The new Russian Revolution - the storming of Lake Krugloye

Russian Head Coach and his often controversial wife, Valentina.  Courtesy RGF

There has been a symphony of voices in the Russian press over past weeks as the results of the Olympics are reviewed and considered; you can find translations of some of the key works on this blog including a partial transcription of a press conference featuring most of the gymnasts and coaches, and interviews with the national coaches and gymnasts.  

The key focus of this coverage, rather than on gymnasts' performance, is on national coaching provision: will contracts be renewed, and were all members of the national teams provided with equal coaching support.  So far, much of this controversy seems to have focussed on the women's team.  Two warring factions have emerged: the Rodionenkos alongside Sergei Zelikson (personal coach to Anastasia Grishina) and Marina Ulyankina (Maria Paseka) appear to be at odds with WAG national coach Alexander Alexandrov.  In particular, concerns about Alexandrov's focus as personal coach to Aliya Mustafina have found the loudest voice, though not always the most consistent.  Grumbles about the Rodionenkos, and in particular Valentina's somewhat clumsy handling of the press, are more muted.  Yet, as we shall see, the more muted voice seems more reasonable in many respects.  Furthermore, some fundamental questions have yet to be aired, let alone answered.

Most recently, Russia's most successful male gymnast of the last quad, Anton Golotsutskov, has made his opinions known in an emotional statement that lays much of the blame for unrest in the Russian team at the hands of Russia's chief coach, Andrei Rodionenko, and his wife Valentina.   Anton, recently retired because of a serious back injury that has left him severely incapacitated for much of the last few weeks, raises several particular concerns :

1. That the Rodionenkos care little for anyone but themselves; gymnasts on the national team are provided with little support in developing new lives.
2. Anton's bonus for participating in the recent European Championships has been taken away from him thanks to errors he made on the high bar.  In 2008 his personal coach, Leonid Abramov, was denied funding to travel with the national team to Beijing.
   
3. The Rodionenkos 'threw out' European Champion Maxim Devyatovski from the team without a second thought for his welfare.
4. The Russian gymnasts have excellent support in terms of the training environment provided at Lake Krugloye; the Ministry of Sport, Youth and Tourism (under the leadership of Minister Vitaly Mutko) is willing to provide anything the gymnasts need and training and recovery facilities there are top class.  Yet gymnasts feel unsupported and fear speaking out against the Rodionenkos because they 'value their place on the national team'.  The Rodionenkos are only too ready to blame individual athletes for errors and for failing to achieve medals, yet when they win attempt to take all the credit.

Woven within stories told on the last few pages of this blog are some complex ideas that raise more questions than answers.  The recent history of Russian gymnastics has been far from smooth in terms of the continuity of both coaching staff and gymnasts.  It is impossible to say whether these apparently converging strands are inter-related, or coincidental, but the sheer volume of change asks a number of questions about the happiness of staff and gymnasts at the national training centre.  The recent history includes a number of unsettling stories:

• Oleg Ostapenko, former national coach to Ukraine, national coach to Brazil, personal coach to Olympic Champion Tatiana Lyssenko, returned to Russia in early 2010 as head coach of the junior WAG team, alongside colleague Ludmilla Korolenko.  By September 2011, he announced his return to Brazil to prepare the national team for the Rio Olympics.  Ludmilla Korolenko left Lake Krugloye at the same time.  Ostapenko's return to Brazil was prompted primarily by significant financial benefits, but was a surprise as he had made his long term commitment to the Russian team clear at the beginning of his tenure.  In a July 2010 interview with the All Around's Nora Schuler he emphasised the benefits of working in his mother tongue, spoke with excitement at the prospects of youngster Viktoria Komova at the upcoming Youth Olympic Games and explained how he would be taking on personal responsibility for coaching Maria Paseka, whose own coach had recently migrated.
• Leading national senior team members Yulia Lozhecko and Maxim Devyatovski were suspended from their teams on disciplinary grounds.  Lozhecko took this in her stride, continuing to compete at national level and excelling on her favourite beam exercise, but never again competing as an international.  Devyatovski, meanwhile, attempted to rehabilitate himself as a full member of the national team, preparing for the 2012 Olympics at his home gym in Siberia.  Just a few days before the Russia Cup competition, Andrei Rodionenko announced that Devyatovksi would have an equal chance of qualifying for the Olympics alongside those gymnasts who had trained at Lake Krugloye.  Yet ultimately, Devyatovski failed to show his face and quietly retired from competition without explanation.
• Valentina Rodionenko publicly renounced 2011 bars medallist, 2010 world team champion Tatiana Nabieva for her 'obesity' and the gymnast repeatedly found herself banished from Lake Krugloye and training in her home gym in St Petersburg.  The career of 2011 European Champion Anna Dementieva has followed a similar pattern.  Admittedly, both these gymnasts have suffered more injury problems than strictly desirable in the run up to the Olympics.  However, their treatment is at odds with that of Aliya Mustafina who, while recovering from a serious injury, was encouraged to remain at Lake Krugloye under the care of personal coach Alexander Alexandrov.
• Valentina Rodionenko publicly announced Anastasia Grishina as the 'second Viktoria Komova' earlier this year, discounting the Olympic chances of Aliya Mustafina thanks to weight gain during her recovery from injury.  
• Valentina Rodionenko has made repeated outspoken claims against the FIG of biassed marking, most loudly around the outcome of the women's all around competition at the world championships in 2011 but also in more general terms on the WAG competitions at the Olympics and in particular the MAG rings event final, where Alexander Balandin finished out of the medals.  While some might agree the points she makes, the manner and timing of many of her statements has seemed unwise strategically, risking offence to international officials and rivals and seeming inconsiderate of the need to foster healthy team morale. 
• Personal coaches Sergei Zelikson and Marina Ulyankina have questioned the appropriateness and fairness of the national WAG coach (Alexander Alexandrov) acting as personal coach to Aliya Mustafina.  Aliya Mustafina herself explained how the national team leadership had repeatedly pointed out to her that as national coach Alexandrov could not take responsibility for an individual gymnast, yet without offering the gymnast any alternative viable arrangement.
• National WAG coach Alexandrov has indicated that Zelikson refused to submit Anastasia Grishina to the same training regimen as other members of the national team, while Mustafina has made it clear that there was dissent from Grishina (and presumably her coach) in complying with national team working orders in London, ending with Grishina refusing to compete beam in team finals.  Zelikson highlights the fact that he obtained support from the Rodionenkos in implementing his own training plans for Grishina, thus implying that Alexandrov's authority as head coach had been undermined. 
  

The key themes have taken some time to emerge, with Valentina Rodionenko's voice the loudest, and providing the clearest indication of the Rodionenko family's position in these arguments.  Alexander Alexandrov, Andrei Rodionenko and Aliya Mustafina have been significantly more measured, reasonable and professional.  What has led to the apparent shift in power and voice between Andrei and his wife? 

Valentina Rodionenko's mandate is unclear; while on the Russian Gymnastics Federation's website she is listed as 'Head Coach' (see here), her 31 years' experience of the sport has been as an administrator without coaching responsibilities.  While Golotsutskov maintains that Andrei Rodionenko has no record of personal coaching, Vladimir Zaglada (2012) confirms that Rodionenko's role, first within the Soviet Union and more recently in Canada, has been that of a managerial head coach, mentoring and developing teams of personal coaches and leading scientific and performance development.  The vocal and very public nature of dissent and conflict within the Russian teams is uncharacteristic of Andrei Rodionenko's management style and of the successes he has created in past years.  Why now should the somewhat strident voice of Valentina become dominant?  At 70 years old, an age when most people are considering retirement, Andrei faces another four years in a highly demanding and stressful job: can his health take the strain without the support of his apparently still vigorous 76 year old wife?

The above questions and issues are temporal, maybe even a small storm in a very large teacup.  Amongst highly strung professionals there will always be disagreement, and sometimes loud voices need to be quelled in order to find some compromise.  Still, though, critical underlying questions remain unanswered.  Is there anyone ready to replace Andrei Rodionenko at the top of the sport?  Will Rodionenko willingly give up his role, and how will continuity be established if change is decided?  What will the main job of the head coach be in the coming years?  

Andrei Rodionenko himself has repeatedly highlighted the problems facing the Russian Federation in establishing and maintaining itself as a leader in world gymnastics.  The availability and training of coaches at all levels is one recurring problem; encouraging participation is another; while the support of VTB Bank and the Russian Ministry of Youth, Sport and Tourism is credited as providing vital finance for the building of new facilities across Russia and within the national training centre at Lake Krugloye.  

Yet the huge capital investments made recently by VTB and the readiness of the Ministry to invest in refurbishing Lake Krugloye are not without their drawbacks.  Providing funding to build new facilities is one thing; finding the money year in, year out to run these improved facilities is yet another.  Attracting gymnasts to come to the facilities may involve overcoming complex social and economic factors.  If the Russian Government has the expectation that recent investment will reap immediate rewards without ongoing investment in operational costs and campaigns to promote sporting participation, little more than stress will result.

Elite gymnastics is very expensive thanks to the need for highly trained specialists, and individual coaching.  At national team level, the Russian Gymnastics Federation employs scientific specialists on every apparatus in addition to head coaches of MAG and WAG at senior and junior levels, medical staff and choreographers.  But at grassroots level the Federation has little power or influence.  Rodionenko has mentioned the need for national coaching staff regularly to retrain gymnasts in their basic skills thanks to deficiencies in their early training.  He highlights that many universities have dropped their gymnastics coaching degrees, making gymnastics specialists a rarity amongst newly qualified sports professionals.  If Alexandrov did not coach Mustafina, who could?  No candidate can compete with the impressive record of this amazing master coach.  With the golden generation of gymnasts who qualified during the 1980s and 1990s often finding themselves forced to work abroad for economic reasons, Russia's resource of gymnastics specialists is running out and as time progresses this effect can only become more pronounced.  Perhaps Golotsutskov is right: perhaps in ten years' time Russia will have nobody on the Olympic gymnastics podium.

A masterclass for coaches led by Rodionenko, his team and former national head coach Leonid Arkayev took place last year, and successful personal coaches such as Maria Nazarova have benefitted from specialist training to take them up to a higher level of proficiency.  Yet with the Russian system still leaking coaching talent overseas, this merely scratches the surface of the problem.  Supporting grassroots gymnastics has necessarily to involve paying grassroots gymnastics coaches a living wage, right across the vast areas of Russia.  Burtasy School of gymnastics in Penza (home to Olympic medallist Denis Ablyazin and his coach Sergei Starkin) is one example of a school which has successfully established its own streams of income, using venue hire as one method.  But generally in Russia, coaches are coaches and do not have the entrepreneurial skills to develop and maintain the multiple streams of income necessary to run a financially healthy gymnastics business.  Besides, Russian families do not always have the money to pay for their children to attend recreational gymnastics classes.  Mustafina is probably right to take a degree in economics and law; an understanding of business is likely to be as important to her as her gymnastics knowledge if she is to establish a career in the sport in her home country, and she can always top up a business degree with a postgraduate qualification in her chosen sport.

Funding the operational costs of the sport including training, recruitment and salaries has become a major challenge for the Russian gymnastics establishment.  This must surely figure highly as a priority for the Head Coach, whoever that may be, over the coming quad and beyond.