Evgenia Tarasova and Vladimir Morozov: We need two medals that we don’t have – World and Olympic gold
Interview with Evgenia Tarasova and Vladimir Morozov. About changes in their career, style, work with Marina Zueva and life in USA.
by Andrei Simonenko for rsport.ria.ru dd. December 20th, 2019
You have been working with a new coach, Marina Zueva, this season, you live in a new country. Changes are always associated with certain disappointments that one has to go through. How do you fight them?
Vladimir: We don’t have any disappointments, we perfectly understand how everything should happen with us this season. Everything was foreseen and expected. It’s not so easy to move to another country, change your lifestyle, training system, or a coach. In general, to change everything. You just need to get used to it, and it will take some time. We are trying to cope, but not everything turned out in the first half of the season. At the same time, something turns out much better than before, and there is no regression, this is the most important thing. It just takes time for hard training.
At the Grand Prix in Canada and Russia, you had problems with jumps. Is it an accident or a consequence of the fact that now you are working more on other things? Your coach, Marina Zueva, said that you work a lot on presentation of the programs.
Evgenia: I would not say that we began to devote less time to technique. We continue to work on technique as we did in Moscow. We just started to do more choreography and gliding.
Vladimir: It’s difficult to combine everything together. We used to have, so to speak, a lot of empty space between the elements. Now empty spaces are filled with transitions, some new things. It is clear that we also try to make all the elements as interesting as possible. We do all the lifts with complex variations and transitions. We do not have any lift in a free program in its classic form. We do not want to return to the simple things. Yes, sometimes it’s hard for us to deal with the fact that everyone gets level four, but someone for simple variations, and we for the original ones. And that they give us not so high components. Indeed, we make mistakes, but at the same time we try not to lose the artistic image of the programs, the plot. This, thank God, turns out. In general, we have complex programs, and they need run-throughs. At the Grand Prix, we still had a raw free program, there was no one hundred percent readiness.
Can you say that now you have the most interesting programs in your career?
Evgenia: Probably, while they are the most difficult for us.
Vladimir: The free program is definitely the most interesting of all that we had before. The short programs were good. The Olympic short was good, the pre-Olympic was good. But this year is better. (Smiles)
Ravel’s “Bolero”, the music of your short program, is considered legendary in figure skating. How did you choose it?
Evgenia: When we arrived in Florida, Marina Olegovna said: “We have to decide about the music, let’s turn on what you chose on the ice.” We started to turn it on, and after that she called us and said: “Guys, do you want Bolero?” Vova and I looked at each other and said: “Yes, we want.” We liked this music for a long time, but we were not sure that we could skate to it. And here everything worked out – she suggested and we wanted to.
Whom do you associate with the Bolero: Jayne Torvill / Christopher Dean, Evgeni Plushenko, Carolina Kostner?
Vladimir: Except for the Kostner, the rest of the programs have been done quite some time ago, and I don’t remember whether someone of the top sports pairs skated “Bolero”. We like that we did Bolero with modern choreography. The music is classical, but the choreography is not quite classical – both arms and movements, and mini-lifts. We show this music in our own way.
When you first met Zueva, tell me, if not a secret, what you talked about – what goals, sports and creative?
Vladimir: I think, sports goals are clear to everyone. We need two medals that we do not have – the gold of the World Championships and the Olympic Games. We talked about it right away. To achieve these goals, we need to create our own face, our style. We are working on it now.
Have you also talked about the fact that all this will not come immediately?
Vladimir: We talked about it then, and now she also speaks about it. We have our own path. Yes, not everything turns out right away, because we never worked on it. And in figure skating, probably the most difficult thing is to learn to skate.
You have already told that your ice trainings end now quite early – at about three in the afternoon. For many skaters, this is unusual, usually there is evening training.
Evgenia: Yes, it probably took a month for us to get used to the fact that at three or four in the afternoon you come home and have a lot of free time for the evening.
Vladimir: But now we have physical trainings in the evenings. You can do it at any time of the day.
After Moscow, with its crazy rhythm, now you live in such a place of Florida where everything is very relaxed and calm.
Vladimir: But that’s not bad.
Evgenia: Nothing distracts. There is a skating rink, there is a house. Maximum immersion in the training process, no need to go anywhere.
But do you have a car?
Vladimir: Yes, one for two. We drive to the gym by car, but otherwise we practically do not need it, because we live opposite the ice rink, a few steps away.
Do you have to drive to the beach too?
Vladimir: Yes, 15 minutes. Beach is very healthy. Half an hour of swimming and you recover well after hard training. It relieves fatigue.
What is the most common stereotype about America that turned out to be false after you moved there?
Evegenia: Probably food. That everything harmful and fatty there. In fact, there are health food stores.
Vladimir: I weigh two kilograms less than last season and I can’t gain them back. (Laughs)
Evgenia: In fact, we train so much and always in an active movement that we have no time to gain weight. So, yes, we were told: beware, move to America and you will gain weight, but it turned out the opposite.
A hurricane once almost get you there.
Vladimir: Yes, but it happens in Florida every year. We were told that we need to get used to it.
Evgenia: It wasn’t the hurricane itself that scared us more, but the way people prepared for it. Everyone began to buy up, stock up … We went into the store, and the shelves, where water usually stands, are empty. We did not know what is a hurricane in the southern countries, that people are preparing for it as to something terrible.
Vladimir: The gas station is empty, there is no gas, everything is covered with yellow ribbons. Like military situation.
How often do Nina Mozer and Maxim Trankov come to you, what place do they have in your training process?
Vladimir: Nina Mozer was with us when we were preparing for the Grand Prix in Canada, then we worked with her before the Grand Prix in Moscow, in the summer she visited us a couple of times. So is Maxim – not in the sense that they come together, but with the same frequency. The entire training process is conducted by Marina Olegovna. Nina Mikhailovna, rather, looks from the side, then makes comments, points on mistakes.
You have not scored enough points to get into the Grand Prix Final. How did this affect the preparation for the Russian Nationals?
Vladimir: We had more time to try to localize the problems and implement some ideas regarding our programs.
Vladimir, I can’t help but ask you this question – even girls, when they skate, put their hair back, and your hair is waving. Doesn’t it get into your eyes?
Vladimir: No, absolutely. In fact, I already had long hair, four years ago, bangs fell on my eyes. I’m used to it somehow, I don’t pay attention. You still see something.
Is it a transition to a very long hair, like Jason Brown’s ponytail?
Vladimir: No, I definitely won’t have a ponytail. Maximum up to the shoulders.
Related topics: Evgenia Tarasova Vladimir Morozov
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