NAVIGATION

1998-1999 Season
Excerpts from an article about 1999 Europeans by Daria Srebnitskaya [Soviet Sport]

Masha used to skate with Anton Sikharulidze. They were Junior World champions. In 1996 Sikharulidze left her from Berezhnaya and Masha started to skate with Timuraz Pulin. What happened to Alexei Tikhonov seems more like a detective story.

-(Alexei) Two years ago, Ludmila Velikova teamed me up with Masha. We've skated for a month and then...I disappeared. The thing is, before I met Masha I skated as a professional and after training for 30 days I thought that it would be better for me to stay pro. I have to repent, I left without saying "Good Bye" or any explanation whatsoever. In May 98 I called Masha back and asked her to give it another try. I missed competing. But Masha is very responsible and honest girl, she told me that she had another partner-Pulin.

Some time later Pulin had to quit for certain reasons. As soon as I was told of such news I immediately flew to St. Petersburg. Later we've trained for a while in Sweden. The training conditions are excellent there. In fall we started to compete in Grand Prix events and even won one of them. That was a surprise!

-Was the first place at European' a surprise for you?

-(Alexei) Of course, we've never thought we could win. We had another goal at that time - to skate well. When I found out that Elena and Anton withdrew, we felt very sorry for Lenochka (Elena) but we never thought that we could win the gold medals.

-(Maria) We were ready to compete for any other medals but the gold surprised us.

-Were you nervous?

-(Alexei) Not during the program, but in the warm up I thought Masha was nervous.

-(Maria) No, I wasn't. I trust my partner and I actually was quite calm.

-Tell us more about your professional career.

-(Alexei) I didn't become a pro at once, I've competed for Japan with a Japanese partner, but our success was very modest: we finished only 15^th at World's. Then I've been working with Tarasova at her "All Stars" Ice Theater. For example, I had the part of Prince in "Cinderella". In the second cast, though. We've often been in tours in Great Britain and I never had time to compete. Now, I'm sure that year I've spent at the theater helped me a lot. Professionals must not only show the jumps but also open their soul.

-Masha, was it hard when Sikharulidze left you two years ago?

- (Maria) He didn't actually leave me. It was our mutual decision not to skate together anymore. However, Anton didn't keep his word, he left before "A hundred years on ice" competition where we were supposed to participate. That was a really disappointing...

-Berezhnaya and Sikharulidze have risen very fast, one victory after another and you couldn't even get to the Europeans. How did it make you feel?

-(Maria) I never envied him. Of course, I was worried that I was, sort of, running on the same place and there was no changes in my career, but I've been training and training and look, it worked!