RSF forcing Russian coaches to coach only Russians until Sochi

[Ajax]

I'm not so sure of that. When V/M switched to S&Z, they were different from the other couples in that camp and I think they kept their individuality. They continued skating in a more mature way, are more balletic and tidier and Tessa even hasn't become skinny like Shpilband's other female skaters. So hopefully I/K can keep their individual style too.

Yes but Zueva and Shpilband suck at choreographing anything sensual/sexy. Just look at V/M's dorky whitebread "Latin" choreo in their FD (And I say this as a huge V/M fan)

[Fashionista]

well,I really hope Fernandez change coach as soon as possible...

He will.

[LadyGray]

There were those who thought Isabel (not Oliver) was sorely lacking some elegant qualities of line and edges, as well, so as usual it's chacon a son gout.

I read this and thought immediately of this

[marbri]

Isabel was very skilled from the knee down. Another story from the knee up.

[alilou]

Russia's got the post-Olympic blues before they've even started
http://www.rusbiznews.com/news/n1050.html

A thousand days before the opening of the Sochi Olympics, Russian athletes have reached a nadir. During the 2010-2011 winter season, which ended in the defeat of Vyacheslav Bykov's team at the Ice Hockey World Championship, Russians only managed to win two top awards. In their race for gold, the future Olympic hosts have been outdistanced by even... the Australians. This correspondent for "RusBusinessNews" has been figuring out who is going to rouse the Russian sports world from its coma in the next three years and how this is going to be done.

It's not sounding good, but a lot can change in 3 yrs.

The pressure on I&K, V&T, Gachinski, Leonova, Makarova, et al must be enormous

ETA: Russia signs multi-million dollar deal with Gazprom to prepare team for Sochi 2014
http://www.insidethegames.biz/olympi...for-sochi-2014

They're certainly throwing enough money at it. It worked for Canada.

[Iceman]

Somewhat ot: I have never understood why more top flight skaters haven't used Raphael,
especially since the Kween used him. As far as I know Mao was his last and that was seasons ago. Also diffiuclt to understand how Morosov juggles so may skaters at a time and appears to do well by them.

[misskarne]

....

Now I have to know...

What did Australia beat Russia at?

[caseyedwards]

All of Austrailias golds and medals were in snowboarding but Russia won a gold in snowboarding as well.

[misskarne]

All of Austrailias golds and medals were in snowboarding but Russia won a gold in snowboarding as well.

Ah, I suspected as much!

[GarrAarghHrumph]

Somewhat ot: I have never understood why more top flight skaters haven't used Raphael,
especially since the Kween used him. As far as I know Mao was his last and that was seasons ago. Also diffiuclt to understand how Morosov juggles so may skaters at a time and appears to do well by them.

Nikolai Morozov, in the US at least, had coaches that assisted him. Those coaches would do much of the training of the skaters, and Morozov would direct it, and do some of the training as well. All of the coaches in the "Morozov camp" basically taught in a style compatible with that of Morozov.

[GarrAarghHrumph]

Closing doors does not seem to hurt Chineese pair skaters. they have built their pair program from nothing, without any influence of the experts from other countries.

That is not true. The Chinese pairs teams and their coaching staff, once the teams were at a certain level technically, came to the US to learn western styles of makeup, hair, costumes, music, and choreography. There were US coaches and etc. helping out.

[hanca]

That is not true. The Chinese pairs teams and their coaching staff, once the teams were at a certain level technically, came to the US to learn western styles of makeup, hair, costumes, music, and choreography. There were US coaches and etc. helping out.

My understanding was that they seeked help from outside only when they were very near to the top. The most of the job (from nothing to near to the top) was done with them being closed to extrenal world.

[giselle23]

That is not true. The Chinese pairs teams and their coaching staff, once the teams were at a certain level technically, came to the US to learn western styles of makeup, hair, costumes, music, and choreography. There were US coaches and etc. helping out.

I read that Zhao trained in Russia early on, before he teamed with Shen.