When you have an audience standing and screaming the entire way through the short program and cheering every element you do, whether it's footwork, or spin, or a jump, to have that kind of emotion coming at you from every direction in the building, it's the most amazing sensation you can get as a sportsman.

Creating emotion was what my career was all about. I wanted people to laugh at me; I wanted people to cry with me. I wanted people to feel good or to think about something when they watched me. I think that's why, even not being an Olympic champion, I have such a huge following around the world.

Michael Phelps is a sporting god among men. It is hard to say if anyone will ever match his accomplishments, but it has been an honor to see him become a legend. He makes me proud of the American sports institution and proud of the sports that get mass attention only every four years.

I'm going to skate exactly the way I want to, create programs that I like, and everything will fall into place where it is supposed to.

Love comes in all different shapes and forms - from friendship and sisters and mums - and as I've got older, I've definitely learned that some of my happiest times have been when I've been on my own.

Charan is very hard-working and non-egoistic, given the family he comes from. He is very open to listening, and he surrenders himself completely to the director. It was lovely to work with an actor like that.

To me, family is first.

Before I left Russia in 1999, I was living in a very poor factory town with my family and friends, and nothing was ever going to change.