by LOIS ELFMAN Te best coaches put their students first, and
the three in this article are no exception. Tat doesn’t mean they don’t each have their own per- sonal reflections on the Olympic experience. For the two who’ve already stood at the
boards at an Olympic Winter Games, there were life-changing moments. For one hoping to see the rings up close for the first time, it’s a matter of careful planning, concentration and a bit help from her friends.
Earning respect — Rafael Arutyunyan
Coaching Alexander Abt to a fifth-place fin- ish at the 2002 Olympic Winter Games in Salt Lake City finally earned Rafael Arutyunyan re- spect from his biggest doubter: his mother. His parents had divorced when he was 14,
and there was little money for him to contin- ue his training in skating. So at 18 he left his home in Tbilisi, Georgia, (then part of the Soviet Union) to become a coach. As he worked tirelessly to develop his career, his mother often asked what he was doing and why he didn’t come home more often to visit. Watching the warm-up for the free skate in Salt Lake City, she finally understood.
JAY ADEFF/U.S. FIGURE SKATING
“When I was a young coach, my dream was to stand next to the best coaches in the world,” Arutyunyan said. “I looked at the top coaches with their students in the kiss and cry and said to myself, ‘Maybe someday I will be there.’ “Ten, when I stood by the boards at Olym-
pics, there were basically six coaches. My student was in the last warm-up group. Frank Carroll, Doug Leigh, Tatiana Tarasova, Alexei Mishin, Chinese coach (coach of Chengjiang Li) and me. I said, ‘Rafael, this is the moment of truth. You are there. You just got it.’ “After the Olympics, my mom starts to rec-
ognize what I do.” For the past 12 years, Arutyunyan has
worked in the U.S., basing himself at the Ice Cas- tle International Training Center in Lake Arrow- head, Calif., where he has trained skaters from all over the world, including Mao Asada, Jeffrey Buttle and Michelle Kwan. Arutyunyan arrived in Torino, Italy, for the
2006 Olympics just as Kwan was forced to with- draw due to injury. Although Buttle offered to try and get him a Canadian credential, Arutyu- nyan was too upset about Kwan and left. He knew Buttle was in good hands with longtime coach Lee Barkell. (Buttle won the bronze med- al). Arutyunyan continued to co-coach Buttle for the remainder of his competitive career, which culminated with a gold medal at the 2008 World Championships. Just as two-time U.S. champion Ashley
Wagner announced she would be training with Arutyunyan, the Ice Castle rink in Lake Arrow- head closed. Numerous facilities offered ice time to Arutyunyan and his students, 2012 U.S. silver medalist Adam Rippon among them, but he se- lected the East West Ice Palace in Artesia, Calif., run by Kwan’s father, Danny. Arutyunyan said it’s the perfect environ-
ment for Olympic preparation, and he is gearing Wagner up to perform triple-triple combina- tions.
He’s also looking forward to returning to
Sochi, where he used to spend summers as a boy. It’s about an eight-hour drive from Tbilisi, where he visits his mother every spring at the conclu- sion of skating season.
Rafael Arutyunyan shares some words of encouragement with Ashley Wagner be- fore her performance at Skate America in Detroit.
38 DECEMBER 2013
Always improving — Marina Zoueva
“I never, ever focus on the win,” veteran
coach and choreographer Marina Zoueva said. “I always focus myself on improvement. Improve
my choreography. Make a stronger composition of music, program, movement and choreogra- phy which can touch an audience and touch the judges’ hearts. Tat’s what I focus on.” Zoueva’s first Olympic Winter Games as
a credentialed coach were 1994 in Lilleham- mer, Norway, where she coached Ekaterina Gordeeva and Sergei Grinkov to their second Olympic pairs gold medal. It was an unusu- al Olympics for several reasons. Gordeeva and Grinkov had stopped competing after the 1990 World Championships, but took advantage of the provision allowing professionals to reinstate. Tey’d gotten married and had a baby. Zoueva had left Russia and moved to Canada, and they did much of their Olympic preparation there. “Te program I choreographed for them,
‘Moonlight Sonata,’ was about how the man appreciates the woman — woman as woman, woman as mother, woman as wife and woman as partner in work,” said Zoueva, who recalled how intense the competition was between Gordeeva and Grinkov, Natalia Mishkutenok and Artur Dmitriev, and Isabelle Brasseur and Lloyd Eisler. “Right before they go on the ice to com-
pete the free skate, I see Katia sitting in a chair in the hallway looking at a picture of her daugh- ter, Daria, and smiling,” Zoueva said. “Tat made me feel confident about them. I knew they would skate great and win.” In 2001, Zoueva moved to the United
States and began coaching alongside Igor Shpilband. Tey took several teams to the 2006 Olympic Winter Games in To- rino, including Americans Tanith Belbin and Ben- jamin Agosto (whose silver medal was historic), Jamie Silverstein and Ryan O’Meara,
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