Aleksey Ulanov is an amazing Soviet figure skater and a man who put the fulfillment of his dreams above ambition.
Childhood
Lesha Ulanov was born in Moscow in 1947. He started skating for the first time at the age of seven. Trainings were held at the stadium of Young Pioneers. He immediately fell in love with figure skating for its high beauty, for the ability to perform classical ballet steps on ice. Then the fashion for skating was set by the magnificent L. Belousova and O. Protopopov, two-time Olympic champions. These were real artists on the ice, on which the young Alexey Ulanov sought to equal himself in artistry and expressiveness. But life judged otherwise. At first he skated alone, then in a pair with his sister, and then a handsome, artistic eighteen-year-old boy was looked after by S. Zhuk and put him in a pair with a young Ira Rodnina, who was only sixteen years old. It happened way back in 1966.
First victories
Already seven months later, the couple took part in the Moscow Skates tournament. Next year 1968they took first place. And soon they were taken to the USSR national team. 1969 brought victory.
It was truly a triumph - first place at the European Championship and the World Championship! But back in 1968, Alexei Ulanov began to wonder if a partner was right for him. She fully shared the views of an innovative coach who destroyed all traditions and invented more and more new, more and more complex, almost acrobatic elements. S. Zhuk in his search moved further and further away from classical pair skating. The coach tried to fill the skating with elements of unthinkable complexity. A. Ulanov thought of it differently, in the tradition of ballet, high art. He was impressed by the skating style of Lyudmila Smirnova from Leningrad. But the skater refused to pair with him, and he continued to work with Rodnina. In 1972, they became the first at the Olympic Games in Sapporo. But this was their last performance together.
Marriage
In the same place, at the Olympics, Alexey Ulanov again approached Lyudmila, and she agreed to become not only a partner, but also a legal wife. In Sapporo they bought wedding rings. Arriving from Japan on February 15, the champion did not hesitate and went to Leningrad the very next day.
There he was immediately married with his beloved, and already by plane the young people returned to Moscow. So intertwined for many years love and sport. They went to Canada for the World Cup already as a married couple, where they received silver medals, losing first place to Rodnina and Zaitsev. This new couple that was opposedthe entire Figure Skating Federation, was able to show their abilities for only two years. In 1974 they had to leave the sport.
Ice ballet
For fifteen years they have successfully worked as soloists of the Leningrad Ballet on Ice.
At that time they had a son, Kolya, and a daughter, Irishka. Ulanov Alexei Nikolaevich spent all his time traveling on tour. He could not deal with children to the full extent, as he wanted. Mom and dad raised skaters out of them. In general, the personal life of Alexei Ulanov developed successfully.
However, after the collapse of the country in 1990, the family moved to America. Now they all worked together in Holiday on Ice. For four years they performed in this revue. And after that, Lyudmila Stanislavovna and Alexei Nikolaevich became coaches. After twenty-one years of marriage, they divorced and went their separate ways. In 1997, Lyudmila returned to Russia with her daughter Irina. Initially, she worked as a coach, and then as the director of the Nadezhda figure skating school. Daughter Irina did not show great success in sports and moved to the ice, long familiar Disney on Ice revue, where she skated new programs for six years. For ten years, the son of Smirnova and Ulanov, Nikolai, worked on ice in the above-mentioned ballets. The children helped their mother to set up her own enterprise - the Dynasty Figure Skating School in St. Petersburg.
Return
Aleksey Ulanov spent twenty years in the USA. The figure skater returned to his homeland in 2010. He wantedto pass on his rich experience in ballet to his children - daughter and son. The elderly coach believes that the era of Rodnina is leaving, a new time is coming. He sees the future of figure skating in something else - as in his youth, in the unfading classical ballet. Figure skater Alexei Ulanov, whose biography is inextricably linked with figure skating, has been teaching kids the right training for the last fifteen years from the age of three or four. He developed his own technique and came to pass it on to Nikolai and Irina.
Opinion on the further development of figure skating
In the photo, Alexey Ulanov is surrounded by children who train with his ex-wife.
Children cling to an experienced mentor. He believes that FC should have a system of education similar to classical ballet. The best children from choreographic schools on ice should be brought up by the most worthy coaches. Such schools in our country, as elsewhere in the world, should be private and maintained at the expense of parents. This very Western approach is unlikely to bring in new talent in the near future, as Russian parents are not in the best of times. According to Ulanov, modern judges should be objective in all respects. They cannot be guided only by the readings of the computer, which unmistakably shows the technical achievements of athletes. Also at the highest level, they should have insight into the music and choreography when building a certain image.
How and where Alexei Ulanov lives now
At seventy, this is verycheerful and happy person. He lives in the suburbs, still skating, teaching the basics of figure skating to his pupils, and fiddling with his infant son.
So everything could turn out happily, because A. Ulanov never smoked, never drank, trained a lot, enduring up to ten performances a week. As a reward at sixty-nine, he became a father who enjoys spending a lot of time with his baby.
Interesting facts
A. Ulanov's family was musical. He plays the violin, sings, graduated from college with him. Gnesins in the accordion class. 10 years of life were devoted in parallel with FC to music. At the time of the meeting with Rodnina, he was already a professional musician, which his mother strongly dreamed of. This is also a certified professional choreographer who looks at FC through the prism of ballet with completely different eyes. His goal has always been to create real art, not to chase grades.
