ALBENA DENKOVA & MAXIM STAVISKI : AMOUR & MAGIE...

Albena and Maxim: shooting stars
Albena Denkova and Maxim Staviski have been skating together for seven years. To prove that their union is a successful one, they won silver at the 2003 World Championships and again silver at the 2004 European Championships. But that's not quite good enough, according to the skating couple.

Maxim: "We were very disappointed with the second place. We have trained very hard to get on top of the podium. This is our goal. To me being second means just that you are the first to lose."
Albena adds: "Many fans and journalists thought we should have had the first place. For the next season we want to train even harder, to make the judges give us the gold medal. Not only training, but also the repertoire will have to be new and different, to make the judges and the audience interested in us. We try to be different in any way we can from other couples, in choreography, music and costumes." But performance doesn't seem to be everything. Maxim: "Being from a small country like Bulgaria can leave you with a disadvantage. Sometimes you have to skate even better than others in order to get the same recognition as skaters from bigger countries. We have to be extraordinary."

In wintertime the team trains near Moscow under the supervision of coach Alexei Gorshkov and choreographer Sergei Petukhov. Albena says: "Unfortunately we have no sponsors and this makes it impossible to train only in Bulgaria. This is why we have to train in Russia. We have a brand new ice rink at our disposal and for us it's very comfortable to practise there. And in the summertime we are in Sofia, training in the Slavia ice rink. And we also do ballet, modern dance and sometimes we go to the gym to work on our strength. Only in the month of June we don't practise." At the moment the couple is preparing the music and choreography for next season.

Being a figure skater doesn't happen overnight. It takes years of hard training. Besides, being part of a team you don't only have to get along professionally. But having to work together almost non-stop also takes the work to a whole new level.

Albena: "Maxim is a very optimistic person. This is a blessing for me as it makes the practises much easier for me. He is laughing and joking all the time and this light heartedness is exactly what you need when you are working so hard.

Maxim: "Our life is very hard, if you're not optimistic you start to drink! The psychological and physical pressure is very high. Besides doing your stuff during the training is one thing, but to perform in front of an audience and to compete with other couples gives you so much adrenaline, it can make you go crazy. Albena is more serious then me. But this combination of characters makes it a perfect combination."

Albena: "I think so too. And apart from that Maxim is a great skating partner. He has good skating skills and techniques. He is helping me a lot. Because the training he enjoyed in Russia was much better then the training I had. This is why I have learned a lot from skating with him."

Maxim: "But that's because I am Russian. The discipline is very strong in Russia and they start skating very young. Like me, most of the skaters start at the age of four. To give an example: when the daughter of my coach turned two and she began to walk her first steps, he put her on the ice to acquaint her with it."

Skating is like an addiction to Albena and Maxim. It has become so much part of them that it's impossible to stop. When they do, it causes real withdrawal sym0