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The first days of the Olympic Games gave our athletes a lot of emotions and medals

Russia (bbabo.net), - What does an athlete think about when he holds an Olympic gold medal in his hands? That the dream came true, that all efforts were not in vain and for the sake of such emotions it was worth going through even the most difficult path to the podium - through injuries, coronavirus restrictions, not paying attention to weather conditions or an inconvenient competition schedule. On Sunday, the first "gold" in the treasury of our team was brought by skier Alexander Bolshunov, who was unstoppable in the skiathlon. Yesterday, medals of the highest standard were awarded to the figure skater team, which was pulled forward by the single skater Kamila Valieva, who gave us a special story. Not lifelike, because she is only 15, but rather fabulous.

The girl in the red coat is Yulia Lipnitskaya. Red ballerina - Alina Zagitova. The world saw and fell in love with our wonderful figure skaters at the Olympics in Sochi-2014 and Pyeongchang-2018. If the 2022 Games in Beijing were held with full stands, during the rental of Valieva, the arena would probably have swept through: "Kamila - space!" The unearthly talent of this girl has been talked about for a long time. She is the world champion among juniors, the champion of Europe among adults, the owner of all world records in estimates. But her appearance and approval on the Olympic ice with its status and atmosphere only strengthened the already powerful effect that is created from her sliding, jumping, programs. Like Sotnikova or Zagitova, Valieva will forever remain a symbol of our success in figure skating at the Olympics.

So far, this is an unconditional victory in the team tournament, where the Russian team scored 74 points and beat rivals from the USA (65) and Japan (63).

The figure skating team competition made its debut at the Sochi 2014 Games, where the hosts of the ice became champions. The top three then were Canada and the United States. In Pyeongchang 2018, the Russians were left with silver, losing to the Canadians. And the "bronze" was taken by the Americans. And in Beijing, we regained the title of the strongest team in the world, which we will wear for four whole years. After all, the only annual team tournament is the commercial start of the World Team Trophy, which is held according to different rules and is not included in the official calendar.

Valieva's contribution to the victory is huge. But it is still a general triumph. Single skater Mark Kondratyuk, sports couple Anastasia Mishina - Alexander Gallyamov and dance duet Victoria Sinitsina - Nikita Katsalapov deservedly became Olympic champions in our team.

Let's introduce our heroes. Mark Kondratyuk retired from the sport at the age of 13, suffering from pain in his knees, but outgrew these problems and returned to the rink.

Official

To Mark Kondratyuk, Kamila Valieva, Anastasia Mishina, Alexander Gallyamov, Victoria Sinitsina and Nikita Katsalapov, winners of the XXIV Olympic Winter Games in Beijing in the team figure skating competition.

Please accept our congratulations on a beautiful, convincing victory at the XXIV Olympic Winter Games in Beijing.

In the team competitions in figure skating, you brilliantly coped with the tasks set, demonstrated the highest skill, composure and will, the desire to fight to the end and win. And, of course, they gave unforgettable moments of joy and celebration to their loved ones, mentors, and numerous fans.

I sincerely wish you health and new successes on the Olympic ice. Keep it up!

Vladimir Putin

Until recently, few people knew about him, but from a no-name he turned into the main hope of our men's single skating - he won the qualifying Russian championship for the Olympics, then took the title at the European Championship and fully coped with the responsibility in the team tournament here in Beijing, giving out two worthy and cool rental.

The advantage of the Russian team over rivals in the team figure skating tournament was unconditional, just like Bolshunov's on the track

Anastasia Mishina - Alexander Gallyamov started as single skaters, then changed partners, but found each other. And coaches. In Stockholm 2021, they surprised everyone with their intensity, winning their debut world championship to the song We Are The Champions. And since then, their ambitions have only grown. Will they be able to repeat the success of the pair Tatyana Volosozhar - Maxim Maxaim Trankov, who won two "gold" in Sochi - team and individual?

Although now our current team already has a two-time Olympic champion - Nikita Katsalapov. He won the Sochi 2014 team gold in a duet with Elena Ilyinykh, with whom they also won bronze in the individual ice dancing tournament. And then life and career changed dramatically. But the goals remain the same. Now, together with the beautiful Victoria Sinitsina, Nikita took the titles of world and European champions, and the Olympic Games.

But skaters have no time to celebrate. Ahead - personal competition. And based on the results of the already past starts, you need to draw conclusions and work on the mistakes, especially since not everything went smoothly.

Records have fallen

Kamila Valieva won the free program of the team tournament, despite the fall from the quadruple sheepskin coat. The rest of the elements were performed cleanly, including the triple Axel, quadruple salchow and the combination of "quadruple toe loop - triple toe loop". Valieva scored 178.92 points for the rental. At the same time, her world record set at the 2021 Russian Grand Prix is ​​185.29 points. However, the Russian figure skater still became the record holder. Valieva is now the first figure skater in history to land a quadruple jump at the Olympics.

But what is the reason for that single fall? You may not have been able to maintain super concentration. Still, Kamila went on the ice almost in the status of a champion. Our team won an early victory after the performance of the dancers. So, as Sasha Gallyamov said, Valieva could just bow and leave. In any case, we were inaccessible to rivals. But, of course, in the case of our single skaters, there was no question of any lightening of the content. The set of jumps was the maximum. As is responsibility. After all, Camila closed the tournament.

Russian skaters have no time to celebrate their success - individual competitions are ahead, where we also claim the podium

- Pretty incredible impressions when you seem to be competing in adult competitions for only the first season, but they are already talking about you. I feel a little pressure, but I hope I manage to cope with it, and sometimes it even helps me,” Valieva said at a press conference. - I am very happy that I managed to do two quads, a triple axel. The second quadruple sheepskin coat did not work out, but I will try to fix it.

Moreover, not all dreams have come true.

- The first time I watched the Olympics in Sochi, when Yulia Lipnitskaya performed, her free program was very memorable. During the Olympics in Pyeongchang, I strongly supported Alina Zagitova and Zhenya Medvedev, - said Camila. - For me, becoming an Olympic champion is a childhood dream. I've been telling my mom about it since I was three years old. And now the dream has come true. Now I will work very hard to make another dream of mine come true.

Don't sleep!

Anastasia Mishina and Alexander Galliamov, who fell from support at the end of the program, also had an unexpected fall at the box office. Thank God, there were no serious injuries.

Alexander Gallyamov is a reliable partner, but there was a loss of concentration due to lack of sleep and early start of the competition.

“We were not ready for such a turn in the very end, but next time we will try to be concentrated until the end of the program,” Gallyamov told reporters. - I don't want to make excuses, but such mistakes are really unusual for us. We never allow this in training and competition. Perhaps the reason is the early start time. I had to get up at four and force myself to be alert all morning. A little lacking, I could not keep my balance. Training at 6:30 am. Of course, no one is used to this, usually couples competitions are put on a later time, because this is the most traumatic sport. But in such competitions you have to be ready for anything. It was necessary to readjust.

Anastasia Mishina tried to defuse the situation and approached the description of this actually dangerous incident on the ice with humor.

- The first thought when I fell from a height: oh, dive! There was little funny in this, but I just tried to keep my face, - the partner added smiling. Maybe she laughed at herself. Because they did everything difficult, and for the last five seconds ... They lay down, in general. We fell asleep. Nothing really hurts. Hit, of course, but nothing. There will be bruises, but we will cover them up. The biggest ones will be here, under the eyes, from lack of sleep.

In the free program, the reigning world champions had no real competitors. But in they are only 0.19 points, but lost to the Chinese pair of Sui Wenjing - Han Cong. In addition to skill and experience (they are 2018 Olympic silver medalists and two-time world champions), among the trump cards of the Chinese is the home rink factor. In a personal tournament, the price of any mistake will be high.

We want to dance

But, to be honest, the results of our dancers are much more worried. Also, the reigning world champions Victoria Sinitsina and Nikita Katsalapov lost twice to American duets. In the rhythm dance, an accidental mistake was made when Nikita hit the trace on the ice with his skate and was unable to correctly perform the counter. In the free program, a penalty point for support was removed. But the ice did not even go one of the favorites in the fight for the “gold” French Gabriella Papadakis and Guillaume Sizeron.

However, Nikita sees no reason for alarm.

- It was one of our best performances. We skated with inspiration, confidently, easily, controlled all the elements, - said Katsalapov after the free dance. - It's a shame that we received a penalty point for support and lost the arbitrary game to the Americans, but the most important thing is that we broke this ice. No worries, we are confident in ourselves and will fight for personal "gold".

Side view

Camille Valiyeva spoke after her junior program "Girl on a Bowl". The granddaughter of the founder of cubism, Pablo Picasso, Diana Picasso was so delighted that she invited the figure skater to the museum of the famous grandfather in Paris.

- Camila just shines and has incredible grace at such a young age. Her performances are amazing! It's a blessing to see her skating," Diana Picasso wrote on Instagram.

The rental of Valieva in Beijing captivated the American actor Alec Baldwin.

- I love the Olympics because even in such depressing times, the planet freezes to watch in awe as athletes (and artists!) like Kamila Valieva show us the beauty of this world. In their performance, it's like a song, a poem, a picture,” Baldwin wrote in a heartfelt post on Instagram. - They have devoted their (in the case of Valieva still small) life to this art... Thank you, Kamila Valieva, for your gift - heartbreaking beauty for this world.

Direct speech

Oleg Matytsin, Minister of Sports of the Russian Federation:

- Congratulations to our figure skaters Kamila Valieva, Mark Kondratyuk, Anastasia Mishina and Alexander Gallyamov, Victoria Sinitsina and Nikita Katsalapov on winning the team tournament! We are proud of our strong team, which brought great joy to millions of Russian fans. The performances of our athletes were incredibly beautiful, spiritual, artistic, full of beautifully executed complex elements.

It is symbolic that Russian figure skaters won gold medals on the anniversary of the start of the Olympic Games in Sochi, where team competitions were presented for the first time, and the Russian team also won them. Nikita Katsalapov, the captain of our team at the Beijing Games, became a two-time Olympic champion. For everyone else, these are the first Olympic medals in their careers.

I am sure that the athletes will be able to recover their strength before the individual competitions, and we will again enjoy their wonderful skates. Special thanks to the coaches of our champions: Tamara Moskvina, Eteri Tutberidze, Alexander Zhulin, Svetlana Sokolovskaya, the entire coaching staff, as well as the President of the Russian Figure Skating Federation Alexander Gorshkov and General Director Alexander Kogan.

The first days of the Olympic Games gave our athletes a lot of emotions and medals