ВBeverly (Yi) Zhu is an ex-American, presently Chinese skater, who was brave and insane enough to dare and switch teams, change citizenship and come live, train and study in China. She is back after the crazy Olympic season, during which she's made some publicity, not all of which was entirely pleasant. Here we talk about what happened then, what's going on now and what might we expect from her in the future.

Beverly Zhu at ISU Grand Prix Cup of China 2023

— Let's start from the very beginning. How did you end up on the ice?

— I started when I was 7 and a half. It was right when the Sochi Olympics ended, and winter sports were super popular. One of my friends was skating too, and the rink was having a discount if you brought a friend over. And I went, and I fell in love with it, and would go all the time.

— Seven and a half is relatively late…

— Yeah, in figure skating it's considered late, but somehow I'm still skating…

— Yeah, and you don't make an impression of somebody who started late. Posture and everything.

— Oh, really? Well, luckily I had a good team back in the States with Derrick and Ivan, and their Russian coaching, that kind of style. And I'm really grateful I have that base, yeah.

— Did you pick up any Russian? Any curse-words?

— Hm… not really, no, it's just that the accent was super strong.

— So you felt like it was all going well, and everything's fine, and there was no hiccups?

— At first I was never on the podium. Well, I was on the podium when I was little, but not during the intermediate and novice I'd be like 4th or 5th. I was kind of a dark horse, never number one. And then in 2018 I pulled out a triple-triple and a clean program and won in novice. That was my high. And then I had a really bad injury, that was the very low. And then I climbed back to where I am now here.

— Gracie Gold, if you remember such a person, started at, I think, 13 (fact check: she was 8), and landed her first triple in 2 years. But she was more of an exception.

— Yeah. Wow, that's amazing.

— When you said Sochi Olympics, it felt to me like, huh, that's relatively recent.

— Yeah…

— Speaking of Olympics. Let's go there.

— Okay [chuckles].

— I wasn't able to go, but heard many things. But let's hear the whole story from the horse's mouth.

— I feel like not a lot of people know what happened over here. At the time I didn't know what was going on internationally, with the news. Prior to the Olympics in 2021 I was in Canada. I was living by myself, training at Cricket. It was the quarantine time, rough for everybody. Ice was restricted, everybody was not in great condition. And then I came back to China and trained with the national team for quite a bit. I had new coaches, new coaching style, new technique and everything. Then I competed at the Grand Prix in Italy, I was getting better and better both mentally and physically and was competition ready. And then there was the Olympic trials, which was 5 competitions. They took the 3 best scores, and whoever had the highest total score got to go. At that time we were all at the same level. Everybody has their best qualities, and everybody has their other qualities, of course, but all kind of the same. But out of the three people I won, and so I was picked to compete for the Olympics. Which I never imagined. I was like: I have this opportunity, I'm going to try my best to get it, if I don't get, you know, I'll just try my best. And then wow, I got it! But not a lot of people knew about the whole process. And they were rooting for the other competitor, because they knew more about her. So when the news came out that I was picked they were like: what's going on, there's something wrong with this. The social media thing happened and became the whole drama. And unfortunately I didn't compete well at the Olympics, which just added oil to the fire. It was a big emotional process for me, it was very hard. But I think we're all good now. It's over.

Beverly Zhu at ISU Grand Prix Cup of China 2023

— No hard feelings?

— Um… I feel like there's still some hard feelings. I want to redeem myself, I feel like I haven't skated the best of me yet. Since then. Hopefully I can redeem myself at one point.

— You have years ahead of you, right?

— I don't know… I don't know… I'm just glad I can skate now.

— Let's back up a little bit. You did choose to switch teams in the Olympic season, right?

— I switched in 2018—2019. But at that time I was still training in the States.

— Right. Were you anticipating that you could aim for the spot, or was it a distand dream?

— At the time I thought I still have a couple of years, let me see what I can do in these couple of years. But I got injured. And I was just hoping to recover by the Olympics. And later the Olympic year came out of nowhere. I felt like oh my gosh, it's here, and I have this opportunity, and I was gonna go for it.

— About the public response. There was some positive and some negative opitions. But my sense was that the negative respose was just overwhelming.

— Yeah, and it's because not a lot of people had the right information. So I don't blame them for being confused. But some were picking the little they knew and turning it around on me.

— And then there's a question of citizenship. Which in your case, I think, is pretty straightforward, you just changed it from American to Chinese, righ?

— Yeah.

— Right. There was a lot of talking about…

— Other athletes?

— Yeah, Gu Ailin, for example. Her situation is still unclear, and she's holding her cards close to the chest about it.

— I don't know anything about the situation, I just think that she's really remarkable. To be able to do what she does… you know. And she voices her opinions and thoughts really well. And she's also a great athlete, a great student. I feel like there's a lot of things I could learn from her.

— Now that it's all over, do you feel like it was interesting, terrifying, I don't know, a trauma for life, or a learning experience?

— Haha, definitely a learning experience, it was terrifying. I was even scared to go outside. The fact that I even went to compete for the Olympics during the whole thing just amazes me. I don't know how I did it [giggles]. It was pretty traumatizing, yeah. But nowadays I'm better, I just wish I could perform better. Perform up to my real abilities out there.

Beverly Zhu at ISU Grand Prix Cup of China 2023

— From here on out, what are your plans, goals, aims?

— This season there's the big Games in China, the 十四冬 (14th National Winter Games — editor's note) that's at the beginning of next year. I'm aiming for that. Also nationals. Hopefully I get to go to Four Continents. I don't have most points. Maybe I could go and do a B-competition for that. I'm also doing college right now, so I'm also aiming to graduate that. I'm a sophomore right now.

— Here?

— Yeah, here in China.

— In Beijing?

— Yeah, in Beijing. And just see what else I can do with skating. I don't know about next Olympics, maybe I could just have it as a goal to keep me going. But we'll see, anything can happen.

— Which university are you in?

— I'm at Peking University (one of the top two higher ed. schools in China — editor's note).

— That's pretty cool! Did they give you any special offer for athletic achievements?

— It's called 报送 (recommendation for admittance to school based on achievements in a non-academic field — editor's note). I'm a psychology major.

— What have you learned so far?

— It's definitely more scientific than I thought!

— Yeah? You thought it's a woo-woo?

— Yeah! [laughs] It's more 理科 (sciences — editor's note). So there's a bunch of mathematics and statistics that I have to take for that class, which is a lot. It's actually cool. To go to college.

— A lot of people criticize your Chinese. It seems that you're at the point when you're actually forgetting some English words and putting Chinese words in there instead.

— That's kinda true. I mean, at the beginning in 2019 at my first Cup of China here my Chinese wasn't even that good. But the last two years I've been living China. I'm sure you know, once you're here your Chinese improves. So yeah, it's better now.

— Let's not talk about figure skating anymore. Tell me something about yourself, what do you like to do, where do you go, how do you spend free time?

— I usually stay in Beijing, since my training and college are both there. I like to draw, play piano, go around with my friends. Not that much, I guess, because training takes a lot of time of the day.

— Hobbies?

— I guess just drawing and piano.

Beverly Zhu at ISU Grand Prix Cup of China 2023

— Are you any good?

— Piano? I started when I was little and I tested up to level 10. And I did some competitions, but then I wasn't that interested in it, as I was in skating. So now I just play for fun.

— What about drawing?

— I never really learned it, but I just draw for fun, yeah.

— On paper? Digitally?

— Yeah, just on paper. I feel like digitally it's not the same.

— I dabbled a bit when I was young.

— Digital? You liked it?

— Yeah, I had what was then known as a tablet, it was connected to a computer, you move stylus on it, but look at the display. It was pretty cool.

— Oh, that one, I've seen people do those, those are so cool!

— Yeah, it is cooler than like an iPad, you can see under the stylus and stuff.

— That's very cool!

— All right, thank you for making time for the interview! Hope to see you at the next competitions!

— No problem! See you!