ALEKSEI YAGUDIN:

�I WON�T LET PLYUSHCHENKO BECOME GRAND�

Q. Almost two years have passed since you left Aleksei Mishin for Tatiana Tarasova, but you still haven�t explained clearly why you did so.

A. Corny is it is, I guess I was afraid. You can�t call Mishin a winner-coach, his pupils always had somebody standing in their way. Just look, he�s been working for so many years and has by now only one champion raised: Aleksei Urmanov. As for Plyushchenko, I won�t let him become as grand as Urmanov. And another thing: in the last period of my work with Mishin I didn�t get enough attention from him. Would anybody like something like this? That�s why, in the summer of 1998, I asked Tarasova to let me into her group. She didn�t accept me right away, she said she had to think. And she asked me for a detailed account of how I�d been preparing for the season while being with Mishin. When I called her two days later, she said she agreed to take me in. To say the truth, leaving one coach for another was the most important and serious action in my whole life.

Q. Both Mishin and Tarasova are very authoritative. Did your rival friends change their attitudes towards you?

A. There�s nothing unusual in changing coaches, no one holds grudges against me for that.

Q. And what about your former coach? In public you always smile and give compliments to each other, while you would probably prefer not to meet at all.

A. Of course, there�s no warmth left between us - of the kind we now share with Tatiana. But no, when we meet we congratulate on each other�s successes... Sometimes during the competitions I come around to Mishin to say: �How are you? How�s your family?�. But that doesn�t happen very often, because I know he has no ardent wish to talk to me. Therefore our contacts are strictly businesslike and perfectly polite.

 Q. But you seem to be quite affectionate about Tarasova since the very first days of your cooperation.

A. Tatiana treats me like I�m her own son, in a very tender way. I know for sure that if I need something, Tatiana will give the biggest alarm ever known, may it happen in Russia or in America, night or day... I haven�t got any problems and troubles now. I just train, perform and win.

Q. Is it hard to be coached by a woman? When you worked with Mishin you didn�t have to think about etiquette, you even happened to swear while on ice, everybody hearing you. Now you must be controlling yourself all the time, right?

A. Tatiana is very stylish, elegant and all, but in fact she�s just one of the Russian womenfolk. [�prostaya russkaya baba� - I�m sorry but I don�t know how to translate it in a better way.] And she understands me when I swear, I sometimes feel free to yell and to cry out four-letter words in her presence. I know I offend her with my flashes of temper, I know she makes all these demands of me just to help me, it's all for my own good, but... That�s my ill nature, can�t do anything about it. All emotions remain on the ice-rink though. Afterwards, in the check-room, we make it up, kiss each other, discuss the training and our plans for the future. There�s no discomfort for me in having a woman as my coach. Tarasova uses strong words too, by the way.

I�ve become very different after the time spent in America. I�ve grown up somehow, I began to take things more seriously - both in life and in figure skating. Everybody who hadn�t seen me for a long time showed a big surprise: �Lyosha, what happened to you?!� Frankly, I don�t like it myself, being that serious and adult. Sometimes I want so badly to act wild, to do crazy things... Of course, I somehow understand why it comes upon me. It�s the off-season after a year that proved to be full of success for me. I�ve won all the tournaments except the Russian Championships - they turned out to be very tough, especially in the psychological aspect. In summer I began preparing my new programmes quite late, I just couldn�t understand why I had to break myself learning, training... I was really puzzled: �Why should I go on the ice again?! I�ve already won everything available, I�m the best, am I not?!� I lost the interest... It�s very hard to lose your goal and the essence of your profession when you�re 19 years old. But now the ardour reappeared.

Q. Maybe that�s because, after the recent Russian Championships 2000, you became aware that Yevgeny Plyushchenko may be a decent rival?

A. It�s not that, I don�t care at all whether I have rivals or not. The most important thing is that I have the wish to work again.

Q. You said you were quite happy with your silver medal, that you had been passing through acclimatization and that physically you hadn�t been at your best...

A. I wouldn�t have won in Moscow anyway. Here, in figure skating both the experts and the skaters know everything from the very start - who will win and who won�t, who will go abroad and who will stay. That�s why I just wanted to perform with inspiration and easiness, with as few mistakes as possible, to create a character on the ice. In Moscow I�ve done all I could, though I�m capable of much more.

Q. There is much talking about your long programme - they say it�s very unusual for you, serious and mature. People got used to see you as a clown...

A. This long programme demanded more creative approach than the previous ones. I chose the music myself, it�s from the film �The Broken Arrow�. After listening to the CD Tatiana asked very doubtedly: �Are you sure you can skate to this?� I said I was. I like the programme, though I was sure from the beginning it would be hard to perform it. The music doesn�t turn the audience on, I don�t receive the usual applause, the energy. But at the same time I feel like my creative side of my personality has grown up very much with this programme. I try to express the feelings of a guy who lost someone very close to him, and for the first time in my career I began to �act� with my face - that�s a skating term, - with my hands... In short, I now want to do everything in a most perfect and complex way possible. Dancing and rollicking to Russian and Gipsy tunes, like Plyushchenko does, and thus gaining applause - it�s certainly much easier and more fun. But this easy way will surely end up in a deadlock, sooner or later.

 Q. On the Russian Championships� press conference you�ve mentioned the incident that happened to you in the summer of 1999, during the Collins tour. But earlier you�d talked about it in a totally different way...

A. Everything I said about everyone drinking and staying up all night was true. It wasn�t me alone who led this kind of life during the tour, everyone did! And my dismissal was caused by the words I said while a party was going on: � I entered into the tour to take a holiday�. Of course Tom Collins who organised the whole thing didn�t like it, and he dismissed me to save the image of his tour. I�d just told the truth though - after having a tough season the skaters don�t tire themselves much, on the contrary, they relax and sort of take a vacation. But they hold their tongues, and at the end quietly receive their money - only I alone bumped into a trouble. In fact, I was framed up...

Q. Was there some kind of a worldwide conspiracy against Aleksei Yagudin?

A. Of course not... I do have conjectures about who might have wound up the whole scandal, but I don�t want to mention any names. I can only say that these people have lots of power in figure skating, and I have to meet them very often. What can I do about it?.. I�m not into boycotts and fights.

Q. And what about the story that happened during the same tour? Some people say you�ve hit Nicole Bobek.

A. I DIDN�T bung her! I just came around into her hotel room one night - you know, the way a man can pay a visit to a woman... And in the early morning she burst into my room with a black eye, yelling: �Aleksei, how could you do this?!� This mess was cleared up very soon, I just explained I had nothing to do with it. Maybe somebody else visited Bobek after I left her, and she just couldn�t remember?

Q. There are lots of rumours about you all the time, and they�re anything but nice...

A. It�s very interesting to read and to hear about what else has been made up about me, but in fact I don�t care much. I know I can�t get rid of rumours. Putting modesty aside, I�m a celebrity, my personality is popular and interesting. But another matter is how the reporters can make such a big thing out of nothing. For instance, once a Collins tour was going on, and I was spotted leaving Rudy Galindo�s room late at night, and he�d always admitted himself a homosexual. After that the whole world knew that �Yagudin was gay�, though Rudy and I are just friends. We only drank some beer together.

Q. Do you like to have a bottle?

A. Of course I do, I�m a Russian after all! Although I don�t drink much since that Collins tour incident last year. I promised Tatiana not to do this. You know how it happens, there�s a meet-and-greet after each tournament... I got used to alcohol when I began frequenting abroad competitions, �one hundred grams� here, �one hundred grams� there... But I�ve got a strong will, and there�s no need in special hospitals and anonymous alcoholics societies for me. I've managed to prove this.

Q. You�ve allegedly changed your agent.

A. Hmmm... Canadian coach Richard Gautier has been a close friend of mine for a long time. But in the beginning of this season, at Skate Canada, some people from my crew came around and asked me to stop keeping company with Richard. The point was that his homosexuality could spread new rumours about me being gay, and that could harm me. I was mad at them when I came to the press conference, and when a reporter asked quite an innocent question: �Why do you look so angry, you�ve won the tournament�, I burst out: �Listen, I don�t give a damn if the person I communicate with is gay or alcoholic, he would be a friend of mine anyway! And I�m sick of everyone meddling into my private life!� I didn�t mention any names, but for some reason everyone thought that I meant my agent.

Q. Is it true you had an affair with the Russian gymnast beauty, Yana Batyrshina?

A. Everybody seems to be talking about this story now, but in fact it began before the notorious Collins tour, and it ended this summer. I�ve seen photos of Batyrshina in a Russian sports magazine, and I made many efforts to get to know her. Was it love? No, a momentary fling maybe. I was attracted by Yana�s beauty and eroticism.

Q. We saw you with a beautiful girl at the Russian championships...

A. Not all of my female friends are my lovers and girlfriends, you know. I�ve got lots of friends, including those of the opposite sex. The pretty girl you�re talking about is just one of them. My heart is disengaged nowadays.

Q. So you decided to concentrate totally on figure skating?

A. If I �totally concentrate on figure skating� I would very soon go insane. I'm not one of those idiots who deprive themselves of all the joys that life gives. I want to have fun, and I also want to search for my one and only. All the more so it doesn�t interfere with training and performing. I�ve got time for everything.