Your nerves fail in the hype
Fallen ice stars express frustration: “Not a dream couple yet”
January 12, 2024, 2:14 p.m
Everyone is talking about European Championship gold and the new figure skating dream couple. The hype and hope are great. But Minerva-Fabienne Hase and Nikita Volodin cannot withstand this at the European Championships. For them, however, they are already looking ahead.
Minerva-Fabienne Hase made no excuses. The German figure skater’s explanation for the failed attack on the European Championship podium with Nikita Volodin was clear and concise. “We are far from being a dream couple,” said Hase after the botched pair skating freestyle at the European Championships in Kaunas.
Hase and Volodin had big goals. It was supposed to be a medal, the hype was great after a series of victories, people even dreamed of gold – until their nerves gave out: In the jumping sequence, Hase was unsure about the double axel, she fell during the triple throw-Rittberger and the lift was aborted. “We would have preferred to have suffered a defeat at another time,” said Hase.
With 69.63 points, they moved into the free skating final in second place. A clean competition would have been enough for the podium. In the end, the Italians Lucrezia Beccari/Matteo Guarise (199.19) won fifth place with 190.69 points, ahead of the second German pair Annika Hocke/Robert Kunkel (177.75) in seventh place. “It was the first international competition in which we entered as the favorites,” said Hase. It became the first international competition that ended in great disappointment.
Put pressure on myself
They have only been on the ice together for a little over a year, and thanks to their experience as pair skaters, they quickly found each other. The rise since then has been meteoric. Before the turn of the year, Hase/Volodin won the Grand Prix events in Espoo, Finland and Osaka in Japan, as well as the Grand Prix final in Beijing.
The results made them gold contenders in Kaunas, which “caused pressure, but some of it also came from ourselves,” said Hase, who analyzed her performance self-critically and reflectively, but did not lose her confidence. “It remains that we have already won a lot this season, but not at the European Championships,” said the 24-year-old. The hope is that the defeat will serve as a wake-up call and sharpen the senses. A new opportunity presents itself at the World Championships in Montreal (March 18th to 24th).
The biggest goal is even further away. The “peak” of performance should be reached at the 2026 Olympic Games in Milan and Cortina. The hurdles to a joint Olympic start also lie away from the ice surface. The Russian Volodin, who is starting for Germany, needs a German passport. The prerequisite for this is, among other things, a German test, which he would currently not pass. Both Hase and Volodin are taking lessons from Lithuania with them for their joint sporting careers.