Anna Shcherbakova: “In Tutberidze’s group, training is structured so that the main competitors are always on the same ice. I don’t even know how it would be otherwise.”
Anna Shcherbakova about competition in Eteri Tutberidze’s group and quad jumps.
original source: Free Program podcast on Channel 1
Anna Shcherbakova spoke about the rivalry among figure skaters in Eteri Tutberidze’s group and quad jumps. Here’s a translation of her comments.
“Q: I can’t help but ask you about what it’s like to train in the same group being the best figure skater along with other top skaters. Was there competition in your training sessions?
Anna Shcherbakova: Of course, there was. But I joined Eteri Georgievna’s (Tutberidze) group at a very young age. In Eteri Georgievna’s group, training is structured so that the main competitors are always on the same ice. They are not separated; on the contrary. You always see how your main rival is working. I have never trained any differently. I always trained in such a way that all the main competitors were always on the same ice. Therefore, I don’t even know how it would be otherwise.
Of course, there was competition, and I think it only played a positive role. Simply, probably, a person who can’t train in a competitive environment wouldn’t go into it. They would choose something that’s more suitable for them. I think it suited me. It’s more motivating, yes.
Q: And then you go to competitions together.
Anna Shcherbakova: Yes, and you know who is how prepared, what content everyone has. It’s all clear to you.
Q: Someone gets a gold medal, someone else gets bronze or silver, or none at all. What’s it like in the changing room afterward? How do you look each other in the eye? How does it affect the relationship between you?
Anna Shcherbakova: I think, for example, Alina Zagitova and Evgenia Medvedeva, they always skated their programs cleanly, so there always had to be consistent performances, and it should be perfectly clean… absolutely flawless, so there shouldn’t be even a single mistake. And here, it turns out that it is really rivalry because you both go out every day, you both skate perfectly clean, and you understand that you are going to compete, and it feels more significant, I think.
But in our generation, when quadruple jumps appeared – at hardly any competition did everyone skate clean. Someone makes a mistake, someone else less so. Whoever coped better, whoever skated cleaner. There were no questions among others: why her, not me? Well, because whoever lost, skated worse. Whoever won, then they skated well at that moment. And what are you going to look at after that?
So, it seems to me, we didn’t feel that sort of direct rivalry because in training we weren’t fighting over who was better. Every one of us had so much trouble with those quads, so much work needed to be done on them, to skate our programs clean, and all your thoughts at that moment are only about what to do, how to manage this program, how to skate it clean, or where to add something, what content to choose. And you’re so immersed in yourself, in the work, that you don’t really care about those sorts of competition.”
Shcherbakova also shared that she was the first among Tutberidze’s students to land a quadruple jump. In 2017, Anna Shcherbakova and Alexandra Trusova began executing quadruple jumps during their training sessions. Shcherbakova performed a quadruple toe loop, while Trusova did a quadruple salchow.
Before the 2017/2018 season, Shcherbakova broke her leg and was forced to miss her first international junior season. In 2018, Trusova became the junior world champion and was the first since Miki Ando to land a quadruple jump at an ISU event.
“Q: There’s a lot of debate over who was the first to perform a quadruple jump in women’s singles skating. You were all in the same group. Who jumped first?
Anna Shcherbakova: Those conversations… I just don’t understand. It might sound like I’m boasting, but I was the first to land it during practice. But for an athlete, the main thing is the competition. What happens in practice stays in practice.
I was the first to land it in practice, but it took me a long time to do it at competitions. And I never even performed the toe loop in competitions. After all, the main thing for us is still the competition.
At that moment, it was, of course, an incredible feeling. Later, quadruples became routine. Moreover, within six months, Sasha was already jumping them in competitions, and it had become the norm. When I started doing them in competitions, it didn’t surprise anyone anymore.
But when I landed it in practice, and they even posted a video of it… I felt like I had done something incredible.”
Related topics: Anna Scherbakova
I don’t believe for a second she was clean and could have competed at the Olympics let alone have won any medal without doping. This pretending she is Olympic champion is shameful. Give Kaori her gold medal.