I've just started playing Russia myself but I may be able to help you when I'm not busy with my clan. The thing is, I don't have the TWC, and haven't broken out TAD in years so I play Vanilla.
Nonetheless I can type out things you need to do. You need to keep producing villagers constantly. Personally speaking I don't always but it's ideal that you do so. You need to hunt as much as possible without building mills. Build a tower if needed. You need to get treasures and explore constantly so you can counter what he builds and raid his hunters. And most important is you need to manage resources well. Move your villagers in advance of what you will need. For example if you are at 47/55 pop and no wood, then move villagers to get wood since you will need a house very soon. And never have very many unspent resources unless you're about to age up or do an expensive upgrade. Mostly it's common sense and practice.
Russian Rush*:
-age up with 14 villagers
-send 300 wood before age up
-gather the crates during transition and send forward 2 villagers to build a blockhouse
-gather the 400 wood from age up and build a couple houses
-set bockhouse as shipment destination and build strelets while sending cossacks
-manage villagers and continue training units as appropriate
-cards I send include 5 + 4 cossacks cards, 700 + 600 wood, 700 food, sometimes 700 gold, boyars, faster training cards (late in the game), etc.
*this is on vanilla I have no idea about TAD but it should be similar I think?
My user is: JoseCapablanca
I'm a 2nd lieutenant rank.
[This message has been edited by Capablanca23 (edited 03-14-2011 @ 09:54 PM).]