Maria Sotskova: Sports is not a sport without rises and falls
Interview with Maria Sotskova, silver medalist at the Russian Nationals 2018.
You can be named among the most hardworking and diligent athletes. However, non-stop training sometimes leads to injuries, as it happened with Yuzuru Hanyu and Evgenia Medvedeva. Does your team take some special care of you in the Olympic season?
– The coach controls this process and if she sees that I’m overworked, she can give me an extra weekend or a break so I can rest. If something hurts, I immediately inform about it, so that the problem can be solved at the beginning and there are no consequences and complex injuries. The main thing is to say everything in time.
Through your entire career was there a time when you had to skate with injury through pain?
– At the junior world championships two years ago, our two girls Polina Tsurskaya and Alisa Fedichkina withdrew (at the junior world championship in 2016 Sotskova won silver and kept three spots for Russia – ed.), I also had an injury. Well, the girls had tears and something serious, but my muscles in the groin were overworked and over-stretched. Plus at that time I was ill, but there was no other way out. It was the pain that it’s possible to endure.
Were you upset when it turned out that the swan theme attracted many other figure skaters besides you?
– Girls skate a swan, and I’m a girl at a ball, just to the music from “Swan Lake”, plus I have different music parts. And I do not feel like a swan, so I did not get upset.
You’re friends with Polina Tsurskaya, even went on vacation together. These competitions didn’t end well for her. Last year you also had such a moment – eight place at the World Championships. How not to give up in such situation?
– Sports is not a sport without rises and falls. We all know what we want and we all have our goals. Even if something didn’t turn out, I do not think that it’s critical. Yes, she did not take the desired place on the pedestal, but in general she had a decent performance. It can not always be perfect, man is not a robot. Our performances can not be equally flawless at all tournaments. Motivation should be found in the fact that you like figure skating and want to do it. I go on the ice and skate for myself, the audience, my team and family.
How does your family cope with all this vicissitudes of competitions?
– Parents can not even watch the live broadcast with my performances, not to say about coming to the competitions and watching from the stands! This is a closed topic. They will first look at the results, and only then – video repeat. Mom is terribly worried, she walks about the room back and forth and can not calm herself down. Plus, all their excitement goes to me, so I ask them not to come, so it’s calmer for them and for me.
National championship is the most difficult competition of the season because of …
– Excitement and too much desire to qualify to the national team. Every athlete goes to this all his life and this season happens only once in four years. Plus it is, of course, a secondary factor, but I felt that I was skating for the whole CSKA. Our guys did not perform well, and it was necessary to defend the name of the school. The most important thing now is to come to the senses. I did my best and gave everything I could, so I need to gain energy again.
But Alexander Samarin became second!
– Any athlete wants a maximum. And if it does not work out, we criticize ourselves a lot, we are angry. So I think that Sasha is upset. We are friends with him, and we train together. He’s a good guy and we get along very well.
His coach Svetlana Sokolovskaya was with you at the Grand Prix in Canada.
– Yes, my coach Elena Buyanova could not go, after all the flight was distant. Svetlana Sokolovskaya and Irina Tagayeva supported me as they could. It was their support that led me to silver at that competitions. This year we’re as one team, somewhere Svetlana Sokolovskaya helps us out, and Elena Germanovna helps her in return.
At that competition you lost to Canadian Kaetlyn Osmond, but then twice beat her – in France and at the Grand prix Final in Nagoya. Did it add you confidence?
– It’s always joyful to get on the pedestal, but Kaetlyn wasn’t in her best shape and screwed some elements. It’s more pleasant to win when you and your competitor were perfect, but you were better!
by Ekaterina Bespalova for sport-express.ru
Related topics: interview, Maria Sotskova
J’adore son “exhibition program” sur Kalinka.
Yay for Maria! :)