Evgeni Plushenko celebrates his 40th birthday: what the ice star lacks in life

… It was Plushenko who taught us to win in men’s skating. We still live with nostalgia for those days. Four Olympic pedestals! Two gold, two silver. Amazing performance: I went to the Games, which means that I also went to the awards ceremony.

Before the Olympic Games in Sochi (just the fourth in his career), Evgeny said: “I want to perform and go down in history as a good figure skater who managed to do something for figure skating. And I want to convey to the young people who want to win a couple of times and run away: on the contrary, keep going. Because figure skating has not yet been fully studied, one might say.

Every five years, when age has a jubilee value, we can count: out of his 35 years, we talked about Plushenko 20. Of today’s 40, we are already talking about 25. Only the first tag, it turns out, was lived by Evgeny without deafening attention from all sides.

Passionate, explosive career with a lot of fans. Envious or enemies – of course. “The ice is mine,” Plushenko not only said, but confirmed it all the time. He left the combat ice and returned, left again and returned again.

It’s true – at times it seemed like too much of it. But it seemed so only until the moment of departure. And then everyone was waiting for his return. He may have actually tried to leave. But domestic ice highlighted the void.

“People surrounding Plushenko are divided into two groups,” said Alexei Nikolaevich Mishin, Evgeny’s permanent coach. – One, big, respects his diligence and talent. And the other, small, refers to his success with jealousy. Many successful people in the eyes of less successful people evoke this base feeling, which is expressed in the question: why come back if a person has everything – medals, money, apartments, cars, children, wife? Evgeni Plushenko is from the category of people who open a window into the unknown. In modern sports, going to the Olympic arena for the fourth time is the unknown.”

Eugene said: “I know that I am doing something new. But I don’t know what will come of it.” And we saw and learned what happened. We follow Plushenko even now, when the figure skater is already heading his own academy.

Yes, Plushenko has always been and is for the audience – a rich source of reflection, admiration, comparisons, surprise. Shock. Delight. Sometimes – and this is also true, irritation. He wasn’t always an angel himself. Hype? Yes, he loves, but today, it seems, he has become more selective.

“I caught star disease, of course. When at the age of fifteen he became third at the World Championships. And I could have won it, but I burned out. Something unreal was going on there – the press forgot about two steps, everyone rushed to me: “You are doing this at the age of fifteen!”. And then I spread my wings: “Oh! So I’m a rising star! Yes, I went through it. My mother brought me back to earth. Life forced me to grow up earlier, so at the age of fifteen I was still older and smarter than my peers. In sports, there are ups and downs. But there is a balance … In sports, you can’t go all the time in ascending order: “bale-bale-bale”.

… Yes, it was a thorn in the heart: Vancouver 2010 silver after Turin 2006 gold. “American Evan Lysacek said that he would defeat Plushenko in Vancouver with one movement from element to element. And he did win. But it was an entry into the appendix, which the international community of figure skaters soon recognized, – Mishin will analyze. “Men’s figure skating has broken the deadlock, and those who were fiercely opposed to multi-turn jumps hastily began to master the quads.”

If it weren’t for that Vancouver thorn, if one of the young people came on time and decisively to replace, maybe the Olympic Games in Sochi-2014 would not have seen Evgeny on the ice. He spoke only in the team tournament, but he said the word necessary for victory on the ice.

In the individual tournament, the words were different. “I felt severe pain on the right in my back and a very heavy stretching leg … Of course, I am very upset. Because the whole year I was preparing after the most difficult operation and went to both competitions. And I wanted to finish my career at a high level, at a good level. But, apparently, this is the only way to stop me.”

The athlete withdrew from personal competitions at the home Olympics just before the start. The examination showed that one of the four screws in the spine, installed during the operation to replace a worn intervertebral disc, which was done in early 2013, broke. After the Games, not only the broken screw had to be removed, but also the other three. Now Eugene says that all the screws are at home next to the Olympic medals.

In Sochi-2014, coach Mishin, in his usual direct manner, wrapped up as if in jest, stated: “I think that Zhenya Plushenko’s career in amateur figure skating is over. We will be able to return to amateur ice only in one case: to participate in the Paralympic Games.”

Plushenko stopped after Sochi. And went on. Show, own academy, a bit of coaching… And then suddenly he announced preparations for the fifth Olympic Games.

He said that everything that “was broken, healed, there is nothing more to break.” Entered the national team. Started training. Plans with a temporary refusal to perform at the largest competitions in the name of recovery – moral, physical – were announced.

“My focus is selection for the 2018 Olympics. I continue to prepare new programs – in my opinion, there will be new images. Plushenko will be a little different. In any case, we are trying to do so, although, of course, it is difficult. I have been skating for a long time, I have a certain image. I’m trying to change, keep up with the times, keep up with figure skating. Of course, I will try to compete with young athletes. If I recover, I will perform at the 2017 Pre-Olympic World Championships, ”Evgeny planned.

He also turned to young people, answering everyone at once to talk about what stands in the way of talents, crushing them with authority. “Sometimes I read: Plushenko is holding back the youth, while others immediately write: in figure skating, as in all sports, young people are not given a road! Prove, be the best and everything will be fine for you, you will be number 1 or 2, 3 … It’s no one’s fault that the guys today occupy the places they occupy at the world championships. They have all the cards in their hands. Friends, I have not performed for a year and a half, everything is in your hands, demonstrate!

The promises were accurate: “If what I planned with my team, we will go step by step, maybe we will bring this matter to an end. If we finish and I qualify for the Olympic Games and other international competitions, then I will prove to myself that yes, I am a strong athlete. Yes, I can do something. Maybe it won’t work, it’s 50/50.” Those 50 who denied the return won.

… His life was divided for a long time by Olympic four-year cycles: in Salt Lake City, the skater was only 19, at the victorious Olympics in Turin – 23, in the difficult silver Vancouver – 27, in Sochi – 31. He rolled his career beautifully.

Today, Evgeni Plushenko is in active coaching. And for some reason there is no doubt that the Olympic Games will return to his life. It seems that he did not want to shoulder this burden of a mentor so early, but somehow it happened. He says he wanted to build a skating rink and a hotel, they already exist. Now his dream is to expand the academy. He also says that from the very beginning of working with athletes, he spent eight hours on the ice. He does this even now, he is fully involved in the process of training athletes.

Once, in one of Plushenko’s departures from the competition, Alexei Nikolaevich Mishin admitted: “I just threw off my heavy backpack.” And then he clarified: “a backpack full of coaching happiness.” It seems that Evgeny wants to add to what he has achieved – a backpack of coaching happiness. He says there is no time to celebrate the anniversary, he has to work.