????By Michael de Waal-Montgomery ????montymike@gmail.com ? “China has good potential in ice skating. There are more and more ice rinks all over the country, whereas before it was mainly in the north. Now it’s spreading. I’m sure with time there will be even more skaters in China.” — Denis Petrov, a former Olympic figure skating medalist who is now living and coaching in Shenzhen ? ? ????DENIS PETROV and his Chinese wife Chen Lu, both former Olympic figure skating medalists, are living and coaching in Shenzhen and promoting a new wave of the sport among local children. ????Petrov is a 45-year-old from St. Petersburg, Russia, and a 1992 Olympic silver medalist. He retired from professional skating in 2002 to pursue coaching full-time and began coaching young Shenzhen athletes in 2005 at World Ice Arena in Luohu District, where Chen is a manager and fellow coach. Chen won one bronze medal each in the 1994 and 1998 Winter Olympics, and was the world champion in 1995. ????New model ????Chen said that in China, traditionally, if a child wanted to pursue ice skating to a professional level, they would have to leave their family to train full-time at an ice skating school, likely in Harbin or Beijing. ????But that’s beginning to change, largely thanks to Petrov and Chen. ????“You love the sport, great, but you don’t have to give up your life for it,” Chen said. ????Petrov said that by offering professional coaching in a casual environment like World Ice Arena, children and teenagers can still lead normal lives and attend local schools, deciding for themselves how much time they want to allocate to skating each week. ????This is starting a new trend in China, with Petrov and Chen helping lead the way. It’s also proving to be a lucrative business model that many others are attempting, and in some cases failing, to imitate, according to Petrov. ????“Kids love it. A lot of kids stay here all day long. After school they stay here all evening, do their homework here, play here,” Petrov said. “China has good potential in ice skating. There are more and more ice rinks all over the country, whereas before it was mainly in the north. Now it’s spreading. I’m sure with time there will be even more skaters in China.” ????Petrov said there are currently only a few ice rinks in Shenzhen, but he believes it’s possible that a future Chinese or even world champion could come from the south — perhaps even from a city such as Shenzhen. ????Coaching experiences ????Petrov said producing a champion requires a perfect combination of many different variables coming together in harmony. It’s impossible to predict, and there is no exact science. ????“As with all sports, you never know. You might teach all your life and you will never get that student who will understand you and you will understand them. It depends on a lot — the parents, the student, the coach, and how they work together. You can invite the best coach to train the best student, but together they might never develop anything,” he said. ????Petrov praised the young athletes he coaches in Shenzhen. ????“Even when I worked in the United States, I had some students from China, and I found they were all strong workers,” he said, adding that despite a new generation of wealthy children in China — a product of the country’s burgeoning middle-class — they still have within them a real desire to achieve and do better. ????“I’m sure many of the kids here haven’t been pushed into skating by their parents. They want to do it, they want to skate. That’s what I feel here. Whereas in the United States, you could see that it was often the parents pushing them,” he said. ????Petrov coached in the United States for several years before moving to China. ????He said the thinking process is an important part of ice skating, and youngsters who are serious about the sport need to dedicate time to studying it outside the rink as well as inside. ????“I remember when I watched ice skating competitions, I was always interested in ‘why.’ Why they did this, why they did that. Figure skating is quite an intelligent sport, it’s not only about muscles and strength,” he said. ????Petrov dismissed the stereotype of Chinese children lacking creative thinking and imagination, as they are sometimes portrayed in the West. He said some of his students have choreographed skating sequences that left him very impressed, showing a definite flair for creativity and individual thinking on par with their Western peers. ????Othniel Chan, 19, a Chinese-American from Chicago, Illinois, is one of Petrov’s most accomplished local students at World Ice Arena, and has been training with him since 2005. Chan has competed in the United States and plans to compete in China in the future. ????“Denis is very easy to work with and pushes me enough [in training]. He’s a really nice guy,” Chan said. “It’s important that you enjoy skating because if you’re forcing yourself you won’t get the same out of it.” ????Happy family ????Chen said the family’s home life is very good. ????“Denis is a very nice person and a great father,” she said, adding that although it was easy working together, with a son and daughter who are 7 and 4, respectively, there also are challenges. ????“We always balance our time. If I have to work late, he goes home to take care of the kids. We take turns,” she said. ????As a former Olympic medalist, Petrov has a lot of demand for private coaching. But he only teaches a handful of students on an individual basis, despite World Ice Arena’s growing popularity and a membership that has swollen to nearly 40,000. ????Five 30-minute sessions with Petrov costs 2,100 yuan (US$340) — assuming you make the cut, that is. ? ? | 