VANCOUVER — Russian coach Marina Zoueva was wearing her Canadian jacket but had packed her U.S. one in her bag just in case.
She was in the unusual position this week of being coach to the Olympic gold and silver medalists in the ice dance, champions and home favorites Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir and Americans Meryl Davis and Charlie White.
She said she was in a win-win situation and next time hoped to have three sets of her students on the podium when the games go to her home country of Russia for Sochi 2014.
"That is my next project. 1-2-3," she said in an interview.
"It's a really good feeling to have two [in the medals], so much excitement," she said. "If they [Davis and White] want to see their coach in an American jacket, they have to win."
The North American success in the ice dance on Monday ended 34 years of European domination— mostly Soviet or Russian — of the event, and the change in fortune is due in some part to her.
"I teach in Russia and win gold, I teach in the States and win gold," she said.
So it is all down to her?
"Probably," she said, grinning.
Russian coaches have had a big impact on 2006 Olympic silver medalists Tanith Belbin and Benjamin Agosto, who used to be trained by Zoueva and are now coached by former Soviet ice dancers Natalia Linichuk and Gennady Karpanossov.
"Clearly the Russians are teaching us a lot. They just give us everything they have, their heart, their soul," Agosto said. "They have so much to give us, training us and making us the best skaters possible. Without them we wouldn't be where we are today."
Zoueva had previously worked with Olympic pairs champions Yekaterina Gordeyeva and Sergei Grinkov, among others, before leaving her country in 1991 and concentrating on ice dancers.
If only coaches like her would return home, Russian bronze medalist Maxim Shabalin mused after he and Oksana Domnina were beaten despite coming into the games as world champions.
"I think we need to bring coaches back to Russia," he said at a news conference.
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