Athletics – New Zealand – News – From Siberia to the Shore

For 17 years Russian-born former international sprinter Elena Vinogradova has been coaching a conveyor belt of some of New Zealand's most talented athletes out of the North Harbour Bays Athletics Club on Auckland's North Shore. Steve Landells charts her fascinating journey.

To understand a little more about Elena Vinogradova (pictured above with Olympian Sarah Cowley) we need to step back in time approximately 40 years.

It is a typical late winter afternoon in her home city of Novosibirsk – located in the very heart of Russia (the then former Soviet Union) – and the gifted young sprinter is on her way to training.

Yet this was no straight-forward 10-minute commute by car. No, this journey was to prove far more demanding.

“I used to climb huge hills of snow for ten minutes before I had to wait 40 minutes for the bus to arrive in temperatures of -25c,” explains Elena from the comfort of the AUT Millennium cafe bar on Auckland's North Shore. “Then when the bus finally arrived it was often packed with people and room for only three people at the bus stop to climb aboard. It used to be a competition to get in line. Then once I was on the bus, I faced a 30-minute ride to train at an indoor stadium, which wasn't really an indoor stadium but simply somewhere to train with a few pieces of rubber laid down. I would then face the same journey back home in the dark. That was my life. I think this upbringing really formed my personality and resilience towards not only athletics but everything in life.”

Elena Vinogradova was born to run. Her father, Vladislav, was a former Soviet 100m champion and international in the early 60s and her mother a national level heptathlete.

Initially starting out as a long jumper, she later switched to the sprints and aged just 19 represented the Soviet Union in the 200m (second round) and 4x100m relay (sixth) at the 1983 World Championships in Helsinki.

The following year she claimed the Soviet 200m title, but was denied the chance to compete at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympic Games because of the widespread Eastern-bloc boycott.

Her distinguished international career also included a gold medal in the 4x400m at the 1990 Goodwill Games and a silver medal in that same event at that year's European Championships. One later she enjoyed her finest ever individual performance, placing eighth in the final of the 200m at the Tokyo World Championships. In Japan she also snared a silver medal behind the Jamaican quartet in the women's 4x100m.

The following year she was hopeful of making her Olympic bow at the Barcelona Games, when injury struck.

“I was in the best shape of my life in 1992,” explains Elena, a 22.80 200m runner (a performance 0.10 faster than the New Zealand record). “Unfortunately, I wanted to run too fast, too soon. I overloaded (on training) and got injured early in the season.”

She took time out from the sport, gave birth to her son, Nikolai – now aged 21 and living in Auckland – and although she returned to “some reasonable success” she formally retired competitively in 1997.

By way of a celebration she took a holiday with her husband to visit his sister who had relocated from Russia to live in Auckland. The trip was to change the entire path of her life.

“Through competing I had travelled to more than 50 countries and I was very lucky to have experienced that,” she explains. “I had never had a desire to live in any of these countries, yet as soon as I arrived here I instantly felt like I was at home. I can't explain why, but it felt so good. Then things slowly started to happen to me without even trying. It was like everything was going my way, so I went with the flow.”

Having dabbled in coaching in her native Russia, Elena was offered a salaried coaching position with NorthSport Academy to work out of the North Harbour Bays Athletics Club and she has remained in New Zealand ever since.
Emerging out of the technically admired Soviet system and having been guided for much of her career by the current Russian national head coach Valentin Maslakov her athletics knowledge-base was strong.

Nonetheless, she admits life in New Zealand was very different to what she had experienced in Russia.

“I loved New Zealand from the moment I arrived, but back then (in 1997) there was no high performance structure,” explains Elena, who learned English at school. “Yet I quickly realised training conditions in New Zealand are like a dream to the extent I felt disappointed I had retired (from competing). It was only a 5-10 minute drive to be able to train on hills, down at the beach or the track. The food over here was amazing compared to what I had been used to in Russia and the opportunity to sustain your health while training was second to none. If you wanted to aid recovery you just needed to jump in the sea. That is why the absence of structure did not bother me, so I decided to run a high performance sport structure within my squad.”

Elena enjoyed rapid success. She helped New Zealand 100m record holder Gus Nketia return to 10.3 shape after serious injury. She guided Jane Arnott (400m) and Jenny Dryburgh (pole vault) to the 2001 World Championships in Edmonton.

Yet she recalls having to overcome the occasional cultural hurdle in those early days.

“All coaching in Russia is built on honesty of feedback,” she explains. “Yet when I first arrived in New Zealand and I told some athletes I didn't like something I was surprised to learn some people had taken it personally. I thought, I am not criticising you, but your running and jumping technique. I had a couple of meetings to aid a mediation process between me and the athlete. I'm glad to say that over time, I've coached myself to communicate the truth in a kinder, more positive way.”

Quickly realising the luxury of coaching a large group of athletes in one specialist event in New Zealand is very difficult because of the lack of depth she has coached sprints, hurdles, horizontal and vertical jumps and many of the throws. No athletics challenge appears beyond her.

Elena guided Brent Newdick to Commonwealth silver in the decathlon and Melina Hamilton to the 2004 Athens Olympics in pole vault. Yet one of her proudest ever coaching achievements was guiding Sarah Cowley to the 2012 Olympics in heptathlon and 2014 Commonwealth Games in high jump.

“Sarah got very close to maximising her talent,” she explains. “I was very proud of her because of the relative percentage of what she achieved.”

Today boasting an eight-strong training group which includes 2014 Commonwealth Games decathlete Scott McLaren, and the Wyatt brothers, Matthew and Phillip, the New Zealand long and triple jump champions, respectively, making her coaching mark on the horizontal jumps which remains her primary current ambition.

Delighted at the development of the High Performance structure in New Zealand in more recent times, Elena, married to Englishman Ludlow Brown, would like to see a future plyometric preparatory programme in place for the 10-12 age group to aid New Zealand's future sprinter/jumpers.

Yet in what areas does Elena believe she excels as a coach?

“Technically, I think I'm strong,” she adds after a lengthy pause. “I believe I have a good eye and can correct bio-mechanic faults. Another good strength is my planning process from my knowledge of periodisation. I am pretty confident that my athletes will be in peak shape when they need be.”

Having celebrated her 50th birthday earlier this year, she still has plenty of ambitions and has not ruled out a crack at one day coaching a leading New Zealand 800m athlete.

But besides her enduring passion for coaching, it is time to address another major love of her life – New Zealand. So why does the Siberian enjoy life so much in her adopted homeland?

“I really like the fact New Zealand has a small population because this make relationships between people very important,” she explains. “The culture is to be friendly, positive and good-mannered because everyone knows each other. If you go for a walk on the beach, everyone says hello. I still really enjoy that because it instantly lifts the spirits.

I remember on a recent visit to Moscow, I was sitting in a traffic jam for three hours on the way to Moscow Airport. It was only at the end of the taxi ride when the driver first spoke to say, 'you must be living overseas.' I replied, 'how did you guess? And he said, 'because you are so relaxed and positive.' That's how living in New Zealand makes me feel – relaxed, positive and happy.”

Author: Athletics NZ  

Athletics – New Zealand – News