Fanmeeting with Deniss Vasiljevs April 2022
English transcript of the Fanmeeting with Deniss Vasiljevs in Bellinzona on April 15th 2022
Text Judith Dombrowski, photos by Judith Dombrowski and Wilma Alberti (c)
(Please note: this should be a transcript that is as close as possible to the conversation we had with Deniss. This is why I tried to keep it as original as possible, even though there are repetitions here and there. The only changes I made was transferring some spoken sentences into better readable sentences where it was really necessary. I hope you all enjoy it.)
We met in a very nice and cosy atmosphere in the castle garden of Castelgrande, the symbol of the city of Bellinzona. The sun was shining, we had around 20 degrees, the first show of Music on Ice had been a full success, so Deniss, his manager Chris, who accompanied him and the fans who had gathered this bright Friday morning where in a very good and relaxed mood.
After he had chosen to sit in the sun we had a very nice chat with Deniss.
Judith: Thanks so much, Deniss, for coming. We want to congratulate you on the amazing season you had, all your hard work definitely paid off. Looking back on it yourself - what was your own personal highlight?
Deniss: That’s already a really difficult question. I would say I felt really free during the Olympics, specifically during my Free Skate. That moment when you are really tense, have that big desire to do something, but there is still something that blocks you and at some point that blockade sets free: you are able to skate for yourself, your own satisfaction. I had this free spirited feeling. You have this flow but at the same time you’re fully conscious and your experiencing something rather than constantly judging yourself from the silent feedback like: oh, this was good, this was bad, there was no judging of the action. You just purely have fun and that’s what happened during my Free Skate at the Olympics.
Judith: Yes, I can relate to that free and happy feeling. I guess many of us would have thought you will mention winning the bronze medal at Euros but I can really understand what you’re saying.
Deniss: I have to say I really enjoyed the thought of winning the medal. But, I was just about to hopp into the bus, to go peacefully back to the hotel when Chris told me: “Buddy, you have to put a costume on!“ To me the fact that my parents were there and in general the fact that it was really a warm atmosphere all around in the arena was a great experience. I had skated with pleasure, with passion. The performance was bright and strong and emotionally touching and to me that’s overall more important than the realization afterwards that you achieved something. I wouldn’t say I really worked for the medal I rather worked for this confidence when you go for it and when you can let go of these desirable thoughts because I had quite a streak of performances that were kind of clean. When you know you can do it effortlessly then it gets even harder because you know you haven’t failed before. Before you could say: okay, well I didn’t do it before so if I will not do it, it just suits the statistics. And the further you go and maintain the streak, the harder it becomes as you expect that you will do the same or better. You work and you improve and it becomes easier and easier and sometimes when it’s too easy you still have to put some effort because you are still in competition and you are willing to be the best. And then you start to intervene into your own preparation, to your own work and you put more than necessary. And that can go sidewards, so really managing yourself is the hardest part about competition. If you are too tired in the competition, you are somehow too stressed, then you can’t manage it. Usually training kicks in, but when you are fully ready, even with the training and you go in there with this conscious mind that is full of wish, it usually goes against the productivity.
Judith: So, this is your fourth time in Bellinzona for Music on Ice already…
Deniss: Yes, and every time I was coming here, there is great weather and now for the first time it’s actually much warmer. (The previous seasons the show had been held in January.)
Judith: What else do you connect with this place, maybe you can share some nice memories..?
Deniss: Usually this event is right before Europeans so you’re already a bit on the needles and you try to fit your Short Program into this really restricted space on the ice and if something doesn’t work you will find excuses like: awww, it’s too small ice or something else is wrong. And you have to manage yourself and go through and there is also not really space to warm up, so you run outside and it’s too cold. So you constantly keep self-talking and trying to find a solution to justify that something doesn’t work and this time, after the season, I feel much more relaxed about everything. I know my season is done and I am in a great shape, so I feel much, much better. A little bit more bold in the approach and I really have fun. This season I started to feel more what I do or relate more towards the image. For example yesterday I felt like it became less of an execution or following a certain choreography and more like: whatever happens. You work less on what you have to do, you work more on how you feel when you do it. That’s an interesting concept that I think I still need to study a lot. It’s something that is really different from previous years, when I was coming more with a certain desire to practice before Europeans.
So to sum it up, I really enjoy that it’s more free this year and that it’s warmer. I used to walk here a lot, particularly here in this castle, every single time I came. And when you stand around here (Deniss gestures to the castle walls all around him from where you can enjoy nice views over the city of Bellinzona) you would always feel the wind and then think: well, maybe it’s after all time to move!
Judith: Like: maybe it’s winter after all! (Everyone laughed)
Deniss: Yes. This year it’s calmer.
Judith: Maybe you can tell a little bit how you plan to re-charge during the off season.
Deniss: Well, first of all I need to finish my season, because we have a training camp right now in Champéry. It’s a really important thing and we came here pretty much straight from it.
This will be the last push, it’s going to be five more days once I return from here. And then I have a little break which I am really looking forward to especially on the planed trip to Portugal. We plan to go the Northern part this time, around Porto.
Judith: Oh, Porto, is so beautiful!
Szilvia: But also more rainy than the South of the country. Pack a rain jacket!
Deniss: Well, I won’t mind that. I would actually like to go somewhere like Scotland. I really love sunny and warm weather when I need to work. If I feel like resting I like rain and a grey sky so that I can relax, sit, think and reflect. I feel a little lack of design in my life and I would love to have actually a little less desire to go out and experience. So I would like to have a little bit more grey-time to hibernate and think.
Judith: I get the impression, that you are doing that a lot: think!
Deniss: Well, I think the biggest change lately has been that I started to first think and then act rather than act because I believe into something and then reflecting on it. I started to work less and I got better. It’s because you invest. It’s logical that you have to push yourself. But my sport is about skill. You can have a great physique and body but it’s all about precision and maintaining the same parameters. And every time you push yourself you first of all get really tired and second of all in explosive workout you need to be fresh. This season I felt like working less on the athletics and more on precision, skill and craft.
Judith: We wish you all a very great time in Portugal, and we hope you can really enjoy your well deserved holidays.
Deniss: And then I need to pass my exams for University. I will also go home to Latvia at some point and then there are the summer preparations for next season.
Judith: Good luck with all of that. You will surely do great. We have a few people here who wanted to ask a question. Anna, do you want to start?
Anna: I really loved both of the programs that you are doing here. I think they are both really special and interesting. I wanted to ask you about the choreography for it’s a sin. There are a lot of closed-in movements when you’re starting and then it gets more open and expressive. Could you talk a little bit about why there are certain elements and also the spin that has like six different positions, that’s really interesting.
Deniss: It was an idea, a research - there needs to be control, but there also needs to be this feeling of rawness and perfection and honesty. Particularly about the spin: It’s fast, it’s difficult to hold each position because the change needs to be on the music. For me it’s the first time trying something like this, and it’s something I’d like to develop, to work on it and find a way how to optimize it. So it will maybe be a feature in a future competition program. You have to try to do new things, right? Generally speaking, just the way the music goes, you kind of build up towards the final climatic moment. You put the elements in order to balance out the overall flow of what’s happening. It was a new thing, it was a try. It was mostly the work on something new, untested and more emotionally involved rather than precisely shaped.
Anna: Will you keep skating this program in the shows in Japan or other occasions in the future?
Deniss: Yes, I am going to keep skating it because I think those programs need time. I do practice a lot on my competitive things but in this kind of programs I feel more alive because I need to focus less on staying within the conscious control. I can let go and don’t care about what’s going to happen. If it will happen great - fantastic, it will feel really sincere. If you mess something up then you at least know and understand your limit. That’s something I deeply felt with this new philosophy part of working on the mood.
In the end competitions are a lot about technical aspects and they restrict you so much in the way you put emotional content into it. This kind of programs allow you to experience something new as a skater. I still need to figure out how far I can open up in order to still stay on my feet.
Anna: I am looking forward to see it growing and changing.
Deniss: It’s funny because no matter how many times I am skating a program during training it really grows on you once you experience the full stressful situation. You can’t recreate this in training. That’s why I think every program needs some exposure to be something.
Susanne: What was interesting, behind me there were a couple of teenagers, they were chatting all the time during the show. And once you skated to „It’´s a sin“ they became more and more quiet and very attentive to your program.
Deniss: That’s great.
Susanne: I actually also have a question. But first of all I want to thank you for all the great memories you created for us, not only this season but for a long time already. I still remember seeing you for the first time during Europeans in Bratislava.
Deniss: (laughs) Oh, that was when I did a dolphin.
Judith: (laughs) What? A dolphin?
Deniss: Yes, I did a dolphin during the step sequence.
everyone laughing
Susanne: My question came up when I lately watched some of your older performances. I asked myself how would Deniss skate to this piece of music now, in his adult manner. Is there any piece of music you would like to skate to again? Or similarly? Like Italian Opera or Michael Bublé? I saw you dancing a little bit when Yuma was practicing his “Smile“ program?
Deniss laughs
Susanne: Or are you looking for new challenges?
Deniss: Yes, I am certainly moving forward and every time I do something it contributes towards me, who I am as a skater. And that’s why my focus is usually on moving forward. But I do understand what you’re saying and I truly believe, if I get back to what I used to skate it would be very different. Because as I said earlier the focus is more on not to do something because it’s said to do it a certain way. For example: smile at this point, breath at this point. I rather have this raw image to feel what I’m doing. And going backwards for example to the time with Urmanov I would love to redo some of the programs, precisely to bring more of what it represented to me because at that time it was still a lot of: you have to do this, you have to do that and you have to do it like that.
Susanne: I am thinking about “Putting on the Ritz“ - it’s a great piece of music but not necessarily something for a 16 year old boy.
Deniss: Yes, but I would also choreograph it differently, in a different manner. In my current experience, when you start to do something, you start by research. You don’t start by: Oh, I like it, let’s do it. It really needs a theme, you choose the angle you see it and you are shaping it not by one single minded straight line, but you start by basically finding the way how to approach it. And once you understand what’s happening, or how you view it, you choose: okay, it will be this way or maybe I would just decide to flip it over. For example with Romeo and Juliet: I didn’t live this program, I retold the story. And that’s what brings the difference from the common approach. That’s what gives life to the program itself. At least in my mind this is the essence of doing something that many did before in your own way. Today I would wish to re-skate the Last Samurai program and change it. And well - Opera is coming - the elevator music of the „Sway“ program. I would take the first part, as I was not super happy with it and I would perhaps try to find something to incorporate it with something else that would somehow highlight that part a bit more. It was too focused. If I re-skate a program I want to feel it more. You have your elements where you have to focus and you have the breathing space. And I want to extend the breathing space, especially when the jumps become more confident. I want to stretch out the emotional aspect of it. This maybe comes with certain sacrifices but I want to feel what I do. Usually you come to competition and you feel like: what am I doing here? The point is, there is so much desire sometimes to just turn back and I am trying to find this approach because I am searching on how I will love this moment. At least that’s my start procession from before. Because competition is usually viewed like - when I was skating in Russia - it was five minutes of humiliation. The coach would say: it’s just five minutes of humiliation, then you will be fine. So I want to break this mindset and want to see it as five minutes of joy. I feel this emotional side more that energizes me, that brings me satisfaction of what I am doing and that’s what I am aiming for. And if I would be doing any program from back then it’s to put more juice or life into it rather than purely executing technical aspects. I want this feeling that I had at Worlds this year. You are fully aware, fully conscious and yet - blink - you realize you are at the end of the program by the end of the program.
When you start the season it’s like hell. When you convert all of the information into the program is really something. Even without jumps and spins, just to run the choreography it’s really taxing and slowly you build it up to the point when you skate and you just blink back and you are ready to go for another one. This process is truly amazing and something I wish to study more towards my future research plans. After I am done with university, after I am done with maybe skating itself. The biomechanics and how a body can adapt and how a mind gets stronger in order you don’t need to focus in order to do good. This is something that fascinates me and I wish to know more.
Judith: Great plans once again, it will come for sure. Simo, your question?
Simo: You have a lot going on in your life, skating, university and so many hobbies. How do you manage your life? Do you have a routine?
Deniss: Well, I do. I have to say I am very fortunate with the university because they give me a lot of space to maneuver. Honestly, I would say it’s more about commitment. If I have decided I will do something, I will find a way. Or at least I will invest myself and the way will eventually appear. You really just need to glue your butt to the chair sometimes. But honestly, I am really grateful that university gives me so much flexibility and the timing when I can approach it because, yes, I am studying something daily but I have these really compressed moments when I actually write things or do projects that really require me where I have windows when I open the documents when I write a test or something. Then by the time it’s done - it’s done. Due to that great opportunity I can choose when I feel it. Because there are days when you really outwork yourself and sometimes you just need some more sleep time.
Another thing is I really like to pre-cook my meals. For example a simple habit of planing what you will buy before you’re going to the shop. Then you go to the shop, you come back and you directly cut the things like in the restaurant. And then you have everything separated, if you want to make an omelette for example, you have your eggs, pre-cut onions, pre-cut peppers, you can directly take how much you want and it’s done. Then you need the same thing maybe for something else: it’s already there, it’s cut, you have your potatoes ready to put them into the oven. You reduce a lot of friction to start something, when it’s already half done.
I for example also like my morning porridge already done when I get up. So the last thing I usually do in the evening is to assemble everything in the already measured cup, add some water and leave it there over night and then I just need to heat it up in the morning and it’s ready.
In the end you prepare only once or twice a week and it’s there. You have certain patterns that you follow.
I love to read in the morning. That’s my time to enjoy that. When you wake up in the morning you are usually all sore and don’t want to move. That’s just the truth you want to keep like this. (Deniss imitates lying cosily in the bed - everyone laughs.) Then what you usually do, is make yourself a coffee. You would put some kind of music, radio, start doing it and you are completely autopilot. But by actually limiting the information that my brain gets by noises I can really start to focus and awaken my senses. You smell the freshly brewing coffee, the real flavor. You start to wake up your sensor to receive information and that you really, when you do your coffee, you’re already half awake. Mobilisation in the morning helps. The body and the mind are just the muscles, right? If you work out everything, your heart-rate goes up and this mindfulness practice really helps. Now I also started to do framing breathing. This is what sets you up. If you achieve victory after victory it creates this momentum I believe in. Until the state of mindfulness goes away. Because at some point I will get overwhelmed and I will switch on a TV show, lately it’s been NCIS - maybe someone here knows - and I am playing it endlessly and this is my way - if I don’t want to clean something for example, I just switch on that thing, put my headphones in and just start cleaning. And then Chris is like: Dude, you’re watching like 8 TV shows a day!
In the evening I start with my routine to finish the day. The last thing is to prepare my porridge, you brush your teeth and like this you construct more and more of a routine.
When it comes to training: It’s kind of easy to create a warm-up routine before you go on the ice but then I try to do something after the ice. But it’s not always so easy to push yourself to do anything. So I try to put the stretching, mobilization, releasing pressure into my evening routine. Those things that make you feel recovering, I feel they had helped me more to be willing to start something. That’s maybe the hardest. To sit down and actually do something. Because you really want to just do this sometimes. (He imitates laying down again).
Over the last year I really decluttered a lot and removed things I didn’t need. If you have less things in general, it feels like a vacation. I honestly for some reason started to feel like my favorite lifestyle is being in the hotel room. I have only one suitcase which is very dedicated to what I need to do, I don’t take my tablet, which saves me so much attention span and you always come into a clean, very restricted simple space. There is time to work, there is time to get out, see something new and enjoy the weather. This doesn’t allow you to sink into those sometimes not so good habits, for example TV or YouTube binge watching, it really helps you.
I really love coffee and tea and I stimulate myself a lot with those things for the purpose when you’re stimulated you’re more productive and secondly you don’t want to eat. And you need to manage, as when you work a lot, you want to eat a lot and when you get overwhelmed you start to eat the wrong things.
During and before the Olympics I went on a coffee and tea detox. I was a mess! (Everybody laughing) But I honestly have to say I never slept as good. And just the fact of sleeping properly even in this stressful situation made me feel alive. Just by stabilizing yourself and experiencing something like this I felt great.
Judith: Did you keep resilient or did you go back to the coffee and tea afterwards?
Deniss: Yea, I am back on my coffee but I used to drink the mocha for two. And I am talking of a big mocha. And I usually just put in a little splash of milk just for coloring purposes. (Everyone laughing again.) So that was my norm. So now I made it much smaller so it’s basically just a small cup of mocha with the same little splash of milk and that is my new dosage!
Judith: Keep it!
Deniss: You know, when you have an opportunity to do something and you kind of believe it’s harmless, you tend to go too far the wrong way. And then you experience crushes that really, really hurt long term. You start to kind of bring it back and like this I am trying to find a balance.
This season I tried to find those limitations, trying to figure out what is useful, what is harmful, because I actually function better in the morning without a coffee. I figured out the coffee is best for me mid-day when I need to decide if I go and take a nap or go out for a walk. Daily walks became such a big help for me. Just get out and walk the same pattern. I have my beautiful route around the village, it becomes slowly bigger. It serves so many good purposes. The latest thing is not to get distracted. Before I used to listen to audiobooks or music or something and you don’t actually want to walk. And now I find it so pleasant. Naturally when we walk we are looking down. I started to work on my eye-sight with some kind of exercises in order to be more receptive to colors. And I feel like my eye-sight became better since I started to pay more attention to different objects.
Judith: So you’re walking like 7/8 km a day without any phone, without anything?
Deniss: Yes. When I got this watch (points at his smartwatch) I was really interested in what it will tell me. And it tells me I am consuming around 4000 kilo-calories pretty much each day. And that I have 15 -16 kilometers of walking each day: my warm up, my movement and I remove it during the ice times. Walking really helps me to stay fit, to get my brain together.
When I started this walking routine my route was really small. I was just getting out of the house and coming back. I started it because I was so inspired by the book I read.* Now it grew up to the point that I get up to a really nice place where I can do my Tai-Chi exercises. Now my Tai-Chi section became really difficult and I can’t do at the beginning of the day anymore, as my legs are not ready. So I do it in the evening when I am done with the day and before my stretching routine so I have time to basically let go.
You just need to stay active sometimes. If you feel tired, usually my understanding and my response now is move and not to sink in deeper. I just feel the need to find the right balance between activity and inactivity. I can work for 100 % for about two hours a day, which are basically my two on ice practices, when I show a really high performance and then there is still the whole rest of the day. You would maybe dedicate three hours, which are two windows for me, for university. You will be seated, you will be very focused. Of course your high performance time is also very focused but then you need something else to do. Okay, you have to cook. Let’s say with meals and everything, that’s another three hours. During eating I wouldn’t practice too much mindfulness, so you are then in your zombie mode.
I try to avoid losing power over the week. You know that feeling when you start the week like a champion, you feel like you’re the best for two days and then the power drops down (Deniss demonstrates it with his hands) and then it starts again, up, down, up, down. My focus became to have less of this but more of a steady rise of power during the week. And actually it makes you feel much, much better by the end of the week.
I am constantly trying new things. For example I started to journal two years ago. And just by simply writing down my observations, writing down my thoughts, my ideas, - I don’t necessarily always go back on what I wrote, what I do - but it’s just like, you start to communicate with the paper and in one way or another this builds up to something that motivates you. If you write something bad for ten times in a row you realize there is something bad going on. This is something you really don’t want to write but you continue writing it. You constantly stop at the same issue, you will get aware that you maybe should change something. You try to figure it out in a tiny way and you will start writing it less and at some point you will be like: hmm, this week I wrote something bad only twice.
In my opinion it’s super important how you start and how you finish your day. And what’s in between there - even if it’s your day off and pajama day the most important part of the day is to get out of the pajama!
At this point our meeting lasted already 50 minutes, so it was time to continue with our little game: Deniss and Chris against the fans about Deniss. You can watch the video of this here:
This was great fun and a very nice ending to a very nice and relaxed fan meeting, that we all enjoyed a lot. Thanks for your great inspirational thoughts, advices and we wish you very much luck with all your next goals, mindfulness practice and we can’t wait to see your new very well thought through and artistically brilliant programs next season.