Alena Kostornaia: Being a Tutberidze’s athlete is also a kind of title

Alena Kostornaia about trainings in the group of Eteri Tutberidze. Part from video interview for Russian Channel 1. Translation.

Aliona: We can have fun and fool around in training, but we still know why we came here and why do we need it (trainings).

All coaches joke, it is considered absolutely normal. And in training it can motivate you, but off the ice they can also say something, we can laugh.

At trainings Sergei Dudakov is focused and tries to help everyone right away, but in life he is quite a cheerful and positive person.

Daniil Gleichengauz can be funny, joke with you and cheer you up, but he can also scold quite a lot. There is no such thing that today he scolds you, praises tomorrow – depends how you work, so he will tell you.

When Eteri Georgievna comes to the ice – this is the maximum concentration, the maximum impact. The desire to make her athletes the best. And in life, this is a woman who has experienced a lot, coped with all the difficulties. It seems to me that I have never met a stronger person both in spirit and physically.

Any athlete from our group would like to grow into such a person like Eteri Tutberidze in the future. We try to do better, try to do more, because we understand that this is both our life and the life of our coaches.

If you do not care what will happen to you, at least think about how much time and effort coaches put into you in order to give at least what you have now.

We are called students of Tutberidze. This is also a kind of title. Because not every athlete can get here, not everyone can train here.

You must believe in yourself, especially in those moments when no one believes in you. There was a moment before I moved to Eteri Georgievna: I have never been on the podium of major competitions, and they always told me that I wouldn’t get there, that I was behind the top ten, totally average.

And at that moment I realized that I can, I want to win. Then I went to Eteri Georgievna and proved to many that everything can be changed.

text version by Lyna Lotsyk for sports.ru

Related topics: Alena Kostornaia