Maria Paseka was on MatchTV this week in a feature about the athlete-coach relationship. She talked about training with Marina Ulyankina, the coach she’s been working with since 14 years old:
“At first, it was a bit hard because unfortunately I wasn’t taught how to work by my first coach. We didn’t really work because there were too many kids in the group and they couldn’t pay close attention to us. And I’ve been on a very long journey, I left artistic gymnastics completely [at one point], I didn’t want to train. And when I came back, I found my current coach, Marina Gennadyevna. And she was the one who instilled in me that I need to work hard if I want to achieve anything in the sport”.
Paseka said that she needed boundaries in her relationship with her coach and even asked Ulyankina to be stricter:
“My coach once told me: I’m like a mom to you. Well, at first I accepted it, I thought she was like a mom, but then I realized that it was hard for me, I needed a firm hand because I’m such a person that when I’m tired I need someone to push me. And I asked Marina Gennadyevna: let’s not, I won’t be like your daughter, let’s be like a coach and an athlete”.
Paseka also talked about wanting to compete the Cheng vault while her coach had doubts. She ended up training the vault secretly with the vault coach and then persuading Ulyankina to let her compete it:
“Well, my coach always worries about me a lot because I had back problems. But I understood that I was confident and that I could do it and our vault specialist, Artem Igorevich, also gave me this confidence, so we started training this vault in secret. And then I told Marina Gennadyevna that I could do it, she only needed to trust me. She gave me a condition:” I’ll give you a week, and if you show me this vault, then I’ll let you, you’ll compete it”. And in a week I showed it to her”.
Support Gymnovosti on Patreon from only $1 a month and help us bring to you even more awesome gymnastics coverage!
