Q&A:http://www.nbcolympics.com/athletes/athlete=2368/qa/index.html
Take us through your pre-Olympic season. It didn't go as you planned, but what's your analysis of it?
My pre-Olympic season was very difficult. I was ill for the majority of it when I was actually competing. went to the Grand Prix events and was-was sick and dealing with some equipment issues. Then before the National Championship I had a very bad virus and I was in a hospital, hooked up to an IV in-in Seoul, South Korea. I lost about eight pounds, nine pounds. I'm not so big, so it's a lot of weight to lose and I wasn't strong enough to start training right away. And by the time I was getting stronger and getting better, I was competing and I was on national television.
It was very hard, because I was in a situation where I didn't trust that if I asked for a bye that I would receive one to go to the World Championships, despite my being the only American medalist the year before. I didn't trust that I would be given that opportunity, so I competed and I tried my very best and it naturally wasn't good enough, just because I wasn't strong enough to be in the top three at that time. It was very depressing and really sad that I couldn't [show] my usual level of-of skating and-style and I was basically out there just trying to get through.
And then after the National Championships I wasn't named to the world team, despite several people saying:, ‘Okay, we're going to work and we're going to get you on there.' Which again, I don't trust anybody. I didn't necessarily believe that that was going to happen. And it ended up not happening.
I really had to juggle in my head whether I wanted to continue skating or not, if I could come back from this. And I realized that I did everything that I could have. I was the top American in the world standings. I had nothing to be ashamed of, I was just sick and unhealthy and not able to perform. And that's not something I could have helped, it's not something that I can control.
So looking at that and looking at the Olympics ahead, I want to give up everything and just be there. I want to be there. I want a medal. I want all of these things to come to fruition and for that to happen, it takes hard work. And I'm one hundred percent committed to making that happen.
Were you able to take away anything positive from last season?
I find nothing positive about the way that it ended. It didn't revive a fighting spirit, it just depressed me and I felt that I couldn't get past that. But I did. I'm a strong person, It's not so much that the problems and the issues of what I faced made me stronger, it's just I realized that I'm strong in myself. Falling down and getting back up , having a disaster and then coming back the next year, it's kind of what I've made my career from. Which is really stressful on me, I can tell you. But it's the way it is.
Is that something you pride yourself in, getting knocked down and then finding the strength to come back?
I think it makes me feel very strong when people talk badly about me and they don't believe in me, because it gives me that fire to show them who I am and what I am. And then when it's done, in general they'll all come up and say, ‘Oh, my god, we supported you the whole way. We're so excited, thank you...you did great. ‘ And I can say, ‘Where were you a year ago? Or where were you six months ago?' That's something that makes me strong. It's very vindictive and maybe it's not the right way that you should perform and find fire, but it works for me.
You talk about trust issues. How much energy have you expended over time kind of trying to maintain who you are and being who you want to be?
Well I'm in a judged sport. It's very political and you can never be sure that you're with the right coach or that we're wearing the right thing. Those things you can't be sure of. I can be sure at the end of the day when I go to bed, that I will lay down and I will be Johnny Weir. And I have to be proud of the decisions I made and be proud of what I've done. That has helped me to be a good competitor, because I don't care so much about what other people are saying about me. It has no relevance to my life and to who I am.
Of course, if you want medals and you're driven just by medals, then you need to make everyone happy and you need to say all the right things. And you need to try to please everyone. But even those people don't please everyone. Even the people that play by every single rule, say every single thing they're supposed to, listen to their coaches and-and bring up different sponsors and all of these things when they're doing interviews like this, those people still don't make everyone happy. Those people don't always finish first. Those people don't always win. I accept that, it's just a lot of people don't.
Can you talk about your international appeal? What makes you so popular around the world?
Well, it's a very big deal for me to teach people - not just kids, but even adults. There are so many people out there living behind a shield of what they think the world wants to see. Life's too short for that. I'm very much about being unique and-and following your own path and falling down and getting yourself back up, not looking to someone else to help you. And internationally I think I'm accepted because I speak my mind, I go to these other places and I'm very open. I'm inspired by other cultures and I'm inspired by what a culture can show me as far as the way they dress, the way they eat, their mannerisms, their manners. I'm thankful every time I go someplace or I'm immersed in a culture.
There's some very big skating hotbeds that support me and follow me as if I was one of their own. I have three Russian web sites. I have web sites in Korean, Chinese, Japanese, Spanish, Italian, and Czech. I have all of these different people from around the world that support me just because I'm me. Not because of my results. I have no world title and I have no Olympic title. I'm a three-time American champion and a world bronze medalist. I'm so proud of all of those accomplishments, but in the grand scheme of things, I'm not supposed to be as big a star as Yevgeny Plushenko or Alexei Yagudin or any of these people, but I hold my own and I'm just as popular around the world as any major champion. That's something that I'm very proud of and something I'm thankful for. My fans really have made me who I am.
You've talked about showing people who you are and you've said that you want to just be a role model to kids; you want to be a role model to kids who want to be themselves. What do you mean by that?
Society right now judges everything about your life and everything about who you are. Kids are awful to each other. My message is just to be strong enough to be yourself. I don't need to fit a mold. I don't need to fit into someone else's idea of what a figure skater, or a man, or someone from Pennsylvania, someone from the country now living in the city - I don't need to fit any of those molds.
I need to be Johnny Weir from start to finish every day. I hope other kids can see that in me and they can learn that it's fine to be who you are and do what you want.
After your last Olympic Games in Torino, you were very descriptive about the way you felt. Are you happy with the way you handled everything? How was the aftermath of the Olympics for you?
Well, the aftermath of Torino was pretty disastrous. I learned how two-faced people, and especially media can be. Second place after a good short program, 'Oh, he's funny. He says what he wants to. He doesn't care what anyone thinks. It's very cute, very funny. He's very young. Star quality, blah, blah, blah.'
And then as soon as I lose a medal for the United States, I felt like the entire country turned and flipped it on me. I was a disaster, I was a loose cannon, I talk too much, I got called every name you can think of, I got death threats, I got terrible, hateful emails, I got all of this bad karma around me just for being me. I didn't change in two days between the short program and the long program. I was still the same, exact person. I just didn't have a good night.
Looking back, I can say yeah, there were some mistakes I made in-in the media. There were some things I shouldn't have talked about, things I shouldn't have said. I stand behind everything that I say and, even when it's a mistake. I said it. Boom! That's it. What am I going to do now?
Now that I'm older and I hope a bit wiser, I can taper it a bit. I don't expect all of the mainstream media to understand what I'm feeling after I just got off the ice, after I had learned I would have no medal. I was so nervous. I couldn't even remember how I skated. I got off the ice and I started talking about my aura. I don't know where it came from. I don't expect anyone to get it, but that's how I felt at that time. I was two seconds away from just bursting into tears, I mean, give me a break.
Just for your own benefit, what did you learn in Torino that you can apply to Vancouver?
Not to let all of the extra affect me. I'm on the ice, I'm skating. That it's like any other competition. People have these notions of what the Olympics should be and it should be this big dreamy land.
And in the end, you weigh a buck thirty, you're wearing crazy something, and you're in the middle of the ice. Everyone's staring at you. I mean, that's what it ends up being. It's just you being you in the normal competitive atmosphere with a camera right here. And that's-that's the only difference. Your face is all over the world.
And knowing that going into [Vancouver], I'll know what to expect. I won't say, ‘Oh, my god. I was in People magazine today,' ‘Oh, my god, I was on the cover of the New York Times today.' That won't affect me because I've lived through it and it's done. Now I know it's not as important as what I actually produce on the ice.
One of the things that's unique to your style is your artistry on the ice. Was that something that came naturally, or did you have to work on it?
My style of figure skating starts with the music. You have to be inspired by what you're skating to. You have to be inspired by the idea around your choreography. You can't just go on the ice and do movements to music. It has to be from your soul. I think I've understood that since I was young, and I was able to bring that out in my skating because I appreciate music so much and it's so important in my daily life - what I'm listening to, what I'm singing along to. I can feel music, and that's the way I like to skate. Everything comes from within and it all comes to the music, not placed on top of music.
People sometimes forget how difficult figure skating is. You make it look flawless when you're competing, what about what it takes to get to that point?
I spend about 24 hours of my life thinking about or actually living on a giant ice cube that I'm falling down repeatedly on, that I'm sweating on, that I'm crying on. It's just as much of a sport as anything else. I hate when people don't believe figure skating is a sport and they want to watch hockey or football, because all those guys, they have a whole team around them, they've got all these pads on.
I go out there in a spandex, velvet, rhinestone-encrusted costume, no pads, and I fall. I have no teammates to comfort me, I just have a very stern Ukrainian coach sitting next to me afterward.
And my sport, it's not what we showed the people on television. It's not the final product. My sport is the falling. It's the crying. It's the bleeding on an ice cube, basically. In early, early hours in the morning, late hours at night, never really getting enough sleep or feeling like you've eaten enough. It's a hard core sport. It's hard for people to see that because, at the end of the day, our sport has a shiny veneer and we have to look perfect and flawless and effortless.
That's what it takes to be a good figure skater. You have to be bruised and skinny and dying behind the scenes, but then cover it up with a smile.
Do you plan on writing an autobiography when you retire from competitive skating?
Absolutely. I will write a book as soon as I'm done. I've got so much dirt that I need to get out of me, and so many dealings behind the scenes and how cutthroat it really is. I'm excited to share all of that while telling my own story and how I've intertwined myself through all of it. I've snaked through relatively unscathed, compared to some people. It's such a small world that I compete in and that I live in, sometimes it's ridiculous, sometimes everyone hates you, sometimes everyone loves you. But in general, we all have one thing in common and we all love it, for the most part, and it makes us some sick, twisted family. And I want to tell that story.
What is your definition of victory?
As I'm in an objective sport I can't be defined by a result or a medal that a group of people get to decide if I'm worthy of. For me, victory is feeling accomplished, feeling like that night I'll be able to sleep easy knowing that I did everything I could and I did everything to the best of my ability.
That's very cookie-cutter and that's very a sweet and sugary answer, but that's what it comes down to in my sport. I can't rely on a stop watch and I can't rely on a team around me. It's just me and then however many people judging me. And that result ends up not being so important if you're happy with yourself. |
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