One of the most artistic Russian figure skaters, 20-year-old Matvey Vetlugin decided to take a serious step in his career. The singles player left the coaching staff of Alexei Mishin and moved to Evgeniy Rukavitsyn. In a conversation with Sport24 correspondent Konstantin Lesik, the skater explained his decision for the first time and also explained why he retired from social networks.
— How did your transition to Evgeniy Rukavitsyn happen? — we begin a conversation with Matvey.
– Smoothly, decently. One of the goals of the transition is to replenish my knowledge about the sport in general, about how to train and train. It is also a contribution to my life experience.
— When did you realize that something needed to change?
— I can’t say that the decision was spontaneous; it was brewing before the Channel One Cup. Such an important step cannot be taken on some kind of emotion or thoughtlessly. I analyzed the thoughts that were in my head. I weighed everything and decided that it would be better for my further improvement.
I want to express my deep gratitude to Alexey Nikolaevich Mishin and the entire team for three most fruitful years of work, for how much I have grown during this time. I hope that further, with Evgeny Vladimirovich Rukavitsyn, we will be able to increase this growth.
— How did Alexey Mishin react to your transition?
– He let me go calmly. Evgeny Vladimirovich then called Alexey Nikolaevich, they discussed everything. I think everything turned out peacefully.
— Why did you choose Rukavitsyn’s group?
– Of course, I saw how the athletes of his group skate. Secondly, this is St. Petersburg, the city where I now live. Also, the coaches of his group have established themselves as first-class specialists in our country. And, of course, I will see Mark Kondratyuk at the training camp (Kondratyuk was next to us during the recording of the interview and nodded approvingly).
— How do you like the atmosphere in the group?
— One of the fundamental principles of our new team is a sense of camaraderie and mutual assistance within the team. Mark won’t let you lie. This concept opens up for me from a new perspective. And I am certainly happy about this. Even before the transition, I had good relationships with all the guys. Now they have become even denser.
— Do you organize jumping battles?
— Now one part of the group is in the off-season. The other part is still starting. I can’t say that we are working according to the same plan. But, with whomever we can, in our free time at the end of training we can come up with something – jumping one at a time, battles, arguments, games.
— What have you already noticed in the new group?
— A slightly different explanation of the jump from a technical point of view; a sense of camaraderie in the group as a fundamental principle of its functioning; great attention to rehabilitation processes is an important point; established good coach-student dialogue.
— After failure at the Channel One Cup, you left social networks. Were you very worried?
“It was an attempt at a little detox.” And I liked it without the constant simmering in the news flow. This is only partly connected with the Channel One Cup. But now I still haven’t recovered anything. So it’s okay for me. I can’t say that I lost much by giving up social networks. Yes, now there is no direct interaction with fans. But I hope that each of them understands that I am faithful to them. And I will try to justify it.
I took the failure at the Channel One Cup hard. Journalists chose me. In front of them, the fans, the coaches, the team, you feel bad feelings – disappointment, shame, etc. It was a difficult pit. Was bad. Very bad.
— Have you already started working on new programs?
— There are several ideas for both short and free. And I am now in the final stages of discussing the choice of music for productions with the coaches. It will be staged by specialists from our headquarters – Olga Glinka and Valentin Molotov.
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