Ludmilla Belousova has passed away (threads merged)

sap5

Well-Known Member
Messages
10,549

OMG! A chance to see the forward outside death spiral, beautifully performed! I know that they invented 3 out of the 4 death spirals, and I think that no one has ever done them as beautifully as they did.

ETA: I don't watch pair skating anymore because IJS has ruined the beauty in my opinion, but pair skating is what made me a figure skating fan originally. So much beauty....
 

Meoima

Well-Known Member
Messages
5,310
OMG! A chance to see the forward outside death spiral, beautifully performed! I know that they invented 3 out of the 4 death spirals, and I think that no one has ever done them as beautifully as they did.

ETA: I don't watch pair skating anymore because IJS has ruined the beauty in my opinion, but pair skating is what made me a figure skating fan originally. So much beauty....
Aliona and Bruno have good programs this season, you should watch them.
 

Sasha'sSpins

🇺🇦💙🙏💛🇺🇦
Messages
5,226
Heartbreaking news! :(

They were enchanting, a TRUE Pairs team - not just two athletes on the ice . I am grateful that their performances are preserved forever on film. They will always be the first of the great Soviet Pairs teams!

Ludmilla's elegance and ethereal beauty will not be forgotten! My heart goes out to Oleg and his loved ones!
 

Spun Silver

Well-Known Member
Messages
12,130
Just posted a new Skate Guard piece on The Legacy Of Ludmila:

http://skateguard1.blogspot.ca/2017/09/the-legacy-of-ludmila.html

Just gutted by this news. :(
Thanks for this. I didnt know that they started skating when they were 16! Or that they were Swiss citizens, not American. That interview you included has many lessons for today's skaters, from wearing the 22-pound belt (does anyone do that now?), to ignoring "the prospects theory," to accepting help from anyone... This passage could sum up their whole way of skating;
Q: Who are your favourite figure skaters?

A from Oleg: The Americans Dick Button and David Jenkins, the German Ina Bauer, the Canadians Donald Jackson, Barbara Wagner, Robert Paul. All of them are very musical. It touches your heartstrings to watch them. Heart - that's what is missing most often. You see a figure skater going all out to do a complex turn. He does it gracefully and cleanly. It would seem that there is nothing more you could expect. But it lacks the principal ingredient.

A from Ludmila: His heart isn't in it.

A from Oleg: Yes, it's skillful and correct, but it's not artistic. Very often the mastery of a figure skater boils down to artistic processing of spiritual vacuity. It always comes out in the movements. There are thousands of high-class athletes but someone must be first, and the first is the one who can reach your heart. That's the way it is.
Watching them you see all that technique and control placed at the service of unison and beauty. They uplifted their audiences. They were icons of pure love. R.I.P. Ludmila, and God be with Oleg until he joins her.
 

bardtoob

Well-Known Member
Messages
14,640
Do you realize this is a thread about Ludmilla's passing? Please respect that.

It was meant to be a complement.

At the time of that photo they were already being told they were too old for the glorious career they were to have. They sure proved TPTB wrong.
 
Last edited:

Tinami Amori

Well-Known Member
Messages
20,156
Re: http://s020.radikal.ru/i718/1511/7c/605702082ad8.jpg

What a lovely pair with so much ahead of them :)
Do you realize this is a thread about Ludmilla's passing? Please respect that.
It was meant to be a complement.
At the time of that photo they were already being told they were too old for the glorious career they were to have. They sure proved TPTB wrong.

For the record, the foto I posted and you commented on, is from 1956, shortly after Ludmila’s first partner, Kirill Gulyaev, decided to quite skating 1954, then Ludmila returned to single skating throughout 1955, and in 1956 was introduced and paired up with Oleg… and that’s the two of them together. B/P became "too old" in the 1970's.. :lol:
 

bardtoob

Well-Known Member
Messages
14,640
… and that’s the two of them together. B/P became "too old" in the 1970's.. :lol:

I was told they were told they were too old in their late teens because they started too late. Furthermore, even before they won their first Euros and after they won their first Olympics they were told they were has beens. I always found their stories of age discrimination inspiring because they were so persistent in the face of naysayers.

Q: Most people think that figure skaters, to reach world class, should begin at the age of eight, or even as early as five. Do you agree?
A from Ludmila: Oleg and I often get letters from children 10 or older who complain that they
were turned down at skating classes because they were too old. I started figure skating at 16.

Q: I believe there was a time when you too were considered a nonprospect?

A from Oleg: Even before last year's European championship in Moscow, Skating Federation
secretary Sergei Vasilyev said that if Belousova and Protopopov did not become Olympic champions, he'd raise the question of keeping them on the national team and of their prospects.

But we won the European championship and then the world championship in America. At the 1964 European championship we took second place. Though we were in fighting form, the unexpected happened: Ludmila tripped on a hairpin the skater before her had dropped. And so before the Olympic team left
for Innsbruck, head trainer of the national team Georgi Felitsin was saying, "Well, in my opinion, Belousova and Protopopov won't do much better at the Olympic games than they did at the European championship."

And even when we came back from Innsbruck with gold medals, he kept on saying that we had won by a fluke, that the chances were 98 per cent against our winning. Yakov Smushkin of the Central Physical Culture Research Institute also prophesied our defeat. He calculated on an electronic computer (using the "prospects" theory, of course) that the curve of match results of
our opponents was rising and that ours was heading downward. On the eve of our departure for Austria he said, "Too bad, kids, but the best you can hope for at the Olympics is third or fourth place." Whenever I meet Smushkin now, I ask him, "Well, how's your computer doing?"

https://skateguard1.blogspot.ca/2017/09/the-legacy-of-ludmila.html?m=1
 
Last edited:

Tinami Amori

Well-Known Member
Messages
20,156
I was told they were told they were too old in their late teens because they started too late.
Actually, in 1961 Oleg was 29 and yet Zhuk saw pair's potentials and took them on. In 1962 they won World Championship, and until 1969 were considered "the pride of the Nation", in spite of Oleg's difficult persona and a decision to be his own coach. In 1969 the team started to get 2nd and 3rd places @ Euros and Worlds. In the following years they placed 4th (1970) and then 6th (1971) at Russian Nationals, and then went back up to 3rd in 1972.

The talk of "are we too old" was started by Oleg, in addition, to conversations between Oleg and the Federation about increasing the difficulty content, which Oleg refused to do claiming (in German language): the sport is called "Artistic skating" not "Athletic skating".

His comments were officially recorded when he said it in response to Kilius/Baumler's statement that they (K/B) should be the the winners because of greater difficulty of their routine.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jvm1u6OvXYI
https://www.sports.ru/dynamic_images/post/133/973/3/share/99a8d0_no_logo_no_text.png
https://www.sports.ru/tribuna/blogs/lamarin777/1339733.html

The Russian Federation took a note of "difficulty" vs. "artistry" and so on..... and next we have Rodnina/Ulanov/Zaitzev..... :D
 

bardtoob

Well-Known Member
Messages
14,640
Actually, in 1961 Oleg was 29 and yet Zhuk saw pair's potentials and took them on. In 1962 they won World Championship, and until 1969 were considered "the pride of the Nation", in spite of Oleg's difficult persona and a decision to be his own coach

Skating Federation secretary Sergei Vasilyev, head trainer of the national team Georgi Felitsin, and Yakov Smushkin of the Central Physical Culture Research Institute were writing them off between 1962 and 1964, and, of course, Ludmilla and Oleg responded by winning Euros, Worlds, and Olympics then doing it some more ... G*d bless Ludmilla and G*d bless Oleg.

Regarding Zhuk, wouldn't it be just like him to train Belousova and Protopopov to embarrass so-called officials and experts and increase his prestige as a coach.
 
Last edited:

Vash01

Fan of Yuzuru, T&M, P&C
Messages
56,511
It was meant to be a complement.

At the time of that photo they were already being told they were too old for the glorious career they were to have. They sure proved TPTB wrong.

The three posts (one of them was yours) I quoted in my post were about Savchenko-Massot. That's why I made that comment to show respect (to Ludmila, whose passing we are discussing). It's not unusual for any of us to get off topic, but this is a sad news. It will be nice to keep the discussion about Ludmila and Oleg and those related to them in some way (even professionally).
 

bardtoob

Well-Known Member
Messages
14,640
The three posts (one of them was yours) I quoted in my post were about Savchenko-Massot. That's why I made that comment to show respect (to Ludmila, whose passing we are discussing).

The picture where I said "they" had so much ahead of them was of Ludmilla and Oleg in 1956, and I was admiring their potential as a youthful couple retrospectively.
 

Tinami Amori

Well-Known Member
Messages
20,156
That's in character :D
Do you read Russian? i think you might, but not sure. If you do, boy do i have some fun "ancient soviet trivia" about mostly Oleg....

Did you know that his original name is not Protopopov, but Gruzdev, and that is the name he was using at at the skating school when he was still skating in men's singles? His mother's familia name is Grott, his father (who left the family early) was Gruzdev, and his step father was a famous jewish poet Dmitry Tzenzor, and NOBODY knows how Oleg ended up with last name Protopopov, which he wrote into his passport application at the age of 16...... :D

let me know if you can read Russian i will give you some links.
 
Last edited:

Users who are viewing this thread

Top
Do Not Sell My Personal Information