Interview with Maria Butyrskaia

European Championships in Helsinki, January 2009

Maria Butyrskaia became the first Ladies World Champion from Russia when she won in 1999. She also is a three-time European Champion. After retiring from competitive skating in 2002, Maria performed in shows. She got married to Russian ice hockey player Vadim Khomitski in summer 2006. Their son Vladislav was born in April 2007, and Maria is expecting her second child in May 2009. Meanwhile, the Muscovite has turned to coaching and attended the European Championships in Helsinki as the coach of Emma Hagieva from Azerbaijan.

 

Q: Ten years ago you won the World Championships here in Helsinki in this ice rink. How does it feel now to come back here?

Maria: To be honest, I don’t have many emotions about hat. Ten years have passed, that is such a long time and I almost don’t remember anything. Yesterday I walked into the ice rink and went up to the tribune and I was thinking that back then, when I skated here myself, I never even went up to the tribune. While I was competing, I was very focused and drawn into myself. Yesterday I felt like I had arrived at a new place that I’ve never been to before. The only thing I really remember are the rocks in the ice rink!

Q: But for sure it is a nice feeling to come back to Helsinki.

Maria: Yes. Helsinki was a lucky place for me. When I competed here in my first Europeans in 1993, I finished fifth. This was a very good result for a debut. And of course I enjoyed the highlight of my career here in Helsinki when I won the title. Obviously it is very nice to come to a place that is connected with the best memories of your life.

Q: You told me end of November in Moscow during the Cup of Russia that you just started coaching Emma Hagieva. She is your first senior level student, I believe.

Maria: That is true. She is my first grown up student and these are my first Europeans as a coach. Obviously I didn’t have much time to work with her; it has been only two months so far. But I like her working  attitude. She only started to skate quite late, she was already 11 years old. I really hope that she’ll progress next  season, when I’ll do the programs with her and we’ll go to the summer training camp. Now it was difficult to change anything. We could have lost everything before Europeans. We plan now to include other jumps into the programs, jumps that she more or less has learned now. There is still some time until the end of March to add something for the World Championships, but still I’m not sure what will come out of it. Next year we can go with more hope into the competition. I’m not stupid and I know exactly that we hardly could expect any success here. However, Emma is very hard working and a very nice girl. I like to work with her and she can progress.

Q: What is harder for you – when you skated yourself or to watch your student competing as a coach?

Maria: When I was competing myself, I knew that everything depended just on me. Now I’m contributing, but I cannot do anything! Of course you want to go out there and to help and to do the triple loop yourself… It was always my favorite jump and I could do it so well!

Q: I was exactly thinking the same thing when Emma missed the loop.

Maria:  I’m standing right there at the boards and I’m almost jumping myself, I hold my arms in the right position… (laughs). Of all things, she had to miss this jump. Overall she skated as she has trained. Of course I know that she, in order to skate clean, would have needed to skate clean each day in practice. This was not the case. She could have missed three elements today. Considering that she didn’t skate so badly and she more or less did her job.

Q: How old are your other students?

Maria: They are ten years old, so they are very young. I left them now in order to come here. They were at another competition, I was there for the short program, but I had to fly here when they had the long program. Obviously it is different to work with them. There you can see my style of coaching. I love working with them. I’m trying very hard, they have beautiful programs and beautiful costumes. Maybe the jumps aren’t working each time, but the people are saying that they are well trained, good girls.

Q: Hopefully we’ll get to see them soon.

Maria: Well, maybe in three years!

Q: Just now 12-year-olds won at Russian Nationals.

Maria: No, my girls for sure won’t win Nationals at the age of 12. And this is not necessary; I’m not striving for that. Why win Nationals at age 12 when you cannot go to Europeans anyway? There is a time for everything. Now she (Adelina Sotnikova) is 12 years old and she is a champion already. What will be when she is 15? This is also psychologically not easy. Hopefully everything will be ok, because this girl is very, very good. She can get very far.

Q: Thank you for the interview and all the best for the future!