Champion of Russia in figure skating among juniors Alina Gorbacheva on Wednesday asked for forgiveness from everyone who ” made me nervous and worried” in the last 24 hours, when the story unfolded around her loss. The Sport correspondent talks about why it is important, while understanding the reasons for what happened, not to mess things up with organizational conclusions and, if the skater makes such a decision, to allow her to continue working with coach Sofia Fedchenko.
I think everyone who followed the search for the 16-year-old figure skater, which included cynologists with a dog, divers, and the Liza Alert search team, froze in horror at the thought of what could happen. The so-called “park”, at the entrance to which a video camera spotted her the night before, is actually just a sparsely populated place on the banks of the Moscow River in the vicinity of several construction sites. Walking here is not the most pleasant activity, especially at dusk. It is fortunate that nothing happened to Alina there, since it is quite obvious that she entered the wasteland in an inadequate condition.
And this, alas, was clearly demonstrated by subsequent events. I spent the night in the entrance, walked the streets all the next day and went to the cinema, knowing that colossal forces had been raised in search. All this is not about the usual quarrel with the coach, which in the practice of big sports can be several a day. Of course, the girl had a nervous breakdown, after which she lost her sense of reality.The last thing now is to blaspheme Gorbachev at what the light stands, as the figure-skating beau monde began to do. According to the outstanding coach Tatyana Anatolyevna Tarasova, the athlete acted “very irresponsibly”, and according to the Olympic champion in ice dancing Natalya Bestemyanova, “simply disgusting.” This is how the mental picture is seen – honored specialists, accustomed to unquestioning obedience, scold the rebellious teenager, indignant at the fact that he did not think about others.
I would like to hope that only mental. After all, it was precisely such an uncompromising line of behavior of adults that most likely led Alina to an act by which she endangered not only the health of her family and friends, but also her own.
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Now there is a lot of talk about a strange life situation – the figure skater lived with her 28-year-old coach Sofia Fedchenko while her parents were still alive. But for some reason, few people pay attention to the fact that the girl moved to the mentor not this year and not in the past, but when she was nine years old. That is, it turns out that for seven years the figure skater's grandmother, who has now begun to actively comment on what happened in the media, was satisfied with the situation. Like mom and dad, who had all the legal levers in order to return their daughter to the family, and did not use them.
I remember that Agatha Christie, through the lips of the hero Hercule Poirot, said: “Among all possible versions, it is the most obvious – most likely true.” And the most obvious thing here is that the situation probably suited everyone. Both parents who sent their daughter to be raised by a coach, and a mentor who had a talented student at her disposal. Of course, Alina herself, who adored and considered the second mother of the person who undertook to make her an Olympic champion – which she, in fact, dreamed of.
But only adults, apparently, did not notice that the 16-year-old figure skater has ceased to be a child who used to perceive instructions as silk. And the first to react to the fact that the student was changing, of course, was the coach – since she took responsibility for the athlete to such an extent that she controlled her studies and went on vacation with her. That is, she acted as a guardian. It is no longer a fact that a teenager at that age, having received a task, will “give it up” and go to fulfill it. He can chime in, and snap, and in other ways show character. There may be many other reasons for rebellion that have not happened before – fell in love, quarreled, broke up, whatever. In other words, everything that was once in the life of every adult.However, not everyone, unfortunately, remembers this – as evidenced by at least the comments that we have cited above. And if they remember, they can consider that the rebellion is suppressed by force. But this method works a couple of times, and then at some point it misfires. You can't win a car race just by pushing the gas. To arrive at the finish line faster than others along the optimal trajectory, you need to taxi at the necessary moments and slow down. And even if this is the case with cars, what can we say about the person whom you, in fact, control, leading along the road to the champion heights?!
Of course, it is also true that the case of Alina Gorbacheva should not be tied solely to the problem of adolescents who cannot withstand the physical and psychological stress of big-time sports. Teenagers run away from prosperous families, and from dysfunctional ones, and from boarding schools, and from private schools – from anywhere, when they are overwhelmed by previously unknown emotions and wild resentment that adults do not understand. What happened to the young figure skater is a special case of the general problem of the relationship between generations. She is not a year old, not ten, not even a hundred. Described in classical literature, probably immediately after this literature appeared. Remember the examples yourself.
Now that Gorbachev has been found alive and unharmed, it is imperative to make the right decisions not only in assessing what happened, but also in the question of what will happen to her next. And I really don’t want the dreams of a young figure skater to fall apart because of one nervous breakdown. And already there are voices on the Internet: “Yes, take the girl away from the coach, from whom she ran away, and from the damned sport, let her live a normal life.” But this is again advice to adults to press the gas pedal, only by turning the steering wheel to the teenager in the other direction. It is up to Alina herself to decide which way to go.
And the environment should not chop off the shoulder and support her in this. Judging by the first statement of the skater, she does not want to change anything. And the fact that she left the Investigative Committee with her mother and coach together is a confirmation of this. If so, we should give the union of Sofia Fedchenko and Alina Gorbacheva a second chance. After all, what happened is a lesson for all adults. Who sometimes forget how they were children. And I would like to hope that they remember that learning, including pedagogical skills, is necessary for a lifetime.
The opinion of the author may not coincide with the position of the editors.
