“We don’t like to talk about girls swallowing pills for their dreams but this is true. One of my partners once told me: ‘Well, another girl will replace you, who will take furosemide, other diuretics and quickly lose weight.” Former skater about the flip side of figure skating
Translation of the interview with Russian skater Ksenia Ermakova about the flip side of figure skating.
source: dzen.ru dd. 17th May by Vlad Zhukov
Ksenia Ermakova was one of the most prominent figure skaters from Nizhny Novgorod. Together with her partner Vladislav Panteleev, she participated in major Russian competitions and even competed in pre-Olympic Russian Nationals. Unfortunately, her career was halted by problems after that. In the interview she talks about puberty, pills, mental health, and machinations — the harsh realities of figure skating. Here’s a translation of her comments.
“Q: Ksenia, what is figure skating like outside Moscow and St. Petersburg?
Ksenia Ermakova: Moscow is another planet. The topic of regions is very painful.
There are many talented kids and good coaches as well. But the established policy that Moscow is always ahead often kills the desire to skate. Now, we have a very bright example – Lisa Pasechnik. We skated with her for about a season under the same coach, and then she moved to Odintsovo to train with Lyudmila and Alexei Gorshkov. A talented, hard-working girl. But, our ice time at the sports school was only around 3-4 hours a week.
Q: In Moscow, skaters have that much practice in just a day.
Ksenia Ermakova: No one creates the conditions in the regions. When your sports school is supposed to allocate 16 hours of ice time per week according to the standards for masters of sports, but you only get three – that’s impossible. Very often we had to go for additional sessions, sometimes to other cities, so that you would at least remember how to stay on the ice.
Plus, we didn’t have a proper coaching staff. Our main coach is wonderful, but we had no constant choreographers, no people for jazz and modern choreography, no individual training specialist. Not to mention a dietologist, psychologist, etc. We didn’t have health care either. There is only a nurse at the rink. It’s actually because of her that I got into sports. I lived in the private sector, and there was a boy from the family opposite who went to the ice – Daniil Murzin. He’s three years older than me. He moved to train with the US national team in 2021.
It was difficult for him to get to the rink by himself – buses to the city from our place didn’t run often. So we were asked to drive them in our car. Since childhood, I’ve been an asthmatic, and exactly this nurse, who worked at the sports school, told me that the ice is beneficial for health. Though now as I am preparing for my graduation exam in biology, I don’t understand what she was guided by, because ice is not recommended for asthmatics. Negative temperatures, high humidity, loads on the lungs… But in the end, they invited me to try.
I started at our state sports school. Although of course, we had these monthly payments…
Q: How was it explained? The trainings, after all, should be free.
Ksenia Ermakova: Yes, they should be. I don’t know why there was a monthly fee in the budget institution, but in the basic training groups, they took payments from us, as mom told me.
Q: And was it a lot?
Ksenia Ermakova: At the basic levels, it was probably about 2,000 rubles per month (23 USD), as far as I remember. But that was substantial money for 2009-2010.
I came to our sports school at the age of three and a half. I trained with the coaches at the regular levels until about nine or ten, and then my mom suspected something was wrong – there was no significant progress, while my potential in figure skating was noticeable: good statics, high jumps, good rotation. And as it turned out later, many people had spoken of my potential for quadruple jumps, and I was already preparing triple axels on the floor.
Q: At what age?
Ksenia Ermakova: About 12-13 years old. I only switched to ice dance when I was around 14, which is quite late, I’ve only been in this discipline for three years. But during that time, I managed to achieve Candidate Master of Sports and Master of Sports – just because I was passionate about working, I really loved it. I trained myself every free minute, thought about the programs.
Going back to the time of me doing singles, my mom saw we were heading in the wrong direction, the trainings didn’t give the desired results. At that time, Anna Shcherbakova, Alina Zagitova, and Sasha Trusova began showing their skills. My mom constantly sent me videos of their skates, trainings, pointing out ‘look and learn, this is how it should be done.’ But in our group, there was no progress. At some point, the coach even started to ignore me. I approach her and ask, ‘What’s wrong with my axel?’ And she replies, ‘Everything is wrong.’
And how can a child perceive this? Now I understand that she simply did not know what to do with me. She didn’t know how to correct, how to explain, she couldn’t find an approach, there wasn’t enough time. It is assumed that you can simply raise your voice at children and they will do as you ask. But in my case, that didn’t work, it’s easier for me to adjust when they praise me, notice my positive sides, calmly point out my mistakes, and then I will do everything, believe in myself.
I loved ice dances more than anything else, there the coach tried to motivate us differently, not as in singles.
Q: In general, this is a very interesting point. We are constantly talking about the incredibly high level of women’s singles in our country, but turns out, not in the regions…
Ksenia Ermakova: Moscow has a lot of resources concentrated, everyone comes here. Plus there is a system whereby Moscow guys take precedence on the pedestal. And in Nizhny Novgorod, even the arena is more for hockey, basketball matches. Besides figure skating, there is also short-track, two hockey teams. There was a huge lack of ice time for figure skaters.
We didn’t even have a gym, so we trained in the halls, on tile floor. They put some thin carpet on the floor and that was it, start training. As a result, a lot of health problems showed up later, because you can’t train on such a surface… I have injured knees, back because of the years I spent training on the tile floor. I also have a cracked heel bone, which was only found after about a month. For a long time I didn’t understand what was hurting in my body, so I trained through the pain.
Then I went to Moscow – already in pair skating, which I also tried. I was scheduled for Artur Dmitriev’s group try out, they were looking for a partner for a good boy. I went there with my cracked heel, and they had ice time for about 3 hours every day, plus physical training, throw jumps on the floor, asphalt… Overall loads are huge in pair skating. Through pain, gritting my teeth, I did everything, and I seemed to have been accepted. However, the coaches still noticed something was wrong – they began to ask if anything hurt me. I was hiding it, of course. What else could I do?
Q: You mean all these problems in Nizhny Novgorod weren’t treated?
Ksenia Ermakova: No. At most they told me something like ‘Oh, why are you always so sick?’ No one really fought for me in my case.
In Moscow, the situation is different, of course. Zhan Vyacheslavovich Bush really cared for his athletes. I also liked it when I was training in pair skating with Yuriy Yuryevich Larionov at “Megasport”. Although I once saw a girl, my age, who landed badly from a throw and hit her head on the ice and almost flew into the board. That’s the whole danger of pair skating. She lost consciousness, got a concussion: laid there on the ice unconscious for a minute, then sat down in the changing room for a while and came back to training – doing the same throw jumps. In the end, she was out for a month.
Q: So, someone is lying on the ice unconscious for a minute and everyone around doesn’t care?
Ksenia Ermakova: Well, the coach was worried about her, but it’s more about the tenacity and character of girls in figure skating. We clutch at all the possibilities that exist just to stay in sports and do what we love. Because in the existing conveyor system, the moment you have to stop – even for just a second – someone can instantly replace you. Because of this, we get back on the ice with fractures, concussions, in whichever state. Like Yuzuru Hanyu did then at the Grand Prix in China.
Q: But for Yuzuru Hanyu there was a gold medal at stake. What is at stake in this case?
Ksenia Ermakova: It’s your pair, the opportunity to show yourself as a capable athlete. Finding partners is just a colossal issue in both pair skating and ice dance.
At such a level as mine, finding partners is very hard. Yes, I performed at the Russian Nationals, made some appearances, but I have no recognition. Therefore, I had to learn to be very confident in myself, to find “my” team. But I can’t even gather ten hours of ice time a week in my home town, how can I be confident?
Now, there is a line of girls for one boy. When Vlad (Panteleev) and I split up, I tried out with a lot of other partners and was at the end of the line. In pair skating there were cases when I was told, sort of, everything is good, you suit each other perfectly, but next week a girl from Eteri Tutberidze will come… And everything becomes clear right away.
Q: Have you faced the necessity of financially providing for partners?
Ksenia Ermakova: It happened once. I once had the opportunity to perform for Kazakhstan. I messaged the boy, we tried, our anthropometrics matched, we generally agreed, both ready to work. I thought: “Could it finally work out to create a pair?” But there was one point – since the boy did not have a Russian passport, the cost of training in Moscow would have been twice as expensive.
And then it turned out that he had no opportunity to pay for it all, in the end the financing fell on my shoulders. But it wasn’t an option for me. I need skates for myself first… Nizhny Novgorod never provided them to me, although I was on the national team and was supposed to be provided with them.
Q: They must have had these expenses laid out in their budget, they were supposed to spend the money purposefully.
Ksenia Ermakova: I don’t know how it worked out. Money was allocated for me, but I never saw it. I’m not even mentioning the scholarship. At least compensate for travel expenses…
Q: That’s corruption.
Ksenia Ermakova: Such a secret kept behind seven seals. My mom went to the administration, asked to give at least once a life pair of skates, but we were always refused.
When the well-known story began in February 2022, there was going to be a serious shortage of skates. And even after the Russian Nationals, where we were the only ones from Nizhny Novgorod region, they told us: “No, we can’t give you skates.”
Q: It’s a matter for the court, you should have turned to the authorities.
Ksenia Ermakova: That would have been a one-way ticket. If you want to skate, you either endure this system, or you quit. And I realized that I desperately want to continue.
Therefore, I dreamed of going to Moscow. We decided that since I have a base for jumps, good prospects and huge desire. I can do triple jumps, I can try. There were even chances to get to Eteri Tutberidze – my mother called Daniil Gleikhenhaus, saying that I jump triples. “Our girls younger than you are already jumping triple-triple combinations, quadruple jumps”, – that was first answer. But then they apparently allowed me to come for a try out. Only my mother thought about it and said: “You will become completely unhealthy there, will you withstand it?” I already had serious problems then. And in the end, we stopped at pair skating, and then I went to dances.
Q: In the context of what you said – about ‘girls from Khrustalny’. For me, it was very surprising how Dasha Usacheva, who has not even fully switched to ice dance yet, immediately went to try out with Dario Cirizano.
Ksenia Ermakova: It’s just status. Even in singles, when you arrive at competitions from not the top school, and a girl from ‘Khrustalny’ comes against you – well, everything is instantly clear. No matter how you jumped…
Many kids leave the sport because they don’t understand how to overcome this system. That’s why I’m now very impressed by Veronika Yametova, as she presents herself, even though she’s from Yekaterinburg! And she jumps so cool, powerful, technical. Great programs, she looks great in them.
Q: I once went to a skating rink of Veronika’s coach – Elena Levkovets, and I was very surprised by her calm approach to coaching. We were standing at the boards, and at some point, her students started playing tag. She looked at all this and said: ‘Well how can I be angry at them? They’re kids…’
Ksenia Ermakova: There needs to be a middle ground. It is impossible in the long term to live training from 6 am until 6 pm, it’s physically incredibly hard, plus such a psychological load. On me, in this regard, public weighing also put a lot of pressure when I skated in Moscow. Once a girl gained 50 grams, this is perfectly natural weight fluctuations, one can just be nervous, cry in the evening, hormones will play, and water in the body will be retained and you have to run for 2 hours around the ice until you lose it.
Q: And everyone is watching this, snickering…
Ksenia Ermakova: Well yes. The whole group is already on the ice, working on their programs, looking at you… Of course, after this, you can’t accurately assess yourself. You don’t change anything in your nutrition, you have an absolutely normal diet, even with a decent calorie deficit, but you simply gain weight because of the puberty period, and they punish you for it.
I’ve worked with a psychologist on the topic of disordered eating behaviour (RPP). There is no such concept as puberty in figure skating. That’s why I highly respect Alexei Nikolaevich Mishin’s staff, who let Liza Tuktamysheva go through this period, get used to the new body, and she was able to return.
Q: What does it mean ‘there’s no puberty’?
Ksenia Ermakova: Nobody can come to you and say: ‘Yes, you’re going through a difficult period right now, but right now we’ll change the training a bit, talk to you, go through it.’ This is the question about the conveyor. Girls can be instantly replaced as soon as they slightly yield their positions for objective reasons. You would rather die at training, but in reality, you just need to calmly do everything that depends on you, be patient and work on your head together with a psychologist and a coach so that you can mentally wait it out and calmly restructure.
Q: Well, you’re right, they don’t wait.
Ksenia Ermakova: Exactly. Interest is quickly lost. They don’t try to keep girls because there’s a whole crowd standing behind them. From a sports point of view, it’s probably right. But what can you do about the people who were rejected? How to bear this?
One of my partners once told me: ‘Well, what can you do? Another girl will come to replace you, who will take furosemide, other diuretics and laxatives, quickly lose weight and will be back on the ice.’ I think: ‘And you calmly say such horrors?’.
Q: This happens in Moscow too? At a high level too?
Ksenia Ermakova: We don’t like to talk about girls swallowing pills for their dream or severely restricting their diet. But this is true, these are not just my words – Nastya Skoptsova spoke about nutrition. When you’re told that because of an extra 50 grams you’ll be running around the rink until you faint this is very painful, even humiliating.
During that period, my close ones supported me a lot. Told me that the world wouldn’t fall apart because of this weight, that everything would come back to normal a little later, time is needed. But I really missed this support from the coach, partner.
Q: What do coaches say instead of support? For example, in situations with ‘excess’ weight.
Ksenia Ermakova: Often I was told stories that they would simply not let me on the ice. They weigh you, find extra weight and exclude you from training until you somehow deal with it on your own. If we had psychologists and nutritionists on our staff, I could have turned to them for help. But most often, they are not there. At the level of the Russian national team, this might happen, but personally, I have never encountered it. Often, the coach does not even consider that such a person is needed in the team.
I have never come across a good psychologist in figure skating. I know guys who needed help with a problem – they also couldn’t find help. One ended up with a bunch of injuries, another continues, but he’s completely injured…
When I moved to Moscow, the first three months in the new group were very tough. I sought help from a sports psychologist and ended up with an in-house specialist. But it turned out that he was there more for form’s sake.
Q: How did you find out that he was just there for form’s sake?
Ksenia Ermakova: I came in asking ‘I want to skate, but I can’t, I have burnout’, however, all discussions revolved around the idea that I need to finish. That I should go to the coach and say that I will not continue training. Well, I did that with bouquet of flowers and a ‘thank you, goodbye.’ The problem remained unsolved, and I had to deal with it on my own later.
Now, I understand that sport, movement, namely ice, on the contrary, helps me to overcome difficult situations, emotions. There was no need to leave altogether, I needed to take a break for a while, gather strength, and return in full force.
Q: If you were to describe ice dancing in three words, what would those words be?
Ksenia Ermakova: Art, because dancing is true art. It’s beauty. It’s soul. The hard work and effort are already understood.
Q: The underside of this beauty is somewhat ugly.
Ksenia Ermakova: This question in figure skating in general stands edgewise.
Now, I am training kids and beginners about my age. I really want to give them my soul, make it so that they succeed. Unfortunately, I often see people who come to coach just to earn a living, not receiving any pleasure from their work or results. I remember my story and realize that this shouldn’t be the case.
How can you stay indifferent when a child is crying on the rink? He tries very hard, but he can’t achieve something. And he is told to get out of the ice. And this is still a mild phrase. They often resort to personal attacks.
There have been instances of physical violence. I once saw a coach beating a child with skate guards until he had bruises.
Q: The coach?
Ksenia Ermakova: Yes, the coach. It reached the relevant authorities, a complaint was made. But at the last moment, it was withdrawn because the children would be left without a coach at all.
Q: So, these coaches have carte blanche?
Ksenia Ermakova: Well, not entirely, this issue will be brought up sooner or later by parents at least. But administration is indeed the last to know about this. My mom attended the training sessions, controlled that they didn’t just throw a skate guard at me and let me skate the program. And in return, my mom was accused for allegedly intervening in the training process.
Q: We constantly hear that figure skating is beauty, aesthetic and art. But why is it, in your opinion, so evil and cruel?
Ksenia Ermakova: Professional sports are always cruel. In some sports, you need to actively gain form for about four months a year, and the rest of the time you can ‘relax’. Figure skaters barely get a month off per year. Plus, single and pair skaters quickly lose jumps. A day without jumping practice and you lose the feeling of the jump. Same with dancers for the feeling of the edge, partner. That’s why we have winter, summer camps, holiday intensives. You’re making a great effort every month, every season. Not everybody can achieve results over long distances.
In our sport, you must always be under the supervision of a competent specialist. This is very hard work, an infinite number of nuances and skills need to be mastered. One needs to understand figure skating as a whole, find an approach to every person. Personal experience is also very important in order to understand the feelings and emotions of an athlete. And there are few competent specialists.
Q: Is there sport without cruelty and pressure?
Ksenia Ermakova: Not without pressure. The coach needs to be able to press in the right way at the right time, but carefully. They should understand that each person needs a different approach. A coach might not provide a flawless technical base, but if they find a psychological approach, the athlete will transform before your eyes. When I came into ice dance, I believed in myself and discovered new abilities. They told me: ‘Ksyusha, you’re awesome, keep up the good work’.
And when I was doing singles, there were moments when I forgot my name. I was only called by my surname: ‘Ermakova!..’. And I remember a lot of my groupmates by their surnames. I’ll say it, and then I’ll think about what the person’s name was, so used to it I was. And when they call you by your name, ask if everything is okay and appreciate your zeal, it positively affects you. You understand your value as an athlete.”
Sounds like things have not changed since Soviet era.. Just got much more expensive, harder and even bigger competition. Bigger money at stake as well. Feeling sorry for the kids.