Knierims split from coach Aliona Savchenko

[elbkup]

This brings up two points. I was having dinner with a Russian skating coach recently and asked why our American skaters are lagging behind the world in difficulty. (Prescinding from our men, of course). He was very dismissive of the American work ethic. In essence, his opinion was that Americans aren't willing to work as hard as the Russians or the Japanese or the Koreans. I don't want to argue this point, but he made it, and he implied it wasn't his opinion alone. So the first point is the work ethic question. The second, and more pertinent in this case, is Aljona herself. I spoke to Eric Radford after the Olympics and I said that if he hadn't been standing next to Bruno when Aljona and Bruno realized they had won, he would have fallen on the floor since Bruno collapsed into Eric's arms. Can you imagine the pressure that boy was under skating with Aljona at that point? If he had made a mistake that cost her the gold, God alone knows what fury would have followed. Great skaters, have to be hardened like steel to achieve the Gold. Aljona is of that ilk. But, being a great skater, doesn't necessarily translate into being a good coach. People for whom something comes easily don't always know how to translate it for someone who finds it difficult. Someone who struggled with jumping could teach me how to jump with more facility than someone for whom jumping came second nature. Perhaps, Aljona didn't think Alexa and Chris worked as hard as she and Bruno had. I have no idea, but she's a tough task mistress that's for sure. Again, I hope Alexa and Chris find a coach to bring out their best, not one who superimposes anything on them.

So topic: in this thread bit I could not resist:
Your Russian friend's comments gave me a chuckle... perhaps he fears losing what philosophers call a "worthy adversary" , couching his fear in dismissive, contemptuous rhetoric. .. analyzing his view would require the skills of a ultra competent psychoanalyst, so, no, I would not want to argue it either.
But reading about your discussion with him reminded me acutely of Baryshnikov's defection to the lazy incompetent USA so many years ago... Ask your friend: as Russia's premier ballet star, what, do you suppose, was Baryshnikov looking for leaving Mother Russia? This film clip holds the key:
Baryshnikov / Hines dance off from White Nights...
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Tr8vtCrzT6w

 

[el henry]

Not every coach works with every skater. And Aljona, for all her gifts, is a brand new coach.

Alexa and Chris are full grown adults. Alexa has been through a major, life threatening illness. Chris was her support. As Chris has said in interviews, going through an experience where you might actually lose your wife, well, it puts skating in perspective. Alexa and Chris have hard-won perspective.

I give them credit for trying, and I hope they find the coaching situation that works for them

 

[andromache]

If I was in a pair wanting to win a world medal one day, I would RUN to Aljona. If she's going to be a little brutal in her training, I'll take it if I really want to win.

I do think that Alexa and Chris should've stuck it out for the season and made it work. (Though I'm not exactly clear on who dumped who.) I think it's rare to find a coach who truly believes in your potential and is confident in their plan to take you where you want to go - which is what seemed to be the case with Aljona. She thought she could get them on World podiums.

As for this sentiment:

The second, and more pertinent in this case, is Aljona herself. I spoke to Eric Radford after the Olympics and I said that if he hadn't been standing next to Bruno when Aljona and Bruno realized they had won, he would have fallen on the floor since Bruno collapsed into Eric's arms. Can you imagine the pressure that boy was under skating with Aljona at that point? If he had made a mistake that cost her the gold, God alone knows what fury would have followed.

I think this a little unfair to Aljona - it makes her sound almost abusive. If they had not won OGM and it was Bruno's fault, Aljona is an adult who is more than capable of coping with disappointment. Bruno would probably be far harsher on himself than she would be on him.

 

[nocturnalis]

If I was in a pair wanting to win a world medal one day, I would RUN to Aljona. If she's going to be a little brutal in her training, I'll take it if I really want to win.

I do think that Alexa and Chris should've stuck it out for the season and made it work. (Though I'm not exactly clear on who dumped who.) I think it's rare to find a coach who truly believes in your potential and is confident in their plan to take you where you want to go - which is what seemed to be the case with Aljona. She thought she could get them on World podiums.

As for this sentiment:



I think this a little unfair to Aljona - it makes her sound almost abusive. If they had not won OGM and it was Bruno's fault, Aljona is an adult who is more than capable of coping with disappointment. Bruno would probably be far harsher on himself than she would be on him.

Didn't someone say that people in Germany were blaming Bruno for popping the jump in the short? He was under immense pressure.

 

[MissBeeFarm]

Didn't someone say that people in Germany were blaming Bruno for popping the jump in the short? He was under immense pressure.

"people in Germany" generally have no idea who Aljona is, let alone Bruno. There were articles after the SP were it was stated that gold was basically impossible after mistakes. And yes, Bruno's mistake was always mentioned. But I wouldn't call that blame as much as stating the facts, that mistake did cost many points. All in all I believe Bruno blamed himself more than anybody else could have blamed him.

 

[TontoK]

Not every coach works with every skater. And Aljona, for all her gifts, is a brand new coach.

Alexa and Chris are full grown adults. Alexa has been through a major, life threatening illness. Chris was her support. As Chris has said in interviews, going through an experience where you might actually lose your wife, well, it puts skating in perspective. Alexa and Chris have hard-won perspective.

I give them credit for trying, and I hope they find the coaching situation that works for them

Hey, El.

I agree with your post, even if it is a little Pollyanna. LOL

The main point is that all the people involved here - skaters and coaches - are adults. We needn't act as though someone can no longer sit at the cool table in middle school lunch.

The training situation has to be a good fit for all concerned. In this case, it obviously wasn't.

I think the K's need to decide what they want out of the rest of their career, and they need to make an honest assessment of how to get there, consistent with their training preferences.

 

[libecha]

My biggest concern with this arrangement was always the prospect of Aljona fully unleashed as an inexperienced coach. She is a famously hard worker, but her whole career, she has had people of equal (partners) or superior (coaches) status reining her in and keeping the standards at least somewhat realistic for the rest of humanity. She's also had a calm, chilled personality opposite her to balance the dynamic, whether it was Robin to balance her and Ingo or Alex Koenig to balance her and Bruno. But as the coach, she's the one in charge. She's the one who has to decide when enough is enough and smooth her own sharp edges. She's the one who has to manage all the personalities, with the extra challenge of her pair being married to each other. It's a tall order for a first-timer. It sounds like she thinks the Knierims need to work harder, but I'm not sure her definition of "work harder" is a sane or sustainable one, so it's hard to tell what that actually means.

She also doesn't seem to me to be really committed to this coaching thing, which is too bad because while I know she has longing eyes still set on the competitive world, her partner seems to be telegraphing pretty clearly that he's not interested. So she's going to need something else to do.

This all began and ended very abruptly and the whole thing was quite odd. I never had high hopes but it leaves a bit of a sour taste, like nobody involved really knew what they were getting into.

 

[DanseMacabre]

If I was in a pair wanting to win a world medal one day, I would RUN to Aljona. If she's going to be a little brutal in her training, I'll take it if I really want to win.

^ This.

Also, I’m not the least but surprised to hear Aljona say what she did. It’s not the first time I’ve heard that Alexa and Chris don’t exactly share her philosophy when it comes to the time and intensity one ought to invest in training. And that’s fine so long as they’re honest and realistic about their goals and their expectations. If they don’t want to compete for medals with the top-ranked teams in the world and are content just being the US #1 (which is a great accomplishment, don’t get me wrong, but it is a bit like being a big fish in a small pond) then hey...they probably don’t need an Aljona-esque push to get there. But if they do want to be competitive at that level...well, I don’t think coach-hopping at the start of the Grand Prix is the way to get there.

 

[lavoix]

K/K looked quite bad at Skate America, I was hoping that Aljona would keep pushing them in the right direction, but it seems that they just didn't want it. If you progress so much with Aljona in such a short space of time, why stop that? It baffles me.

 

[MACGoldSeal]

K/K looked quite bad at Skate America, I was hoping that Aljona would keep pushing them in the right direction, but it seems that they just didn't want it. If you progress so much with Aljona in such a short space of time, why stop that? It baffles me.

This may be a case of, "Be careful what you wish for, you may get it." Wishing for something and having the reality be far different than the 'dream' could be what is going on here. My hope for Alexa and Chris is that they find a coach who will bring out their relationship in their skating. Married couples have an edge that brother and sister pairs can't. I know I harp on this, but remember Barb Underhill and Paul Martini. No brother/sister pair could EVER pull off what these two amazing skaters did. I have never felt a moment of 'heat' in Alexa and Chris' programs. Johnny Zimmerman would bring that out for sure.

 

[gold12345]

The Knierims made a lot of mistakes, some weird ones, but overall, they certainly look very improved and have promising programs, which makes this whole thing more baffling. I wouldn't have expected them to have an amazing outing given all the changes they've made combined with the trauma of losing your coach the week of the event, but they truly look promising.

Aljona is a first-time coach and there are two sides to every story. The Knierims have indicated that the story isn't simply that they couldn't train at Aljona's level of intensity. As someone else mentioned, we don't know what Aljona's "intensity" actually is or of it's even sane. Also, just because you don't follow Aljona's exact plan it doesn't mean you aren't working hard enough. Part of coaching is constantly adjusting your plan based on what your skaters need. There's no one "right" path to the top. The Knierims are adults and a world level pair team, and needed to be included in the decision making. It would be understable with all the changes if they were a bit concerned about doing too much too soon. Everyone involved needed to be patient with the process.

My concern with Aljona as a new coach was that there's nobody there to help balance her out or give her advice. Some new coaches ease their way into coaching by partnering with an already established coach (ie. Robin Szolkowy working with Nina Mozer). Winning Olympic gold is NOT the same as coaching other people. They require two different skill sets.

If it's true that Aljona is the one who ended it, it doesn't make her look good to have left the Knierims flat the week of a GP event, regardless of what the arguments were or how hard they were working. Even if she was mad at them for not following her exact plan, she should have saw through her commitment to accompany them to Skate America instead of leaving them there to fend for themselves. I can only imagine what that did for Alexa's morale, especially. Maybe Aljona wasn't totally ready for this coaching thing. Maybe she was trying to live out a longer competitive career through her students instead of being more mindful of their needs.

It's really hard for me to believe that the Knierims would have WANTED to leave their coach the week of SA. That would have been self-sabotaging. They were singing Aljona praises a couple weeks ago.

 

[QuadThrow]

The information we got are so short. The room for speculation is so immense.

At the end of the day this whole story makes everybody appear in a bad light. The Knierim for missing the chance to continue working with Aljona and Aljona for ditching the opportunity.

Aljona has always been brilliant but stubborn. Her personality has chanced over the years but the Olympic Gold reinforced her ENTJ-personality. Her childhood and youth had not been the easiest. Everyone who knows her story might understand her better.

She will always need someone to balance her out. Through the last years she had even four men around her (Bruno, Liam, Alexander and Francois Ballester). Many people need to be pushed. Some people need to be stopped. I really doubt that she will be a worldclass coach since she will usually struggle to understand other's needs and special feelings. She will be a great choreographer with great ideas and her influence will make everyone look greater. But as a head of a team she will struggle.

 

[RobinA]

Ouch. Sounds like she told them it wasn't going to work because they're not working hard enough--hope that's not it, but it sounds like it. That's got to be a real morale crusher for them. I hope they can find another coach who they can work well with. I'm also not sure Aljona has done herself any favors. This might well make anyone else hoping to train with her in the future think twice...

Nah. Anybody who has ever seen Aliona skate should have a pretty good idea she trains like a beast. It seems sensible that you wouldn't go to her unless you were willing to TRAIN.

 

[Princessroja]

Nah. Anybody who has ever seen Aliona skate should have a pretty good idea she trains like a beast. It seems sensible that you wouldn't go to her unless you were willing to TRAIN.

Oh, I don't mean because of the hard work. I agree with you there. I mean it's not a good look--however good of a choice it may or may not have been in reality--to dump your first students a few months right before their first major comp. I think if there are more skaters wishing to work with her, that would understandably give them pause. Again, we'll probably never know the backstory so I don't have the info to make an opinion about the actual merits of her choice. But still, this was a trial for her as a coach too, and it's fair that a later potential student might look at it and think twice.

 

[GGFan]

I'm very late. I have no idea why this spilt happened but given past records I'm riding with Aljona here. Sorry, but given the work ethic of American pairs in recent years, and the improvements she made in a short time I think this was a journey the Knierims should have stuck with.

I think she was their window into what it takes to make it to the top level. Ultimately, I wish them the best.

I'm happy that Aljona confirmed on TSL's home page that this is not the end of her coaching career. I think she has a lot to offer.

 

[el henry]

I'm very late. I have no idea why this spilt happened but given past records I'm riding with Aljona here. Sorry, but given the work ethic of American pairs in recent years, and the improvements she made in a short time I think this was a journey the Knierims should have stuck with.

I think she was their window into what it takes to make it to the top level. Ultimately, I wish them the best.

I'm happy that Aljona confirmed on TSL's home page that this is not the end of her coaching career. I think she has a lot to offer.

Excuse me?
Work ethic of American pairs?
Do you have any back up for that statement?
As in Ashley Cain and Tim Leduc practicing their hearts out to achieve that smooth supple “as one” skating? As in Deanna Stellato coming back after 16 years to work and work and work at being a pairs lady?

If Aljona thinks Alexa and Chris weren’t adopting her program, all well and good. But it wasn’t because of some supposed laziness or lack of commitment on the Knierims’ part.:disapp:
If anything I would expect that Alexa and Chris know that there are far more important goals in life than medals. And that they weren’t afraid to tell Aljona that. If so (and completely my speculation based on their history of Alexa almost dying, and ya know, while being completely committed, priorities that are a tad more important than skating) bravo for them:agree:. I applaud that attitude

I wish Aljona, Alexa and Chris all the best as they go forward from this.

 

[lavoix]

Ouch. Sounds like she told them it wasn't going to work because they're not working hard enough--hope that's not it, but it sounds like it. That's got to be a real morale crusher for them. I hope they can find another coach who they can work well with. I'm also not sure Aljona has done herself any favors. This might well make anyone else hoping to train with her in the future think twice...

Why? Aljona is amazing, if you want to be as amazing as her, you gotta put in the hard work. If not, you're free to leave.

 

[Skater Boy]

If I was in a pair wanting to win a world medal one day, I would RUN to Aljona. If she's going to be a little brutal in her training, I'll take it if I really want to win.

I do think that Alexa and Chris should've stuck it out for the season and made it work. (Though I'm not exactly clear on who dumped who.) I think it's rare to find a coach who truly believes in your potential and is confident in their plan to take you where you want to go - which is what seemed to be the case with Aljona. She thought she could get them on World podiums.

As for this sentiment:



I think this a little unfair to Aljona - it makes her sound almost abusive. If they had not won OGM and it was Bruno's fault, Aljona is an adult who is more than capable of coping with disappointment. Bruno would probably be far harsher on himself than she would be on him.

I think it is very naive to think Aliona is an obvious panacea as a coach even moreso Bruno. The odds are not super that despite Savchenko's attitude she wants it all or like that song Never Enough - nothingis enough for Aliona. Who knows what her coaching technique versus her competing technique. One should not assume they are the same. And it is yet to be seen if it would work for a skating team. The fact that the Knerims looked so uncomfortable in their programs shows that Aliona may not be the miracle worker or fantab coach we all seem to make her to be. Aliona will always be a superstar as a p airs skater but let's not oversell the woman as a coach. Besides long term wise Aliona is about Aliona - she says she wants to comeback - that is a conflict of interest. What things started to click and then she goes after another gold? Perhaps Aliona is the greatest competitior in pairs. Not so sure she is a coach - the Knerims did not look comfortable at all at SA.

 

[ancientpeas]

Not all coaches or styles of coaching work for all people. Just like when people automatically say "send them to Eteri" or "send them to Raf" or "send them Brian" or (formerly) "send them to Frank". Lots of really good skaters have been with those coaches and failed to produce the desired results with them. It is not a one size fits all equation.

Here is one thing I want to say: I do like Sk/K's programs this year. If Aljona had any part of that then I am grateful to her.

 

[lavoix]

The information we got are so short. The room for speculation is so immense.

At the end of the day this whole story makes everybody appear in a bad light. The Knierim for missing the chance to continue working with Aljona and Aljona for ditching the opportunity.

Aljona has always been brilliant but stubborn. Her personality has chanced over the years but the Olympic Gold reinforced her ENTJ-personality. Her childhood and youth had not been the easiest. Everyone who knows her story might understand her better.

She will always need someone to balance her out. Through the last years she had even four men around her (Bruno, Liam, Alexander and Francois Ballester). Many people need to be pushed. Some people need to be stopped. I really doubt that she will be a worldclass coach since she will usually struggle to understand other's needs and special feelings. She will be a great choreographer with great ideas and her influence will make everyone look greater. But as a head of a team she will struggle.

Care to share more about her story? I'm quite fascinated in knowing more about her.