NIKOLCHENKO Vlada (UKR)

I'm taking a break ...

Earlier, I shared with you about the consequences after COVID 19.
I don't want to go into all the details, but rehabilitation after an illness is not easy and takes time. I expected everything to be easier.

A hard training regimen, performance, stress, loads cannot be combined with the recovery period. I sincerely hoped and believed. But alas ... new consequences appeared ... and after consultation and advice from doctors, my family and I decided to take a break from sports.

Will I return to the stage carpet?
Time will tell ... Everything will depend on my health.
For me, gymnastics is an important part of my life ... But now it is more important to take care of my health.

I know that many fans were waiting for me in Tokyo, I am very sorry that I will not be at the Olympics. But this is life. I would like to wish good luck to all the participants of the Olympic Games and our Ukrainian team 🇺🇦

This solution was given to me quite difficult, so I hope for your support

Vlada Nikolchenko: "I am not ending my career, but I am taking a break"
by Daniil Vereitin
08 Sept 2021

The leader of the national rhythmic gymnastics team of Ukraine, after a mysterious absence from the Tokyo Olympics, announced that she was suspending her sports career. For the first time, Vlada Nikolchenko spoke frankly about her decision, about working with Irina Deryugina and about the consequences of the COVID-19 disease she had suffered - in an interview with Focus .

- When did you realize that you were not going to the Olympics?
- Five days before departure. I stopped going to the gym, realizing that I could not work. My condition, both moral and physical, was deplorable.

Vlada Nikolchenko loudly declared herself in 2019. Then the girl won three bronze medals: at the World Championships in Baku, at the European Championships and at the European Games. Possessing great looks and charm, Vlad attracted attention and became the recognized leader of the national team. It would seem that everything was going well, Ukraine had hope for medals in Tokyo. But in 2020, the Olympics were postponed because of covid, and a difficult period began in the life of Vlada Nikolchenko, which continues to this day. It got to the point that the girl, under strange circumstances, did not go to the Olympics, after which she announced a break in her career.

Focus talked with Vlada Nikolchenko about what happened in her life: about offensive defeats, about the coronavirus disease, about relationships with other gymnasts and the coach of the national team Irina Deryugina, about working as a model and returning to sports.

"I haven't watched the final of the Olympics"

- After the European Championship, I was not even put in the application, - says Vlada. - Irina Ivanovna (Deryugina - Ed.) Explained this to me by the fact that she submitted me and Vika Onoprienko to the Olympic Games. But the NOC and the Ministry of Sports, without her knowledge and consent, changed me to Christina Pogranichnaya. It's hard to talk about this topic - nothing has been explained to me yet. Why did they change me? At the 2019 World Cup, Christina and I won licenses together. But why my license was canceled, I don't know. For three weeks I trained, knowing that I was not on the list. And for me it is very important to understand what I am preparing for and where I am going.

- Have you watched the finals of the Rhythmic Gymnastics Olympics? What did you feel? Or did she choose not to torment herself?
- I didn't watch it. I came across some pieces on Instagram, because the entire Internet is teeming with: some scandals, who supported whom, who was sued, and so on. Ukraine, fortunately, was not strongly involved in this, because we were content with 9-10 places. I don't even know what to comment on. The girls are great. And I can't say that if I went, I would definitely take gold. Maybe I wouldn't have made it to the finals at all. I am very happy for the girls from Bulgaria, they are great. Their victory is really deserved, now it is the best team in the world - as far as the group program is concerned.

"In 2020 I realized that I lost the meaning of life"

- The situation before the European Championship in Kiev really looked very strange - when at the presentation of the team they said that you were not included in the application due to some "severe stress". What was it?
- I already spoke about this once when this topic was raised for the first time. Although earlier they tried to keep silent about this. We had a small conflict with Irina Ivanovna, there were certain disagreements. It often happens between a gymnast and a coach, there is nothing like that. But before the European Championship, it all went far - and, perhaps, she decided to somehow punish me or teach me a lesson, not putting me in the team. And I did not agree with that. In our conflict, no one wanted to meet halfway. I was very offended at Irina Ivanovna, and she, probably, at me. Then I was the first to apologize because she is a great woman and trainer. And still I'm younger and had to apologize.

I continued to train with the girls, the three of us worked together, and to be honest, it was tough. I just burned out morally because of an incomprehensible situation: am I speaking after all or not? I was not thinking about the result, how I better prepare, but about what to do so that I was still included in the team. If the girls calmly prepared, went to training and gave all their best, because they knew that in three days they had a start, then I was in a bad state. Then I had major stress.

- 2020 was a turning point for you. But there were also victories, for example, at the Ukrainian championship. Was the year difficult because of the results or because of your morale?
- Everything has gone wrong since the beginning of the year. Even when we were preparing for the Olympics, in February-March, the last competition took place in the Czech Republic. We arrived on March 8 and a week later they announced quarantine, after another 5 days the Deriugina Cup was canceled - and that was all. Then life is like a fog ...

Athletes live in a special rhythm: competitions, trainings, you do not have time to return to Ukraine - and you already have to fly somewhere again. In April, we were supposed to have four starts in one month. Every Wednesday you fly away and every Monday you arrive. This is such a crazy rhythm of life, I was very tired, but also blissed out. And if you sit in the same hall in Kiev, every day you see the same walls, then you start to feel sick from the monotony. It's terrible for me, so I asked for all the competitions.
And when in 2020 it all ended, it was such a turning point that the meaning of life was lost. I was deeply depressed. I didn’t understand why I’m training, I gained a lot against this background. Because there were no answers to the questions: "When will we have the next competition?" and "Why is all this now?"

In the summer we went to training camp in Uzhgorod, gradually got into shape and started training. The lockdown was partially removed, life began to improve, but 3-4 months it was hard.

"I didn't believe that I had a covid"

- This spring, you contracted the coronavirus. Do you understand where and how you got infected?
- In the room. It was not that everyone got sick en masse: it is clear that someone got sick first, it is clear that before that everyone drank from the same bottle ... In fact, it all started earlier, in 2020. We were just at the Ukrainian championship in Uzhgorod. Before that, no one was sick at all. Well, yes, covid. We wear masks, we use antiseptics - and this bypassed us. And in Uzhgorod there was just a "red zone" when we arrived at the championship. In general, they should not have allowed the holding of the championship, but we had everything without spectators and somehow the tournament was allowed to be held. One of the girls became ill and had a fever at night. She confirmed the coronavirus. At first they hid it from the whole team, then another girl fell ill, and then another.


- In a word, the domino effect has begun.
- Yes. Half of the team fell ill, we arrived in Kiev and spent 10 days in quarantine. They tried to protect those who live with their parents and families, and isolate those who are sick. Then everyone recovered, the European Championship was held, and everything was fine. But the next wave happened after the New Year, and then in March. One of the girls had a birthday on March 8th and it was terribly difficult for her to train. She felt bad, but the coaches did not understand this and told her something like "Why are you lazy? Do you want to take time off and celebrate your birthday?" The next day, her temperature rose to 40 degrees. They passed the test two days later, she confirmed the coronavirus. She got sick on Monday, and on Wednesday I start coughing very badly. I generally have bronchial asthma, but I do not use an inhaler, because it qualifies as doping. Sometimes I have allergic attacks, especially when I come into contact with dogs. Immediately I start to choke.

But at that moment I realized that this was already abnormal, I cough as if I were a smoker with 50 years of experience. And yet, I continue to train, they do not give me any descent. The next day I go to take a PCR test, although they won't let me go to it and they say that you made 500 of them and never got infected when everyone was sick ...

To be honest, I didn’t believe that I had a covid. The next day I did my first workout, and I get a positive test. They send me home quickly, although that didn't make much sense, because the girl, from whom I probably got the infection, trained for several days, and I worked with everyone with the coronavirus. And again we have a semi-quarantine, there is no one in the hall.

- How did you cope with the disease?
- I will not say that it is very difficult. I coughed, but it was expected, because the bronchi are my weak point. The temperature was no higher than 38. I had been ill, I thought it was good that there were antibodies now, I passed the test, everything is fine. But the recovery period was a nightmare. We train on the second floor, and I couldn't even climb the stairs. There was such shortness of breath that I just choked. And I still have to train, do a lot of runs, run! Send side effects to the lungs. I ran 500 meters, stopped and "died". Later I was able to run 2-3 kilometers, then 5, 7, in a word, I ran away. We have dealt with this problem.

Then I recovered very much, it is not clear why. I passed the tests - it turned out that I had a problem with the thyroid gland. This covid left traces in my body. The pills only take away the symptoms for a while. Any unwanted load causes my recovery to start over. And with such training as ours, everything is even more aggravated. It turns out that I seem to be completing the treatment, but then everything starts in a circle.

- You got sick, but managed to get in shape and go to the European Championship, where you took 13th place. Do I understand correctly that this was the last chance to qualify for the Olympics and this result left you out of participation in the Games?
- No, what kind of selection for the Olympics? Our licenses were played in 2019 at the World Championship. At this European Championship, some licenses were indeed played, but for countries that have not yet received them. Ukraine had two licenses in the individual program and one in the group, this is still from the 2019 World Cup. This was the first selection, 16 people for a personal program and 9 or 8 for a group. We went to the Olympics from the first selection. And nothing was decided at the European Championship for Ukraine.

"I often disagreed with Deryugina"

- I was told that Irina Ivanovna Deryugina has a special relationship with you. How did you meet?
- It was in 2016, when I came to Kiev to watch. My first coach left for America, but before leaving, she told me that if I want to pursue a career in artistic gymnastics, I need to leave Kharkov for the capital. Otherwise, every month I will only slow down. Dad discouraged me, he wanted to send me to study abroad. But my mother listened to me, and I said that I wanted to try myself in Kiev.
My parents expected that in a month or two I would return to Kharkov, finish my studies at school and go somewhere to enter. But I got to Deriugina at a time when preparations for the Olympics in Rio were in full swing. I saw how Anya Rizatdinova works in the hall. I watched her and caught fire from the inside, set myself a small goal that I did not tell anyone about: I argued with myself that I would also participate in the next Olympics. Unfortunately, this did not happen. But I am grateful to Irina Ivanovna and the entire Ukrainian team for the path in sports that I have passed. But it's not over yet. There may still be a lot to come.

- What happened next?
- Joint work with Irina Ivanovna has begun. In 2017, I was already in the junior team of the group exercise, and in 2018 I worked in the adult program in the individual competition. Group competitions helped me a lot, but I am definitely not a "group". I like the personal program, I have to be alone on the carpet.
Irina Ivanovna examined the potential in me and at the first world championship at the age of 15 I was already in fourth place, behind the most adult and titled gymnasts in the world! This turned the perception of everyone upside down: judges, rivals, and spectators. No one then understood how it happened? How girls who performed in Rio can lose to a 15-year-old debutante who just entered the world of sports. Gradually, we prepared further, but 2020 was a watershed year.

- I have heard more than once that training with Deryugina is like serving in the army. This is true?
- In terms of discipline, yes. 12 hours in the hall, very strict rules, prohibitions, up to external life. This system is passed down from generation to generation, I do not quite understand why this is so. In many moments I did not agree with Irina Ivanovna, but I realized that I could not go against her. You just need to accept it all. I haven’t received answers to many questions so far, and I still don’t agree with many of them. If I were the head coach, I would have acted differently. But still, no one knows 100% of Irina Ivanovna's entire work. Perhaps, in her place, I would agree with such rules and requirements.

"This is not fame, but responsibility"

- 2019 was a fruitful year for you: a bronze medal at the World Championship, a bronze medal at the European Games. You became very famous in an instant. How did you deal with this?
- I would call it not fame, but responsibility. Because when you get into adult tournaments at the age of 15 and start showing results, winning medals, a lot is expected of you. Our fans, coaches and judges are accustomed to the fact that if you took bronze, then at the next tournaments you should take silver and gold . You mustn't lower the bar. But they forget that there is a human factor, and even the most titled champions lose. Probably, they demanded of me the most. Irina Ivanovna saw tremendous potential in me, I applied for Olympic medals, but the year 2020 has changed a lot.

- I remember that you were called the leader of the Ukrainian national team then.
- Yes. This responsibility was felt very much in 2019. In the first half of the year, there were World Cups and Grand Prix, there was such an unwritten law that you don't have to return home without a medal. And I started to lose. All the phased competitions did not go very well, but further results at major tournaments were overshadowed by these minor failures. If in 2018 I did not have medals from the World and European Championships, but there were all sorts of grand prix and other commercial competitions, then in 2019 everything was the other way around. I won all the top starts, but I did not prepare well.


After a medal at the European Championship, I realized that I was going to the European Games. This is the system of the Olympics: there is a team event in Ukraine, I was in the group program, and in the personal one. And then I realized that I did not have a second number - who could insure me in case of failure. I understood that they were expecting a medal from me, and I could not let them down. The responsibility was colossal, my knees were giving way. I realized that I gave all of myself in the gym and squeezed out my maximum. In this one minute and thirty seconds, your whole life passes before your eyes , your heart beats very quickly.

But when everything works out for you, you get off the carpet, they interview you, your heart flies out of your chest ... It's worth living for such emotions. And after such moments, everything bad and difficult is forgotten, how you went to this, through tears in the hall and all the difficulties that you met on your way.

- Have you ever cried in the locker room after the competition?
- Yes, many times. At the World Cups and Grand Prix I was very upset, but I did not cry. But at the European Games I did well in the all-around program, but I made a mistake in the "tape". The last stage was exercises with the ball, and I was always "on you" with it. My hands are constantly wet, the ball rolls off somewhere, jumps out. And I understood that if I go out now and do everything right, then I will be on the podium. If I make a mistake, then that's it, I fly past the all-around and don't make it to the final with the ball. And now, the final exercise with the ball, and I could not cope with the excitement.

Later, I thought for a long time, analyzed, analyzed this moment so as not to repeat such mistakes. I really thought a lot about the medal. And at the World Championships I stepped over this, thinking not about a medal, but about my program and work in the gym. What will happen next is not important. Neither how the judges will evaluate me, nor how my competitors will perform.

But after I did not qualify for the all-around final at the European Games, I remember sitting with Irina Ivanovna and crying. She reassured me, said that nothing terrible had happened and that we would still fix everything. At such moments, the coach's support is very important for any athlete in order not to lose heart. Of the two types, in the final of which I got, I took bronze. In clubs I did not agree with the refereeing, but these are such nuances that do not depend on me.

- It is not often that you meet an athlete who honestly admits that he made mistakes somewhere.
- Probably, everyone experiences failures in different ways. Someone can analyze, as I do, but someone says to himself: "Forgotten and moved on." But how did you forget if it could happen again? It seems to me that this is very important for an athlete.

"Paris? Rather, yes!"

- Is Paris 2024 real for you?
- Of course, really. I don't know if I will recover in 2-3 months, in six months or a year. Previously, gymnasts had a maximum of five days' vacation, otherwise you will get better, get out of shape and "the world will collapse." But after the quarantine, everyone realized that you can rest in gymnastics for three months or six months, and you will still come back. Yes, it will be much harder, but everything is real. How to really lose weight by 10 kg and get in shape. It just takes more time. But if this period is really important for the athlete, then this should be done.
For Paris 2024, I would say yes rather than no. Because the Olympic cycle is shorter this time - not four years, but three. This is a big plus. I also want to watch the rules change. Every four years our rules change and not all gymnasts can adapt to them.



- You recently started learning to ride a motorcycle. Why do you need it?
- I am an extreme in life, I even want to jump with a parachute in the near future. I have such dreams. And I caught fire with a motorcycle when I was 18 years old. I got acquainted with a company that is engaged in motor sports, I wanted to try to ride it myself. Mom did not particularly support my decision, she said: "Study, drive in a circle, go around the chips, but not around the city." But my father called and said: "Hello, this is Vlad's biker? How did you go for this, it's very cool!" I was shocked by this.

In Kiev, as I already understood, it is profitable to ride a motorcycle, because you can drive through the center not in 2.5 hours, but in 15 minutes. This is a big plus. By the way, there are a lot of motorcyclists in our city, except for the couriers "Glovo" or "Rocket".

- You have an Instagram page - how often do guys direct to you? And what was the dumbest tackle?
- Oh, well, the stupidest thing that they wrote is immediately: "Marry me." Someone sends "lights" to history, but here they write this to you. You sit, read, and think: "Yes, I have already fled." I don't know what people think about when they write this. In general, I try to develop my Instagram, write myself and come up with themes for posts - my imagination works well. There is also a girl, an SMM manager, who helps me. A lot of messages come in direct. When we started to cooperate, I had about 600 requests in the direct - despite the fact that I answered someone. There were good proposals for both advertising and cooperation. And I simply did not see these messages. Therefore, I attracted a specialist.
The second reason for our collaboration is content. I am an athlete blogger and follow many popular bloggers. Most of them stay away from sports. But, for example, there is Anya Rizatdinova - I follow her, is signed up, and I like the way she maintains her blog. I want something similar, but at the same time, something of my own. I have a very diverse audience: kids, gymnasts, fans. Ukrainians, Russians, foreigners ... That is, you need to keep an account in English as well.


- Your profile says that you are a model. Do you do this professionally?
- Yes, there are a lot of proposals for filming - write modeling agencies. I really like this area and I am interested in such projects, especially now that I have free time. Previously, I was offered, for example, to fly to a show in Milan, or agencies that send models to Europe and the USA approached me - I refused. Because - what is America if I train every day, 6-7 times a week. And now it has become possible, I am open to cooperation.

- Vlada, on July 30 you announced a pause in your sports career. What are you doing now?
- You can say that I enjoy life. The main reason I decided to take a break is my health. After being ill with covid, complications began, everything dragged on and sometimes I feel better, sometimes worse. I was diligently preparing for the Olympic Games and, roughly speaking, scored on my own health. I knew that I had a gym and a main goal - and everything else would somehow work out by itself. I still feel the consequences of this approach. It so happened that I didn't get to the Olympics, and you can't get your health back.

Now I spend time with my family, recently I flew on a long-awaited vacation. I study - earlier training had a priority over the university (Vlada studies at the Institute of Physical Education - Ed.). We are all in the training hall for 12 hours, it’s hard to pull on some kind of training program, you don’t have time to pass tests and exams ... All three summer months we had to close our training questions, because in the spring there was preparation for the European Championship, they didn’t let us go. And it seems that it should be easier online, but this makes you even more lost ...

Now I want to devote more time to the university. And in general I am thinking about getting a second education. I do not end my career, but I pause, because I need to solve the accumulated problems. And then, if I feel that rhythmic gymnastics is so much mine that I cannot live without it, then I will return.

"I had a psychological breakdown... With evert conflict, even byond, stress arises due to war in my country and comes out of me without my permissione in such an aggressive form. It was a situational emotion that I regret, I didn't want to offend anyone. Please don't take this personally. It was not me who said this, but emotions in me. Sorry."