Plushchenko, Yevgeny

▪ 2005

      Even though Yevgeny Plushchenko was performing with an injured knee and was facing a number of strong opponents, he dominated the three programs of the 2004 world ice-skating championships and won his third title—his second consecutive—with a dazzling free skate marred only by a fall caused by his skate blade's encounter with a sequin on the ice. Before that, however, he had thrilled the audience and earned high marks from the judges, including four perfect 6.0s, with a program that included two quadruple jumps—one of them as part of his trademark quad toe loop–triple toe loop–double loop combination—and the first triple Axel–half loop–triple flip combination landed cleanly in competition, as well as complex straight-line footwork.

      Yevgeny Viktorovich Plushchenko was born on Nov. 3, 1982, in Solnechny, Khabarovsk kray, U.S.S.R., and moved with his family to Volgograd when he was a young boy. He began skating at the age of four after family friends gave him a pair of skates they no longer wanted. It soon became apparent that Plushchenko had a real talent for skating, and he progressed rapidly. In 1993, however, the skating school where he was training closed because, as an aftereffect of the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, the government could no longer support it. His mother took him to St. Petersburg, where he began working with skating coach Aleksey Mishin at the St. Petersburg Figure Skating School. He was already able to perform the triple jumps roughly, and by the time he was 12, he had perfected them. At 14 he landed a quad for the first time. He also added the difficult Biellmann spin to his repertoire of moves, one of the few men to perform it. Plushchenko began competing in 1996 and within a year had won the world junior championships. He then moved into the senior ranks, taking a silver medal at the European championships and a bronze at worlds in 1998 and the silver at worlds the following year. In 2000 he could manage only fourth place at worlds, but he came back in 2001 to win his first world championship gold. Plushchenko took silver at the 2002 Winter Olympics, but injuries kept him out of worlds. Later that year, however, at the Cup of Russia competition, he entered the record books once again—this time with the first quad toe–triple toe–triple loop combination landed cleanly in competition—and in 2003 he regained his world championship title.

      Plushchenko had entered the 2004 world championships with a number one ranking, and he maintained that position as the 2004–05 season began. In October he commemorated his 10 years of working with Mishin by performing in an exhibition program in St. Petersburg. He dedicated his performances to the victims of the terrorist attack on a school in Beslan, and a portion of the show's proceeds was channeled to the victims' families.

Barbara Whitney

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