Заслуженный тренер России Елена Чайковская отрицательно относится к выдвижению Аллы Шеховцовой на должность председателя технического комитета ISU, которую раньше занимал Александр Горшков. В течение последних лет жена генерального директора ФФКР Валентина Писеева работала судьей на крупных соревнованиях.
"Шеховцова думает, что она умеет чувствовать и создавать, и это трагедия для российского фигурного катания. Проблема в том, что она решает, кто хороший, а кто – нет. Поэтому сейчас мы имеем то, что имеем", – приводит слова Чайковской The Globe and Mail.http://sport.rambler.../581039936.htmlControversial Russian judge up for skating postAs Russian skating falters, Shekhovtseva seeks international influence
BEVERLEY SMITH
Published on Thursday, Jun. 17, 2010 2:34PM EDT
The Russian ice dancing official who supported the controversial Aboriginal routine of Russia’s top team at the Vancouver 2010 Games is running for an International Skating Union post.
Alla Shekhovtseva, who has worked as a judge at world and Olympic ice dancing competitions, is a candidate for the ice dancing technical committee. The Congress of the International Skating Union will hold elections on Friday in Spain.
Shekhovtseva has served as a judge over the years even though her husband is the Russian federation chief, Valentin Piseev. Despite what some critics see as a conflict of interest, she has judged at most world championships and Olympic Games during the past decade.
One respected Russian journalist described Shekhovtseva as “the most knowledgeable, powerful and respected of Russian judges” and that “her opinion is deferred to at the elite level.”
However, there are also critics of her judgment and influence. In Vancouver, Russian skaters failed to win a Winter Olympics gold medal for the first time in 50 years and with the next Winter Olympics to be staged in Sochi, Russia, Russians have a long way to go to regain their dominance.
“When [Chaikovskaya] came to the federation, it was a terrible story for skating in Russia,” Elena Chaikovskaya, a renowned ice dancing coach in Russia, told The Globe and Mail in a telephone interview. “[Shekhovtseva] thinks she knows feeling and creation and this is the first tragedy in Russian figure skating.”
“The problem is she decides that one person is good, another is not. This is why we have what we have now.”
The ice dancing team of Oksana Domnina and Maxim Shabalin settled for a bronze medal in Vancouver after winning the world championships in 2009.
Domnina and Shabalin are from the Odintosova club, of which Shekhovtseva is a director. She reportedly had a strong hand in approving the Aboriginal routine that received worldwide criticism for lack of authenticity, over-the-top costumes, and a tone that struck some as mocking rather than honouring Native dance. Domnina and Shabalin kept the routine for the Vancouver Olympics, as it was too late to prepare another.
Because of injury, Domnina and Shabalin skipped the Grand Prix season, and the routine was first presented at home at the Russian championships where it received high marks. It wasn’t exposed to international scrutiny until they skated at the European championships a month before the Olympics.
Domnina and Shabalin were not strong enough skaters to carry off the kind of programs that they used at the Vancouver Olympics, Chaikovskaya said, adding that somebody should have encouraged them last September to find other material.
When she and others at home first saw the Aboriginal routine, Chaikovskaya said: “We all just stared at each other with fear in our eyes.”
But only she and top coach Tatiana Tarasova said anything. Tarasova spoke out on Russian television during the national championships, saying that it would be “impossible” for them to win the Olympics with the routines. Subsequently, Tarasova was not sent to the European championships or the Olympic Games, Chaikovskaya said.
Top Russian coach Natalia Dubova, who left Russia to work in the United States in 1992, was also critical of the routine.
“I always think, when I work for Russia, how the country will be represented in the world,” she said. “We try to follow the standard and be the best of the standard and have personality.”
Attempts to reach Shekhovtseva in Spain have been unsuccessful to date.
http://www.theglobea...article1607867/Russia's figure skating power playEmbattled skating federation former president retains authority in new position
Beverley Smith
Globe and Mail Update Published on Wednesday, Jun. 09, 2010 6:55PM EDT
After leading his country to its worst Olympic results in 50 years, outgoing Russian Figure Skating Federation president Valentin Piseev has found a way to retain power in the face of heavy political pressure.
In the days following the 2010 Vancouver Winter Games, during which Russia failed to win a gold medal in figure skating, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev ousted Piseev from a couple of important committees – including the organizing group for the 2014 Sochi Olympics – and called for his resignation.
Medvedev seemed to be saying that there was a need for new blood to get Russian athletes to the Sochi Games, although, for figure skating, it may be too late. It takes at least 10 years to develop an elite figure skater.
Evgeny Plushenko, who won a silver medal in Vancouver, has hinted that he will try to compete at Sochi but by then he’ll be 31 years old.
After the 2010 Olympics, Plushenko told Medvedev that with Piseev at the helm, figure skaters are “treated like floor rags.” He said a large amount of money slated for the sport doesn’t trickle down to coaches or skaters.
Plushenko claimed that he sold his car – a gift from the former Russian president Vladimir Putin – to pay for costumes and coaches in his comeback attempt in Vancouver.
Despite Medvedev’s move against him, Piseev evidently found a way to remain in power anyway. Although he maintained he wouldn’t seek re-election as federation president, the federation constitution was changed recently to create a new position – general director. The director has full authority to make decisions and distribute money, leaving the president as an apparent figurehead.
One candidate for the president’s job, 2002 Olympic pair champion Anton Sikharulidze, withdrew his name from consideration after finding out about the constitutional change at the last minute. “While my goal was to develop the federation, the new rules do not grant such powers to the president,” he told Russian reporters. “I am a young, energetic, and fairly busy man. I don’t have time to carry around the briefcase for the general director.”
Piseev persuaded Alexander Gorshkov to run for president. Gorshkov won the post, getting all 66 votes. Piseev then became the general director with 65 votes.
At the International Skating Union Congress elections this weekend, Gorshkov will be unable to run for any elected positions as the constitution forbids federation presidents from filling such posts.
Instead, Piseev’s wife Alla Shekhovtsova is expected to enter the race to become a member of the ice dance technical committee, or even its chairman.
In recent months, a growing number of Russian coaches and former skaters have publicly criticized both Piseev and Shekhovtsova.
Plushenko backed Sikharulidze for president. Elena Chaikovskaya, the matriarch of ice dancing in Russia, told The Globe and Mail that Piseev has hampered the work of coaches he does not like, got rid of opponents, and surrounded himself with people who agree with him.
Piseev, 68, has a talent for staying in power. He was dismissed from his Russian federation post several times over the years, but bounced back every time.
In Moscow, Chaikovskaya seems totally unaware of Piseev’s coup, and is celebrating the win of Gorshkov. “I am outside the confidence,” she admitted earlier this week.
But outside the country, the expatriate coaches figured it out very quickly.
“[Piseev] will be able to do what he wants again,” said one coach who wished to remain anonymous.
http://www.theglobea...article1598419/
