"This chaos crossed all boundaries": Garanichev on WADA checks, preparation for the season, new coach and Fourcade's departure

- Each new biathlon season is preceded by a difficult summer.

How did this period go with you?

 - I would not allocate a specific month.

In terms of loads and the training process in general, the whole summer turned out to be difficult.

Like autumn, when we have already started ski training.

At the penultimate training camp in Aldan, we had to do quite hard workouts and very long ones. 

- The technique of ski training was brought to biathlon this year by Yuri Kaminsky, who in a recent interview noted that you are a very difficult athlete for him.

Do you understand how you deserve such an assessment?

- Perhaps the words of Kaminsky were simply misinterpreted.

We are constantly discussing some things with Yuri Mikhailovich, called each other when I was preparing for the season in my region in the summer - I spent two training camps without a team.

At the training camp, I do all the proposed work, as I did in previous years.

I never have a problem changing a coach.

I always completely trust the specialists I work with.

- Kaminsky is still a completely new person for biathlon.

Did you believe him right away?

- Yes.

Internally I tuned myself in for this at the beginning of spring, when we were told that we had to work with a new coach.

The fact is that I already had the experience of being at the same training camp with Yuri Mikhailovich, when he was still working in cross-country skiing.

It was a very long time ago, I myself was running on skis - I came to that training camp with Vitaly Shilov.

With Kaminsky it can be difficult in the sense that technically he is a very developed person, offers a lot of new things and pays attention to everything, even minor mistakes.

That is, starting to work with him this season, I understood what the emphasis would be.

I understood that we will most likely return to those loads that at one time distinguished the same Nikolai Lopukhov and Andrei Padin.

Yes, and at Alexander Kasperovich, we also constantly sat on large volumes.

- You and Oleg Perevozchikov managed to work as a junior ...

- Yes, Oleg Orestovich even invited me to the junior team.

I still think that that work made it possible to lay an optimal and very good base, for which I am grateful to all the ski trainers who worked with me.

- At the end of last season, it seemed to me, they made it clear to you that the coaches of the men's team are not eager to see you in the national team.

- Sergei Belozerov (the former head coach of the men's team, now the coach of the reserve men's team -

) did not conduct

any conversations on this topic with me

.

On the contrary, he said, they say, Zhenya, everything is fine, we will continue to work.

That is, there was no such topic even close.

And then I read somewhere that Belozerov does not see me on the team.

When you read such interviews, you never know whether the person really said so, or whether the journalists presented everything in their own way.

But I can't say that I was very upset.

I began to think that, perhaps, everything is for the best: I will calmly prepare in the region for the qualifying starts.

- As the autumn control competitions showed, your preparation was successful.

How do you yourself feel about the November results?

Do they mean something to you, or were you just completing the momentary task of qualifying for the World Cup?

- I can't say that I pursued the goal of getting involved in these selections by all means.

Internally, I was ready to start the season with both the World Cup and the Russian Cup.

The global and main task for me was to fully complete the entire volume of summer work.

The first control cut in this regard was the Russian summer championship in Tyumen.

There I had a rather difficult move, but do not forget that all this happened against the background of very serious loads.

Then we did a good job in Aldan.

Well, at the control competitions it was important for me to understand whether I got into the form that I had not had even at the qualifying starts for two years, or not.

- Did you get the answer?

- Yes.

Even before the control tests, I had a feeling that I had improved a lot this season.

The main feeling is that I can endure and give all my best at a distance from start to finish.

In the same mass start, for example, there was a very hard slide, but I managed to keep the pace well.

- What do you have to think about more often now - about training, or about the coronavirus?

- Psychologically, of course, the situation is pressing, but in this regard, I worry not so much for myself as for my family.

What if, say, I get sick, even if asymptomatic, I can transmit the virus to someone else.

I take this very seriously, I don't go out again.

Even if you need to go to the grocery store, only in a mask, only in gloves.

Even when I trained at home, I lived in a very clear schedule: I trained, changed my clothes, went home, without contacting anyone again.

Somewhere we, of course, are reinsured, we greet each other only with gloves, but the whole situation now is such that it is better to play it safe.

In any case, I have not yet caught the sidelong glances due to the fact that I did not shake hands with someone.

- You have always, in general, been a supporter of some hermitage in the team.

- I think this is typical of most athletes.

Especially when you are preparing for the starts.

The closer they are, the more serious you take your body, you make sure that you don't catch even a common cold.

Do not get wet, do not overcool.  

- After the disqualification of Evgeny Ustyugov, and with him the relay teams of Vancouver and Sochi, you remained the only Olympic medalist from the entire Russian generation of biathletes.

There is no fear that the story is not over, and the next time it might bomb your result too?

- I very clearly understood that none of us is immune from anything.

Sometimes it just seems that this chaos has crossed all possible boundaries.

When some foreign athletes write that, thanks to WADA and other inspection organizations, they are under reliable protection, I can understand them.

But when the same WADA officers have come to me in four months already ten times, if not more, and all this is initiated by the IBU (International Biathlon Union -

), you involuntarily begin to wonder: what do they want, coming almost every a week and realizing that they can't find anything at all?

Find some far-fetched reason, as was the case with Yana Romanova, Olga Vilukhina and Olga Zaitseva, with the same Ustyugov ... Maybe they don't like my little hemoglobin, which constantly falls short of the average value?

Or do they expect some miracle that I will swallow something forbidden in oblivion?

- At present, we can say that you, unlike Evgeny Ustyugov, were just lucky to have naturally low hemoglobin.

- Yes, just running with such hemoglobin can be hard.

I am not Fourcade in this regard.

- Is the fact that Martin Fourcade finished running is good for biathlon or bad, in your opinion?

- It is bad for any sport when such a strong and media personality leaves, for which everyone, regardless of the country, is rooting, and all athletes want to run in races with such a rival.

At one time, I think everyone was just as upset over the departure of Ole Einar Bjoerndalen.

I was lucky - I managed to run around with Fourcade a lot and visit different situations.

But this is the life of an athlete.

We can only wish Martin success and further development in some other activity.

- Who, in your opinion, gave more to biathlon, Fourcade or Bjoerndalen?

- I think Bjoerndalen.

- Why?

- Because he was the person who brought biathlon to a very high status level.

When I first started skiing, I watched biathlon largely because of Ole Einar.

It seemed to me that Bjoerndalen is exactly the peak that everyone dreams of.

It is clear that he was not the only one who moved our sport.

Take the same Tomas Sikora, Rafael Poiret, Rico Gross, Michael Grice - all these people ran in such a way that it was impossible to predict until the very last how the final result of certain competitions would turn out.

Against their background, what did Fourcade give biathlon?

Well, yes, the same relentless struggle as Bjoerndalen.

But his statements will also be remembered.

The footsteps to Alexander Loginov, attacks on Anton Shipulin, some ugly skirmishes that form an attitude towards Russia, although all these claims are, by and large, sucked from the finger.

But apparently, this is our share now, to do our job and not pay attention to what is happening around.

- Do you have an opponent in your team that is always interesting to compete with?

And in general, do you single out someone in this regard?

- The struggle within the team is always needed, even at the regional level.

When I switched to biathlon, strong guys were running in our Tyumen team.

Sergey Tarasov, Sergey Balandin, then came Ivan Tcherezov, Maxim Maximov.

I always wanted to reach for them - to fight with them, to beat them.

I always had a competitive streak.

That at 20 years old, that now - at 30 (Evgeny Garanichev was born on February 13, 1988.

).

It is always a pleasure to train with Anton Babikov, Edik Latypov.

Earlier - with Anton Shipulin.

Although outside the competition, we do not have any kind of struggle.

We communicate with each other, correspond, we can meet and quietly sit in a cafe, relax, just talk about life.

- Do you regret that the world champion Alexander Loginov trains mostly alone, and not with the national team?

- Sure.

Such athletes in a team are a big plus for everyone.

But I'm not upset.

We are always in close contact.

In the same Tyumen it turned out with Sasha to go for a drive, shoot, change something in the very atmosphere of training.

After all, we have a truly individual sport, and the person himself chooses how to prepare.

There are athletes, including foreign ones, who are part of the national team, prepare centrally, but in training they try to do everything possible so that no one is next to them when they perform certain work. 

- If it depended on you where to hold the final training camp, would you choose Tyumen or Khanty-Mansiysk?

- I feel more comfortable in Tyumen, first of all because of the opportunity to organize accommodation as close to the track as possible, and not to travel to training on a shuttle through the city.

In terms of stadiums, both are gorgeous.

But, I think, leaving for Khanty-Mansiysk was the right decision.

There are ascents, there the running track was prepared as close as possible to the conditions in which we will start at the first stage of the World Cup in Kontiolahti.

And this track is just as hard.  

- Does the fact that this year, due to the pandemic, will not be the stage in Ostersund, unloved by biathletes, does it cause you any feelings? 

- I would say that Ostersund and Kontiolahti are very similar.

Both there and there it happens that the weather is incomprehensible, and there is very little snow, but in general I do not remember any special problems.

I think these are equivalent stages.

Finland is definitely preferred though.

- Why?

- Because of the fans.

I am sure that 90 percent of those who come will be our people!