Often you need to take some risk, but it must be a realistic risk, you can't take a crazy risk.

I began with track and field because this is what I know.

I think that, generally, you need to live with your sport 24 hours a day.

I have spoken with many former athletes, and they tell me the best time they had was in sports. I listen to them and use their experience in my career.

The strategy of my coach and me was that we looked at pictures of all the best pole vaulters from around the world, and we took the best parts from them, and we created a person that had never existed. We then started to work toward being such a person.

People come from around the world and can understand each other without even speaking the same languages!

I decided to create a sports club during the Soviet times. It was my dream.