[7] Tournelle du Soleil: SERGEY (Patreon)

• 15 May 2023 • Day 1 at Cirque IHQ: Sergey •

SERGEY.

In my earliest years of chasing circus dragons in Montréal (circa 2017) I’d asked around for anyone who folks might recommend as a contortion coach. I’d already been travelling to San Francisco whenever I could afford it to do training intensives with Serchmaa Byamba. But Montréal was a lot closer than SF, a lot more affordable to get to, and eventually I ran into someone who gave me a name: Sergey Volodin.

A local Montréal artist offered: “He’s a Russian coach, he works in the daytime at Cirque du Soleil as one of the coaches to onboard new or returning artists. He’s not, like, a Mongolian contortion coach. But he’ll train flexibility with you, and handstands, and anything else you need to do.”

It sounded good to me. The other artists he was working with were incredibly flexible and strong. I didn’t need any further motivation to pursue trying to train with him.

But Sergey was skeptical when I met him all those years ago. And to my eager, competitive younger self, coach-generated skepticism was the sweet, sweet fuel that fired up my engine. If somebody told me I couldn’t do something, I couldn’t help myself but try to prove them wrong. In all honesty, that’s at leats half the reason I got so into contortion in the first place – but that’s a story for another time.  

My first ever conversation with Sergey happened in 2017 and went something like this:

“What do you do?” he had asked me bluntly, Russian accent strongly present, changing the “w”s to “v”s and adding weight and roundness to the “o” and “u” sounds.

“Straps and contortion,” I supplied brightly.

“No, you don’t."

Wh–what?

I didn’t want to be disrespectful, and I wasn’t sure how to continue the conversation.

“Well –” I chuckled nervously. “Yeah, I mean – that’s what I’ve been doing…”

“No,” he said simply again. “You do not do straps and contortion."

At my persisting confusion, he continued: "This is like digging hole, then putting dirt back in hole.”

“I don’t understand,” I had said, keeping a smile on my face. Like digging a hole and then putting dirt back in the hole...?

“The muscle, the muscle in the back,” he continued, waving a hand impatiently. “It blocks the bending. No good. Plus, you’re too tall,” he added.

“What’s wrong with being a tall contortionist?” I responded, warming up to the challenge.

“Hard to bend,” he said.

“Well, that might all be true,” I said. “But it’s what I’m doing anyways. And I’d like to do some lessons together.”

He huffed. “Show me a bridge,” he said.

I did.

“Hm,” he said.

“I work really hard,” I had said.

He remained stony-faced, impassive. Thinking. Finally: “Okay, we try three lessons. I will decide after that if we keep training or not.”

“YES!” I grabbed his hand and pumped it up and down in a firm handshake. “You won’t regret it. Thank you.”

He replied with a mysterious grunt and left that studio for the day.

What followed was a couple years of one of my favourite coaching relationships to this day – and one of the most demanding. It was what I wanted, though: I wanted a coach who would hold me to a higher standard. And Sergey –someone who spent his day working with the athletes and acrobats who’d already made it into the hallowed halls of Cirque du Soleil– was exactly that.

At 5’9”, having a coach who was larger than me for the first time (the Mongolian women I’d met thus far for coaching had all been quite petite; I’d towered over them) was a game-changer. He could support me and move me into positions that I couldn’t quite find yet on my own, giving my muscles the chance to figure out how to hold me there.

With Sergey, there were lofty heights that I was expected to reach. For years, nothing I did was good enough. Eventually, on rare, golden days, I would get a gruff “молодец” (maladyets) – ‘good job’.  And while I don't think I ever did achieve what was hoped for, the unspoken understanding that I was to work as though it was possible brought things out of me I never would have found on my own.

I jump up so he can see me above the weight racks. “Sergey!” I call,  beaming.

As soon as he catches sight of me, the deadly serious face breaks into a toothy grin. I reach him, wrap him in a big bear hug, and squeeze him as hard as I can. I keep my hands on his shoulders when I finally pull back. “Are you the one evaluating me?” I ask. “For strength and conditioning , I mean?”

“Maybe,” he says. “I don’t know. Hold on.”

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Stay tuned for your next instalment of Tournelle du Soleil.   It'll be landing in your inboxes tomorrow at 7am EST / 1pm CEST. Until then, stay strange & wonderful - XO Ess