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Sports correspondent recalls one of the most mysterious events of the Sochi Olympics — the failed replacement of Evgeni Plushenko after the team tournament figure skaters and his subsequent withdrawal from the personal tournament.
Plyushchenko found a competitor
There are still many gaps in the rules of the Olympic “team guide” for skaters. To the point of being unclear which team should be ranked higher in a certain situation of equality of points. Before the Games in Sochi, the order of substitutions in the team came to the fore.
- The fact that between short and free programs you can change skaters in two disciplines is It's clear.
- The fact that only those athletes who qualified for the Olympics in individual competitions take part in the team tournament is also true.
- But the rules included one more point: if only one skater/pair is entered into the Games from a country participating in a team tournament in any form, in the event If there are medical indications before a personal tournament, you can replace him with an athlete outside the quota.
In our country, as you know, in those years, men's single skating was lame on both legs. A worthy replacement for Evgeni Plushenko did not appear after his triumph at the 2006 Games. Artem Borodulin, Sergei Voronov, Konstantin Menshov, Artur Gachinsky — these skaters at one time or another showed promise, but in the end they did not live up to their promise. And Plushenko had to return to performances again and again: first to Vancouver 2010, where he became a silver medalist, losing some crumbs to the American Evan Lysacek, and then to Sochi 2014.
And it seemed to many that none of those who had lost all the other Russian quotas in previous years could compete with Evgeniy in the fight for the only ticket to the home Games. However, the Russian Figure Skating Federation (FFKKR) and the coaching staff of Maxim Kovtun, a skater who switched to adult figure skating literally six months before the start of the 2013/14 season, did not agree with this opinion.
After winning the Junior Grand Prix Final in December 2012 in Kovtun, the FFKKR saw not just an alternative to Plushenko, but at least a real backup in case Evgeniy, who had gone through a lot of injuries, was unable to prepare for the Sochi Games. And they began to “drive” Maxim through adult tournaments to give him time to get stronger for the Olympic season.
Sometimes this happened bypassing the sports principle when selecting members of the national team for the main competitions. Many probably remember the scandal called “Give Kostya a place in Europe”: Menshov, who won the bronze medal at the Russian Championship in the 2012/13 season, was unhooked from the European Championship in favor of Kovtun, who came fifth in the national selection. The skaters then staged a massive flash mob on social networks to protest against this injustice, the situation reached the Russian Minister of Sports of those times, Vitaly Mutko, who eventually, after Kovtun failed at the World Championships and left the team with one ticket to the Olympics, publicly stated, that the FFKKR made a strategic mistake.
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But one way or another, Elena Buyanova and Tatyana Tarasova — and it was they who then worked mainly with the young skater — managed to achieve their goal. By the beginning of the Olympic season, Kovtun was a completely competitive athlete, at least at the Russian and European level. He and his coaches set an ambitious goal: to perform five quadruple jumps in the programs — two in the short, three in the free. Now we have about a dozen skaters who can do this, but then, except for Kovtun, no one was aiming for such a number of quads. Even Plushenko.
And it was difficult to imagine a situation in which an Olympic champion loses the selection for the Sochi Games to a young competitor. Plushenko is a lump of Russian sports; he announced his goal to compete at the fourth Olympics in advance. Evgeniy won’t be in Sochi — how can that be? “Just think,” one of the experienced figure skating figures told me then. “You Know Who will ask the assistants during the Olympics: when is Plushenko performing there? What will they answer him — excuse me, but we have Kovtun here instead of him?” «
Piseev swore desperately
This, of course, is a joke — but in every joke, as they say… And in order to minimize risks, the FFKKR adopted special regulations for the 2013/14 season regarding the selection of the only Olympic participant in men's single skating. It was supposed to be determined by the decision of the expert council, taking into account not only the result of the Russian Championship or simply the level of sportsmanship, but a number of factors. In particular, psychological stability and experience of performing at major international tournaments. That is, this was a clear hint that Plushenko was not threatened with the prospect of being left without a fourth Olympics — as long as his health did not fail.
And the 31-year-old athlete, of course, no longer had it like a junior. The long-suffering back did not allow the illustrious champion to carry out the pre-Olympic season in full force, and he eventually went out to compete for the first time only at the Russian Championship. After the short program, it seemed that there would be no sensation — Plushenko was ahead of Kovtun by about five points. However, in the free program, Maxim finally caught the looseness and courage that he did not always have enough at previous starts of the season, and won a landslide victory, bringing the same five points in the sum of Plushenko’s two programs.
However, Evgeniy did not look upset after the defeat. And in the mixed zone he gave a speech that would come back to haunt both him and the entire Russian team during the Olympics. “I plan to compete in the team tournament, and in the personal tournament I will give way to a young athlete,” Plushenko said, after which 10 minutes later, the general director of the FFKKR, Valentin Piseev, who had read these words, was desperately cursing in the smoking room at the Sochi “Iceberg”, trying, together with those gathered around journalists to understand how to save the situation.
But it was already extremely difficult to save her. The fact is that Plushenko revealed a plan that the federation most likely came up with during the season — when it became clear that Evgeni would not be enough to compete in both the team and individual tournaments of the Olympics. Plushenko goes to the «team competition», after which, due to an injury — of which he has a lot in sleep mode — he transfers Olympic accreditation to Kovtun.
Of course, there was no need to talk about such a strategy publicly a month and a half before the Olympics — after all, it became clear to everyone, including competitors, that the Russian team was planning to injure Plushenko. But the problem is that the regulations did not clearly state whether this should be a fresh injury received during the team tournament of the Games, or, for example, an aggravation of an existing one. At the 2014 European Championships in Budapest, a few weeks before the Olympics, journalists rushed to the then ISU President Ottavio Cinquante for clarification. But he also did not give an unambiguous interpretation of the regulations.
Meanwhile, at the same European championship, the question of a Russian participant in the 2014 Games finally disappeared. Kovtun was unable to cope with the psychological pressure, making a number of mistakes in the free program and remaining behind two other Russian participants — Sergei Voronov and Konstantin Menshov.
And the Olympic champion, without going to Budapest, performed the skate in front of the expert council at home — and it was enough for the FFKKR to announce: the main Olympic participant from Russia is Plushenko, the reserves are Kovtun and Voronov.
Voronov could also become a participant in the Olympics
The team tournament demonstrated: the decision to field the most experienced fighter turned out to be correct. Plushenko on the Iceberg ice enjoyed himself from the first to the last second of his performances, and even though they were technically flawed, the Olympic champion did the main thing that was required of him: he gave two convincing skates and scored almost the maximum points, instilling confidence in the rest of the Russian skaters .
Well, and, like the icing on the cake, in the short program “Chana pulled” — this is how Evgeniy himself described the fact that he was ahead of the current world champion.
However, in the free program of the team tournament, it became clear: Plushenko’s strength was really running out. He simplified the second half of that skate, and at the end of it he announced that his injury had worsened. That is, in fact, he prepared the ground for the replacement, which was discussed for so long all the months before the Olympics.
An application for the federation's individual Olympic tournament had to be submitted the morning after the end of the team tournament. Even the journalists, impatient to see what name would be on it, had trouble sleeping that night—let alone the main characters. As a result, the lists submitted to the ISU included the same surname Plushenko.
The participants in the events do not like to remember what happened that night. Different versions slipped into the press. The strangest one is by Plushenko himself: the fact that they were going to call Kovtun to replace him, but at the decisive moment they could not find him.
Over the years, I have spoken off the record with various witnesses to that night. I can say the main thing that I understood for myself: all parties did not behave very nobly, and in the current conflict we could very well talk about Voronov’s participation in a personal tournament.
However, it seems to me that the decisive factor in the non-substitution was the fear of our side to face the protest of competitors — first of all, the Canadians who fought with us for gold. A story with an injury would be too predictable — coupled with Plushenko’s very statements after the Russian Championship.
Of course, it is not a fact that the ISU would have granted the appeal, but due to the same crookedly written “teamman” regulations, the case could well have reached the Court of Arbitration for Sport. Clearly no one wanted to expose their well-deserved and beautiful team gold to such a risk.
Lightning X
Well, many are still arguing about what happened next — how orchestrated Plushenko’s withdrawal from the personal tournament was before the start of the short program. I didn’t get out of training in those days with the participation of the already two-time Olympic champion and came to the conclusion that Evgeniy still tried to do everything he could. Yes, it was clear that Plushenko’s chances of winning a third Olympic gold were slim. But with a favorable set of circumstances, even without the maximum technical set, he could take a medal. Why did he have to refuse the second Sochi award without a fight?
But the day before the start of the personal tournament at one of the skating rinks at the training rink Plushenko fell very unpleasantly. And from that moment on, I couldn’t perform jumps at all. In the morning, during training on the day of the short program of the personal tournament, Evgeniy skated in a circle for about 15 minutes and left — and at that moment it became clear to me personally: in all likelihood, he would not perform.
And then evening came. Plushenko was to open the second group of short program participants. Evgeniy went out to warm up, and I carefully watched what he would do. The champion tried to go for one jump, then a second, but after the third he grabbed his back with his hands and dejectedly went to coach Alexei Mishin. A couple of meters before the board, Plushenko crossed his arms with the letter X — and this meant his removal. Then the skater went to the referee to inform him of the decision.
About half an hour later, Plushenko reached the mixed zone. His explanations were logical, the message about the next upcoming operation was obvious. The only thing that confused me was Evgeniy’s words about plans to perform in spring shows — this did not really agree with the severity of the situation with his health, and indeed with its ethical side. There were then statements of intention to compete at the fifth Olympics — which, as we know, did not happen.
But be that as it may, the outstanding figure skater became a two-time Olympic champion and made an invaluable contribution to the victory of the whole team. For which Evgeniy receives gratitude, respect and honor from all of Russia.
The author’s opinion may not coincide with the position of the editors