TORONTO - Since retiring from competitive figure skating in 2019, Tessa Virtue has pursued academia, a career in the business world and mentored young athletes.
Now, the five-time Olympic medallist is venturing into another space: podcasting.
“Virtuoso” will appear exclusively on YouTube Canada and will see Virtue explore the pursuit of excellence, something the most decorated female figure skater in Olympic history knows a thing or two about.
The 37-year-old will interview a variety of guests, including athletes, artists, scientists and entrepreneurs about the experiences, habits and practical tools that shaped them.
Virtue said she hopes listeners can apply some of the insights into their own career and lives.
“So much of my life as an athlete was spent actually honing kind of the mental skills and tools to perform under pressure on the world’s biggest stage.
And that’s the thing that I think differentiates performers at a certain level,” she said on Thursday.
“I’m so interested in how people manage insecurities and doubt, how you put yourself out there (when) you’re vulnerable to scrutiny and criticism, how you pick yourself up after a failure and forge ahead and how you manage the expectations of success once you’ve achieved something.” Virtue’s podcast, scheduled for release later this year, is a part of a new slate of creator-driven shows launching on YouTube Canada that includes reality and scripted series spanning topics such as entertainment, sports, food, comedy and lifestyle.
One of Virtue’s podcast guests is her former ice dancing partner Scott Moir, whom she skated with competitively for 22 years and won three Olympic gold medals with, including in 2010 and 2018.
Virtue said interviewing her former partner was both easy....
