russian athletes are facing the pressure to compete regardless. I mean just look at what's happening with Samarin currently and the comments TAT apparently made about him! :jaw:
 
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