Telling me once about Anastasia Mishina and Alexander Gallyamov, their coach Tamara Moskvina said: they say that the strongest side of the players lies in the ability to gather at the right moment in order to show the maximum, as well as in stability...
These qualities did not immediately become obvious to the world. The first thing was to place them in the appropriate “packaging”: think over the style, image, add details and touches that would make the pair different from the rest. Which, in fact, is what Moskvina did when she received Nastya and Sasha into her group in 2020 from the hands of absolutely outstanding techies - the Velikovs.
Throughout last season, the skaters were actually forced to fend off attacks from their regular rivals and group partners - Boykova and Kozlovsky. The latter seemed to set out to take revenge for the Olympic year, in which Mishina and Gallyamov won all official competitions with the exception of the personal Olympic final.
The revenge was a success: Boykova and Kozlovsky were left with two fundamentally important tournaments - the Russian Championship and the Russian Grand Prix final, after which the couple made the “transfer of the year”, leaving Moskvina for Tutberidze. As it was seen from the outside, the transition was dictated by the burning desire of the athletes to complete the history of their fundamental rivalry with a solid exclamation point.
One could probably believe in the reality of such a plot if it were not for Moskvina’s personality. In the correspondence confrontation with her former students, she behaved like a chess grandmaster, who had calculated all possible scenarios in advance, and completely unemotionally. The post-Olympic decline of their main players, including.
Perhaps that is precisely why the coach did not even think of attaching importance to the results of last season. After all, it was Moskvina who once noticed that an athlete after the Games, especially one who fought for a medal and won it, is like a racehorse after a race. Which, first of all, needs to be wrapped up, watered and given a good rest. It is clear that you can whip the horse instead, it will rise and be able to run for a while. Perhaps even quickly. But then he falls and dies. Therefore, the groom, in the sense of the trainer, must, first of all, understand: does he intend to go further with the athlete or not?
This idea, simply in other words, was confirmed in Magnitogorsk by Nastya Mishina: “We have heard many times that after the Olympics there is a decline. They didn't believe it. We thought that we were young and strong, this would not affect us. But, indeed, there was a decline last season. Not as strong, but it was there. And we are happy that we managed to overcome this decline.”
In fact, it’s even a pity that there wasn’t an equal fight between the current and former wards of the living legend of the coaching department. Formally, Boykova and Kozlovsky were deprived of the opportunity to compete for gold medals by the disrupted final lift, during which the skaters lost about five points.
But in fact, it’s time to talk about a certain coincidence of circumstances: it so happened that Tutberidze herself openly and even somewhat demonstratively lost interest in what was happening inside Russia, Maxim Trankov and Alexey Tikhonov combined coaching activities with commentating, and Pavel Slyusarenko focused on his own Perm duets . Immediately before the Spartakiad, the former European champions held a training camp in Perm, but you need to understand: sparring with weaker opponents always gives more advantages to those who catch up.
Moskvina simply continued her chess game. This season, she made an attempt to lead her skaters away from their usual style by inviting a new choreographer to direct, but in fact immediately calculated that the skaters most likely simply would not have time to skate such an uncharacteristic program. She explained her refusal to perform briefly: “I didn’t like that the guys in this program didn’t look strong.”
Actually, the current triumphant performance of Mishina and Gallyamov is a story of incredible inner strength. Which is manifested not only in the impeccable quality of the elements and the result as such, but in many small details. In the strong and at the same time careful hands of a partner. In his readiness to turn any situation into a joke, to laugh at himself if this can make those around him smile. In Nastya’s calm, deeply feminine confidence that she is the best and most beautiful and, no matter how difficult it is, she will never be left alone. That together with a partner, with whom the couple celebrated their seven-year collaboration in Magnitogorsk, they are able to move any mountain. That is, of course, if Moskvina is nearby.
I once joked in a conversation with a trainer, saying that Tamara Nikolaevna is like the Sherpa who leads people to Everest, helps carry the load and, at the same time, makes sure that none of the clients die.
“Well, not to that extent, but I certainly make sure that my skaters recover without depressing themselves mentally. To do this, you cannot stupidly force people to work. We need to make sure that the athletes themselves feel that they can do it. So that they would be the initiators, not me,” the interlocutor answered me.
Probably the most valuable quality of a coach, when his players have already climbed to a decent height, is to ensure that all members of the team do not have the feeling of the finishing corridor for as long as possible. Hence, probably, Moskvina’s main principle: “Never say never.”
While her younger colleagues insist that in pair skating, taking into account the current rules, there is no point in thinking about complicating programs with ultra-C elements, Tamara Nikolaevna casually recalls that the quadruple salchow throw was learned in her group even Elena Berezhnaya and Anton Sikharulidze at the very beginning of the 2000s, the quadruple toe loop throw was successfully performed at the 1998 Goodwill Games by Oksana Kazakova and Artur Dmitriev, and the no less complex triple axel dates back even earlier: in 1980 this element was assembled introduced into the arsenal by Irina Vorobyova and Igor Lisovsky.
Accordingly, according to Moskvina, there is no reason to stop such experiments with Mishina and Gallyamov. The rules may change, which means you need to be prepared for this.
The ending of the sports pairs tournament was also eloquent. While the champions continued to comprehend the emotions they had just experienced on the ice, admitting (according to Gallyamov) that the final support had to be pulled out “by the teeth”, since there was no longer any strength left, Moskvina was already in a different dimension, soloing in front of journalists in mixed zone: “We need to do something completely new next year. So that you say: “Wow, Grandma Tamara!”