At the end of last year, Artur Dalaloyan gave a long interview to Dynamo, the official magazine of his sports club. Among many interesting things, he revealed that he was a backup dancer at Junior Eurovision in 2007, he writes poetry and likes watching romantic movies.
Q: After your victory, everyone wanted to interview you. Are you tired of this attention or, on the contrary, enjoy it?
A: I’m very tired. At first, it was interesting, lots of questions on all sorts of topics, but by now I’m already tired of all that and I soon will step into the shadows and stop giving interviews. I’ll focus on the training and will have proper rest in my spare time.
Q: Are you afraid that the fame will get into your head?
A: No, I’m not afraid of that at all. I understand that this attention will pass quickly, it’s temporary, while I have specific goals and tasks.
Q: Who decides which newspapers you should give an interview to and in which TV shows you should participate?
A: No one. After the competition, journalists meet us in the mixed zone and we answer their questions. Regarding interviews, if people contact me, I talk to them. No one tells me what to do, no one advises who to talk to and who not to talk to.
Q: You looked quite comfortable on Evening Urgant. Did you talk to Ivan before the show and rehearsed some things or it was pure improvisation?
A: We didn’t rehearse anything and I was actually very anxious before the show – it’s Channel One, the show that the whole country is watching. I was told that I should be relaxed, not to tell about the meaning of life or the specifics of training certain elements, I just needed to relax and talk to Vanya in a joking manner. Which is what I tried to do, even though I was still nervous at times and my voice was even shaking.
Q: We didn’t notice. And how did you feel being alongside Ivan? He’s so tall.
A: Calm. We were sitting down and were at the same level, I think the guest couch is taller than his chair. But when we met in the dressing room, I realized that he’s really tall. But I’m used to it, all the people around me, excluding the gymnasts, are usually two-three heads taller.
Q: It was really nice to watch Fetisov’s talk show on the “Zvezda” channel. Except for Nemov, the rest of the guests belonged to Dynamo club – Ivanova, Kryukov, Garibov. What does belonging to Dynamo mean to you?
A: It’s my home club, I grew up here and I’m incredibly grateful to the people who raised me and taught me and still take care of me. To tell you frankly, there are many offers, people ask me to compete for other clubs, but Dynamo is my family, I can’t imagine leaving the family.
Q: Where did you start doing gymnastics?
A: In Novosibirsk, at a local children center. I took classes in pottery, judo and artistic gymnastics. This was where my parents were told that I had a natural talent for gymnastics and needed to train seriously. After that, I was brought to a specialized artistic gymnastics gym. I trained there for half a year and then we moved to Moscow from Novosibirsk. My aunt, Tatyana Kaushnyan, said that Dynamo had a great gym, the best in the country.
Q: How did she know that?
A: She used to play field hockey.
Q: Did you start training back in Petrovskiy Park gym?
A: Not just started, most of my life was spent there. Gymnasts shared the building with hockey players, I remember how we walked to school through the park and there were players from the hockey team in our class.
Q: Did you live in the neighborhood?
A: My mom, brother and I actually lived in Podolsk – my father left by that time. But I spent all the time at Dynamo. The gym was truly gorgeous, it was large, with all sorts of safety equipment, with foam pits that are really needed for working with kids. The mats won’t help if you fall really hard, the coach had to spot kids at all times, but if there’s a foam pit, gymnasts are not afraid to fall, can calmly work on new elements and improve. The gym in Olympiyskiy where we train now can’t even be compared to that. But soon we won’t have even that, in 2019, Olympiyskiy will be closed for renovations. I hope the club president Andrey Georgiyevich and the club will be able to find a new place where we can move.
Q: Do you still train at the Dynamo gym?
A: Of course. We have training camps at Round Lake every month but they last 2-3 weeks. The rest of the time, we need to train at home.
Q: Where were you taught to point your toes – in Novosibirsk or Moscow?
A: In Moscow. We had a choreographer Olga Vladimirovna; every Thursday, we learned to point our toes, do splits – we worked on the artistry, in general. I’ve always been good at it, I was the best in the group, the rest of the guys did not like choreography classes very much. But I liked them because I got praised. And I was willing to do anything to hear how good a job I did and how great I was.
Q: So, you’re the kind of person who needs a carrot, not a whip?
A: Yeah, probably. Although sometimes, I need people to be stricter with me, I don’t have an easy character.
Q: When you got to Dynamo, did you start training with Alexander Kalinin right away?
A: I was put into his group on the very first day.
Q: You’ve been together for many years. Were there any serious disagreements?
A: There were disagreements and at some point, I even switched coaches.
Q: Why?
A: Ideally, your coach needs not only to work with you in the gym but also represent you when communicating with the head coaches, especially when you get invited to the national team camp – to prove your worth for the team. Alexander Vladimirovich is not like that, he’s reserved, modest, he doesn’t know how to insist on something or pressure someone. I decided to find a coach capable of doing that. I found him. But it turned out that we didn’t have a good relationship in the gym, I realized that I needed Kalinin who tolerates all my outbursts and knows how to make me do a certain exercise during a difficult time.
Q: How did Alexander Vladimirovich take you back?
A: Calmly, without reproach. And he never reminded me of the time I left him. We just turned over a new leaf.
Q: At what moment did you realize that gymnastics was your career, that it was where you could realize your potential?
A: I didn’t have such a moment because there was just nothing else. From the first junior gymnastics level, from the first competition, from the first success, I knew that I was in the right place. There was no question whether it was for me or not. Even compared to school, gymnastics was more important. Even though children are taught that studies are the most important thing while the rest, including sports, is secondary. For me, what happened in the gym was always more important.
Q: What do you consider your first success at competitions?
A: My victory in the all-around at the Russian Championships among the First-class level [one level below elite in the Russian classification]. I was about 12 or 13. Because of that victory, I was invited to the junior national team training camp.
Q: Where the head coach at the time was Nikolai Kryukov whose success you’ve just repeated. Do you remember how his coaching was?
A: It was general coaching, not directed at just me. Under his guidance, we learned or perfected many elements, there was a lot of work on conditioning, too. He gave us advice about competitions, how to keep it together, how to stay calm.
Q: And what was his tip on how to stay calm?
A: To work with your mental state, to be able to distinguish between serious things and small stuff, not to focus on worries, not to pay attention to external factors.
Q: The gymnastics national team is quite close and cheerful. Do you also stay in touch outside the sport?
A: Yes. Less with the guys from other cities, of course, but all the time with those who are in Moscow. We go to the seaside together, to recovery training camps. There are no fights on the team, we are very close. I think that when there’s team spirit, there’s no envy or jealousy, it’s the most important thing.
Q: Do you party together?
A: Party? We’ve long forgotten what that is. I meet up with Nikita Nagornyy and Dima Lankin and have dinner at a good restaurant together, just to eat good food.
Q: What about the girls on the national team?
A: We’re not as close with the girls, they have their own circle.
Q: Were you able to watch their competition at the World Championships?
A: Yes, that’s the rule: at any competition, we go to cheer on them, to support them.
Q: Who’s the leader of the team, who makes everyone laugh, jokes and lifts the team spirit?
A: Definitely Nikita Nagornyy. He’s such a chatterbox, funny guy, the life of the party.
Q: Some coaches say that there’s no place for jokes during training, that laughing relaxes you while gymnasts need utmost focus.
A: They’re exaggerating it. During training, we find time to talk and to joke. The focus is mostly important when performing the elements.
Q: Perhaps that’s because you’re adults already and all the elements are perfected to automaticity?
A: Maybe. I remember that during childhood, I behaved differently in training, I was more serious. But now the practices are more relaxed, we’ve been doing some things for years and don’t need to figure out how to do them.
Q: To be honest, for a long time, I would confuse you with Nikita Nagornyy. Then I learned I wasn’t the only one.
A: Everyone confuses us with each other. Once, at Round Lake, this situation happened… Usually, Nikita and I go to lunch together, but on that day, he went earlier. So, I come in, order food, and the chef get surprised: “You’ve just eaten!”. I explain to him that I’ve just come from the practice and haven’t entered the canteen before, but he responds: “Why are you lying? Just say that you’re still hungry”. My face gets all red and I explain to him: “You probably confused me with Nikita”. He still wouldn’t believe me and give me lunch as if he was doing me a favor.
Q: What goals did you set for yourself when you went to the World Championships? How many medals? On what events?
A: I rather wanted to show the maximum I was capable of. I knew that I’d done a huge amount of work and was well-prepared. I was setting myself to not be distracted by anything and to stay confident, especially on the first day when acclimating happens and you feel like everything’s lost and you lost all the readiness. I wanted to do my job easily, calmly and beautifully, which I generally did, except for the fall on bars in the team final. I just got carried away which is not how I usually am. We were competing as a team and the guys kept looking at the scores and calculating the hundredths and the thousandths. I also started looking and calculating and you shouldn’t do this. But I’ve already worked on my mistakes and I’ll try not to repeat them.
Q: Sports journalists started comparing you to Nemov. Why him? What similarity do they see?
A: Maybe, the journalists don’t know the world of artistic gymnastics and its heroes that well. After the competition, people from different countries interviewed me. Japanese journalists compared me to Uchimura, Americans to someone else. It’s all on the surface: they compare me to people they know best.
Q: And do you think that you resemble another gymnast?
A: I don’t like this idea – to be similar to someone. I can take useful qualities from one or another gymnast but, generally, I’m unique.
Q: Do you have favorite gymnasts?
A: Kohei Uchimura, the Japanese gymnast who became an all-around World Champion six times. Winning the all-around competition is the most valuable.
Q: Was the nickname King Artur invented recently, after the victories, or you’ve had it for a while?
A: It’s from the school times, everyone knows the Legend of Kind Arthur.
Q: What do you think about this nickname?
A: It’s funny. I don’t feel like a king at all.
Q: Do the rules at the World Championships allow flexibility? For example, to replace one vault with another?
A: Yes, I used to do a triple-twisting Yurchenko but did a double pike in the all-around. It’s normal. A day before the competition, gymnasts submit the vaults they are going to do. I made this decision because my wrist hurt a bit on the Yurchenko vaults, I needed to save it for the final because in the vault final I’d have to do two vaults anyway. This applies to all the events, you can adapt to the situation if, of course, you are flexible and don’t have a problem changing a routine. Some gymnasts start panicking because they’ve been practicing their routines, the order of the elements, to automaticity. But there are flexible gymnasts who don’t have trouble changing something. I hope I belong to the second category.
Q: Do you often have a plan B?
A: Any gymnast always has a plan B. But you can do it without losing in difficulty and execution or you can lose a few tenths in difficulty or have poor execution. I think I can replace one element with another without losing anything.
Q: Will you upgrade your routines for the Olympic Games or do you plan on perfecting the routines you have now?
A: I’ll definitely upgrade. The World Championships showed that we can’t yet fight for medals on high bar. It’s very sad and it was hard for me to compete in the final knowing I couldn’t show anything competitive. I don’t have difficult elements or combinations in store, so, even if I’ll do my routine cleanly, I still won’t make the top three. So, I have to upgrade, but that makes it more interesting. If everything was easy and effortless, there would be motivation, but now we have a year and a half to build a routine and get it to a high level.
Q: The head coaches said that the year 2019 is for preparation. What does it mean? You’ll still participate in championships, right?
A: If we didn’t qualify to the Olympics, we would spend the year doing the routines that are consistent and that we are confident about. And we wouldn’t be able to upgrade or to take risks anywhere because we would need to qualify. Now that we did, next year, we can try new routines in competitions and raise the difficulty.
Q: How much input a gymnast has in constructing a routine?
A: About 70%. He chooses the elements and their order and the rest is the work of the coaches.
Q: Have you ever experienced negative attitudes towards the Russian team at international competitions?
A: The European Championships in Glasgow. I can’t say that the treatment of our team was as friendly as usual there. At some point, we were even booed and that had nothing to do with the quality of our performance. We were asked to ignore it.
Q: From the outside, it seems that gymnasts from different countries support each other, that it is sort of brotherhood. Is this true?
A: That’s true, we talk to each other. In gymnastics, there are no conflicts, no setting others up.
Q: How do you communicate with WADA representatives? Do they pay more attention to our team?
A: Both at the European Championships and World Championships, there was a lot of attention to Nikita Nagornyy and me. We were the only ones to get tested. But generally, I wouldn’t say that there’s a lot of attention to us or that they visit us all the time.
Q: Let’s talk about your family a bit. Your dad is Armenian and your mom is Moldovan. Do you feel these roots?
A: I did after the World Championships. People called me from Moldova and Armenia, congratulated me, said “you’re ours”, invited me to visit. The journalists went to the village where I was born and grew up until the age of four, they visited the neighbors and talked to them.
Q: I know that you’ve never been to Armenia but have you visited Moldavia since moving?
A: I have but a very long time ago, when I was 10 or 11. I remember the village, my grandparents, all that village life, how I milked the cows and gathered eggs. I’m a country boy, after all. [laughs]
Q: Do you remember Moldovan language at all?
A: No, I don’t remember either Moldovan or Armenian. Back when father lived with us, we spoke Armenian a bit, but I have long forgotten.
Q: Have you seen your father since then?
A: He disappeared. Apparently, this happens, he’s not listed among either living or dead. We have a wonderful mom, she raised my brother and me on her own.
Q: Did she cook Armenian or Moldovan dishes at home?
A: No, it has always been Russian cuisine at home.
Q: Do you cook?
A: Not often, but when I do, it’s always tasty. I think it’s a natural ability. I feel the required proportions very well, what goes with what, sometimes I don’t even know consciously why I did something a certain way, I just know that it will be tasty.
Q: Do you have signature dishes?
A: French-style meat which you bake: a layer of potatoes, a layer of meat. I make different variations of the dish depending on whether I want to have a heavy or a light meal. I can make tasty borsch or pasta. I really like pasta with salmon and cream sauce. I make a good pilaf. So, I have sort of a menu to offer.
Q: Tell us what your brother is doing. He used to do gymnastics with you, right?
A: When I was already an elite gymnast, Garik also came to the gym. He did it for a bit but it turned out to be not for him. When you’re a kid, you’re often crying, the coach is yelling at you all the time, forcing you to do exercises despite your “I don’t want to” and “I can’t”. Not everyone can endure this. So, my brother stayed for a year and then left, he focused on his studies. He’s studying acting at a junior college right now, he has more of an artistic nature and acted in movies already. I remember how I lived with my coach for three months when mom and my brother went to Venezuela to film “To the beach” movie. Garik played the son of one of the main characters. This year, he’s graduating from junior college and will be applying to a theater institute.
Q: You have a cross tattoo. When did you get it?
A: This tattoo is personal. I can only say that I got it during a difficult period in my life when there was a lot of failures and stuff that I didn’t want to happen. I found this specific cross, read about it and put my own meaning into it. And I can say that it’s working.
Q: On your Instagram, I saw a photo on a hanging bridge in Sochi and a comment about a bungee jump but it was not clear from the post whether you jumped or not.
A: I did. And it was amazing, I think I have never experienced such adrenaline and a burst of emotions. It was something unforgettable. I really wanted to do it and there was a long way towards it. Back then I wasn’t yet earning well and the jump cost 15000 rubles, I couldn’t bring myself to spend so much money. But suddenly I realized that I shouldn’t worry about spending money. I jumped and it was worth it.
Q: Were you in Sochi with the national team or on vacation?
A: I went there for three days with my girlfriend. We spend three magical days in Sochi.
Q: Did your girlfriend jump as well?
A: No, she was afraid to. But she promised me to jump the next time.
Q: Have you ever done any other extreme sports? Water biking or skydiving?
A: No, but I had another kind of extreme adventure when two years ago, I went to Paris to spend New Year’s Eve alone.
Q: I can’t believe it. Why alone? Especially on New Year’s Eve?
A: I’ll try to explain. There are people who don’t like being on their own and don’t know how to. They’re afraid of it, they have to have company. But I sometimes want to stay alone, to think about something. At the time, I had a lot going on in my life that I needed to figure out. It was after the Voronin Cup which I won. Everything seemed great but I wanted something more, I had unrealized ambitions. And in this state of mind, I wanted to celebrate New Year’s Eve alone in Paris. I apologized to my mom that I wouldn’t spend it with the family and flew there. The trip was like a fairy-tale.
Q: I haven’t seen a single photo of you in a suit.
A: Like a classic one with a tie? Of course, I don’t have such photos. I don’t wear ties at all. But, sometimes, I can wear jeans with a shirt.
Q: That doesn’t count, I’m talking about a proper suit.
A: I think last time I wore a suit was in fifth grade. Since then, it just wasn’t for me. But now that we’re talking about it, I think that it’s time to get a suit. I’m getting older and there can be times when I’ll need a suit.
Q: Tell me how you studied in school. Did you have favorite subjects?
A: Physical education.
Q: What about the least favorite?
A: Math. I’ve never understood it. While I didn’t like Russian Language, Biology, Literature, and other subjects much, I studied and knew them and I got praised. But with Math, no matter how I tried, I still couldn’t understand something. This started in the seventh grade when I missed a lot of classes and then just couldn’t catch up. We performed at junior Eurovision, four boys from the gym were backup dancers there. Then I made the national team and had even less time for school. So, I’m not very strong in Math.
Q: Do you study foreign languages?
A: I try studying English. I also really like Spanish. But learning languages requires time. It’s easier with English because I studied it in school and I had practice since I travel abroad a lot.
Q: Do you have favorite places abroad? You put photos of Stuttgart on your Instagram several times.
A: I really like it. I went there to compete for the local club. Germany has a Bundesliga for artistic gymnastics. It’s like football, clubs play against each other. They boost their teams with foreign gymnasts. You sign a contract and come to the meet of Stuttgart against, say, Straubenhardt. The competition rules are different from the international elite. One team puts one person on an event. The coaches decide who to put against another gymnast. If you are chosen – you have to go out and win over this gymnast. The gap in your scores will decide how many points you brought to your team.
Q: Who invited you there?
A: Valery Belenky, an ex-Soviet gymnast. He works there as a head coach and invites gymnasts from Russia. First, I competed for Frankfurt for a couple of years, then for Stuttgart for about two-three years.
Q: How useful was this experience for you?
A: It turned out to be very useful! In Bundesliga, you compete without a warm-up, it really strengthens you. Later, when you participate in competitions with a one-touch warmup, it’s much easier for you.
Q: You had a post about walks around Moscow. What places in the city are your favorite?
A: I can’t name specific places. I like Moscow as a whole, I like living here.
Q: Do you have time to visit museums, theaters, movies?
A: No, unfortunately, although I’d really like to. Last time, I saw Anna Karenina.
Q: Do you have time to watch some movies on TV or online at home?
A: Also rarely, I come home from practice late, especially when I train at Round Like. But if I have time, I watch dramas. I like Nicholas Sparks movies, romantics ones, about love, they calm you down and sort out your feelings. With such schedule as we have, with such constant pressure, you become rigid, even insensitive.
Q: That’s definitely not you, I read your poems. Do you often feel inspired to write?
A: Sometimes. I like writing – for a special occasion or for my girlfriend.
Q: What does your girlfriend say?
A: She likes it, it feels nice. Although, when I read her my poetry for the first time, she had a storm of emotions, the second time she was calmer and then she got used to it.
Q: You get used to good things fast. Tell me, where will you celebrate this New Year’s Eve?
A: in Moscow, with my family. I moved to my apartment literally a few days ago, after the renovations were finished. There was a lot of trouble, a lot of work, but now it’s all behind. And, of course, we have to celebrate New Year’s Eve here.
Photo: E. Mikhaylova, Russian Artistic Gymnastics Federation
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What a well rounded athlete and person . Hope he does well in Tokyo