After the Russian skaters were not accepted to the World Championships, the official competitive season ended at the Channel One Cup, where the team of Anna Shcherbakova defeated the team of Mark Kondratyuk. Alexandra Trusova refused to participate in this project, explaining this decision by her reluctance to perform after the Olympic Games in Beijing. Competitions in the Chinese capital turned out to be really morally difficult for student Eteri Tutberidze – the skater in the free program was the first in the world to do five quadruple jumps, but this was not enough to beat compatriot Anna Shcherbakova, who performed only one element of ultra-si . Trusova’s hysteria and tears hit the TV broadcast, as did the words “Everyone has a gold medal, but I don’t” (Shcherbakova won a gold medal in the individual tournament, another Russian woman Kamila Valieva won the highest standard award in the team championship – socialbites.ca ”) and “You knew everything” to their coach.
What meaning was attached to the second statement, only the athlete himself and, possibly, the coaching team know, but after the Games there was a lot of discussion in the media about what would happen to Trusova. It was about both ending a career and switching to another coach – that’s exactly what two-time world champion Evgenia Medvedeva did in 2018 after an almost similar situation. However, time passed and there was no official news. In April, Alexandra also took part in the shows organized by Tutberidze’s coaches in Minsk and Moscow.
In the Russian capital, the figure skater presented a new trick, which can partially be considered an answer to the question of retirement. On the ice, the figure skater appeared on the song “I Will Not Let Down” by the singer Yolka, her skating was a great pleasure and standing ovation from the public.
Here, despite the impressive jumping content, Trusova was able to cleanly complete all five quadruple jumps, which she announced at the start of the season, only at the Games, that before that their numbers were reduced (due to the athlete’s injury during the fall) or jumps with errors. It is also worth remembering that after the transition from juniors to adults, Trusova did not have a single gold medal, so it is something that the skater definitely has to deal with. True, here the question arises how quickly he can prove himself in the international arena – so far there is no clarity about the time of the removal of the Russians.
Trusova also began working again with the choreographer Dmitry Mikhailov, who worked at the academy of the two-time Olympic champion Evgeni Plushenko, under the guidance of which the athlete trained for about a year – she left Tutberidze in May 2020, but soon returned to Khrustalny.
“We are preparing a surprise for you,” said Trusova, posting a video with Mikhailov on the Telegram channel.
Questions about the end of a career also arose at the address of the Olympic champion Shcherbakova. But it is worth noting here that the skater admitted that after the First Channel Cup he “added fuel” to the fire, now he has a feeling of confusion, which can affect his decision.
“Right now, I want to rest until I’m the only one feeling generally confused. It is not clear what awaits us, I will look into the situation,” he said.
At the same time, a few weeks before the start of the Channel One Cup, which was postponed twice and was finally held to coincide with the World Championship, Shcherbakova was sure that she did not plan to complete it after the Games in Beijing. .
“I definitely have the desire to skate more. I still can’t imagine myself without figure skating. “I don’t have a clear idea of what my next career will look like, but I’m not ready to finish it,” he said.
Maintaining motivation in the current conditions, where it is not yet clear what the next seasons will look like for the Russians, Shcherbakova is still slightly less than Trusova. He has Olympic gold in a personal tournament, a medal of the highest standard of the World Championship, three times climbed to the top step of the podium of the Russian championship. She did not win the Grand Prix Final and the European Championship, but her gold collection is quite extensive. It is not worth excluding the possibility of announcing Shcherbakova’s retirement, but after the Tutberidze show in Moscow, the athlete admitted that she is still preparing for the new season.
“At the beginning of May, there will be a full opportunity to recuperate and relax. There is no program plan yet.
I’m gearing up for next season but I’m not learning any new quads at the moment. He trained the quartet rittberger when he would perform at the World Championships, but later focused on pure rental of programs.
While there were plans for the World Cup, there was more enthusiasm to teach him,” he said.
Gold in the team tournament at the Olympic Games in Beijing was won by Nikita Katsalapov and Victoria Sinitsina. The couple’s path to China was quite difficult, during the season the skater struggled with severe back pain, so they had to miss the start – for example, the dancers were withdrawn from the free program at the Russian Championships. But the pain did not prevent the skaters from winning the European Championship, and in addition to the gold in the “commander” at the Beijing Games, they could take silver in the individual tournament. They lost only to the elite French – Gabrielle Papadakis and Guillaume Sizeron.
Penalties at international starts, frequent injuries – this cast doubt on the continuation of the couple’s career. However, they had announced a few days ago that they would continue skating, and Russia’s removal from tournaments under the auspices of the International Skating Union (ISU) serves as an additional motivation.
“We made a decision, we already have a schedule, we have plans for a training camp. We train. In principle, we do not have any changes and differences from the regular season. Do we plan to continue? We plan, we go to the collection – that’s one hundred percent. Everything, of course , will depend on whether the Russian figure skating will be on the world stage.
Motivation? Now this is the motivation for us and our team – to show what kind of athletes the world is losing,” Sport24 quotes Katsalapov.
Daria Usacheva turned on the ice during the show. His story during the Olympic season is quite tragic – an athlete training in the Tutberidze group skated for several weeks with pain in his hip, and at the stage of the Grand Prix in Japan the injury made itself felt. In the warm-up before the short program, Usacheva began to do the jump, but could not bend and collapsed on the ice. She struggled to her feet, rolled over to the side, and was already away from the arena in her arms. After a few months of recovery she returned to training during the Olympics and went on the ice during a show in Moscow. True, in his performance the athlete did without the performance of jumping elements.
After the show, Usacheva admitted that she had more motivation to keep going after the injury, and also talked about how her recovery went.
“Slowly, without jumping. So that nothing happens again. Jumping began to improve. In terms of training in volume, over time everything is the same as before. I just do things a little different – what is needed now,” he shared.