What Happened To Figure Skaters 'Harley & Katya'?
Harley & Katya (2022)
A Quick Film Review
Those with just a passing interest in figure skating may only know of Team Australia's pair skaters Ekaterina Alexandrovskaya and Harley Windsor from their surprise win at the World Junior Championships in 2017.
A Quick Film Review
Those with just a passing interest in figure skating may only know of Team Australia's pair skaters Ekaterina Alexandrovskaya and Harley Windsor from their surprise win at the World Junior Championships in 2017.
But serious figure skating followers know more...that mental and physical challenges pushed the pair to a breakup, and, ultimately likely, to Alexandrovskaya's suicide just three years later.
A fittingly poignant documentary from 2022, Harley & Katya, just released in the United States on Netflix, takes a look at the once-promising skating partnership and its maybe not-so abrupt end.
Behind the headline elite skaters dominating global podiums are legions of would-be pairs skaters toiling to make connections with the 'right' partner. That search often crosses borders, with nationality switches to accommodate those matches and competitive opportunities. In that respect, Alexandriovskaya's and Windsor's start together was not so uncommon.
Though they did come from starkly different backgrounds - Alexandrovskaya from Moscow and Windsor from small-town Penrith, Australia. When Windsor's coaches needed a new partner for him, they looked back home to Russia. And a new pairs team was born.
The match wasn't without difficulty - Alexandrovskaya struggled with the language barrier, and, at only 16-years-old and four years younger than Windsor, with adjusting to a different new life away from home. Those struggles would persist despite increasing success on the ice. The two won that 2017 junior title, and then Pyeongchang 2018 qualification - culminating in an 18th place finish at those Winter Olympics. As the media pounced on the novelty of Windsor's Aboriginal heritage during those Games, Alexandrovskaya's Russian-ness, and continued language barrier, made her a public afterthought.
But bigger problems lay hidden. Or not so hidden - hints at over-drinking by Alexandrovskaya, still just a teenager, are admitted by what was her support system in retrospect. Friction with coaching and finding herself losing support, she and Windsor move to Moscow to train, where a devastating diagnosis is delivered. Struck with epilepsy made more sensitive by alcoholism, Alexandrovskaya's career is suddenly over in 2020, and at just age 20. And in July, in the midst of a COVID-19 pandemic that further shut down her world, Alexandrovskaya jumped from a sixth-story window to her death.
Harley & Katya treads respectfully around the mass impulse to find 'blame'. Everyone featured acknowledges the tragedy both of a teenager finding herself lost and alone suddenly without purpose, and of a system that wasn't sophisticated enough to offer support for young, emotionally vulnerable athletes. Had Alexandrovskaya received more support, who knows where the promising potential from 2017 would have taken the pair. For his part, Windsor remains competitive, recently announced as representing South Korea with Choe Hye-Jin.
The highlight moment of Harley & Katya? Witnessing the pair's final performance at 2019's Skate America in Las Vegas...mournful in its knowing presentation. It's a shame we aren't able to know more of Alexandrovskaya, her thoughts and her ambitions. But Harley & Katya serves as a well-done reminder of the all-too-often unseen struggles of athletes on the cusp of stardom.
We need to remember.
A fittingly poignant documentary from 2022, Harley & Katya, just released in the United States on Netflix, takes a look at the once-promising skating partnership and its maybe not-so abrupt end.
Behind the headline elite skaters dominating global podiums are legions of would-be pairs skaters toiling to make connections with the 'right' partner. That search often crosses borders, with nationality switches to accommodate those matches and competitive opportunities. In that respect, Alexandriovskaya's and Windsor's start together was not so uncommon.
Though they did come from starkly different backgrounds - Alexandrovskaya from Moscow and Windsor from small-town Penrith, Australia. When Windsor's coaches needed a new partner for him, they looked back home to Russia. And a new pairs team was born.
The match wasn't without difficulty - Alexandrovskaya struggled with the language barrier, and, at only 16-years-old and four years younger than Windsor, with adjusting to a different new life away from home. Those struggles would persist despite increasing success on the ice. The two won that 2017 junior title, and then Pyeongchang 2018 qualification - culminating in an 18th place finish at those Winter Olympics. As the media pounced on the novelty of Windsor's Aboriginal heritage during those Games, Alexandrovskaya's Russian-ness, and continued language barrier, made her a public afterthought.
But bigger problems lay hidden. Or not so hidden - hints at over-drinking by Alexandrovskaya, still just a teenager, are admitted by what was her support system in retrospect. Friction with coaching and finding herself losing support, she and Windsor move to Moscow to train, where a devastating diagnosis is delivered. Struck with epilepsy made more sensitive by alcoholism, Alexandrovskaya's career is suddenly over in 2020, and at just age 20. And in July, in the midst of a COVID-19 pandemic that further shut down her world, Alexandrovskaya jumped from a sixth-story window to her death.
Harley & Katya treads respectfully around the mass impulse to find 'blame'. Everyone featured acknowledges the tragedy both of a teenager finding herself lost and alone suddenly without purpose, and of a system that wasn't sophisticated enough to offer support for young, emotionally vulnerable athletes. Had Alexandrovskaya received more support, who knows where the promising potential from 2017 would have taken the pair. For his part, Windsor remains competitive, recently announced as representing South Korea with Choe Hye-Jin.
The highlight moment of Harley & Katya? Witnessing the pair's final performance at 2019's Skate America in Las Vegas...mournful in its knowing presentation. It's a shame we aren't able to know more of Alexandrovskaya, her thoughts and her ambitions. But Harley & Katya serves as a well-done reminder of the all-too-often unseen struggles of athletes on the cusp of stardom.
We need to remember.
RSS Feed