Kamila Valiyeva is back on the ice. At a competition in Moscow where jumps alone are judged, she made it to the semi-finals. The figure skater, their fate at the Olympic Games in Beijing four years ago who had kept the sports world in suspense, has served his doping ban and taken part in a competition again in Moscow. She was 15 when banned substances were found in her body before the Games.
When this became known, she had just shown perhaps the most beautiful short program of all time. While some pilloried her as a doping offender, in her homeland she was celebrated as the innocent representative of the invincible figure skating school. When she fell several times in the free skate, there were a lot of tears in the stands in the Beijing hall.
Only one remained ice cold. Eteri Tutberidze, her trainer, was simply angry about her student’s poor performance and received a major Olympic reprimand from the then IOC President Thomas Bach, who described her as cold. Valiyeva was ultimately banned for four years. A lot has happened since then. Russia has invaded Ukraine and is mistreating the population, but one thing has not changed.
Eteri Tutberidze stands at the gang and monitors the performance of her protégés. At the games in Milan she will look after the Georgian Nika Egadze. Because the European champion pretty much screwed up his ideas in the team competition, the ice-cold face of the Russian-Georgian coach that so disturbed Thomas Bach four years ago was seen again.
One will never know the attitude towards Ukraine
It’s just one of those crazy stories that figure skating is full of. Also because Tutberidze is the coach of the Russian Adelia Petrosian, who is starting as a neutral athlete, one would only like to know what she thinks about Russia’s attack on Ukraine. You’ll never know. She walks through the world like an untouchable. She is regularly in the USA to visit her daughter Diana Davis, whom she gave birth to in Las Vegas in 2003. Davis, who is not really known whether she has US citizenship in addition to Russian and Georgian citizenship, is also currently in Milan. She competes in ice dancing for Georgia with her husband Gleb Smolkin.
Together with her, she was also the Russian champion and achieved 14th place for the Russian Olympic Committee team at the Games in Beijing. When there was speculation after Davis and Smolkin’s wedding, The two, who were training in the USA at the time, could start for the States if the Russians were approved for the Georgian team. Last Friday, the Russian from the USA was even the flag bearer for her new sporting home of Georgia.
Of course, Smolkin also has to answer questions in Milan about his mother-in-law, at whose figure skating school in Moscow children have been tortured into broken bones and bulimia for years. No, she doesn’t give any tips, she’s just Diana’s mother, he always says. He is the spokesman for the ice dancing duo because his wife has been severely hearing impaired in both ears since childhood, which she recently announced on Instagram. Another story like that.
“Not my decision”
And another story. By the way, Gleb’s father follows the competitions from Russia. As an actor and show host, he is a real celebrity in his homeland and would probably never have thought that his son would become Georgian.
In any case, he has nothing against his mother-in-law’s presence in Milan. In contrast, the head of the World Anti-Doping Agency Wada, Witold Banka, does not feel comfortable with the idea of the presence of the trainer of an athlete who has been convicted of doping. “But that’s not my decision,” he said at a press conference before the games began. This is not a decision by the IOC, said its spokesman Mark Adams when asked about it in Milan.
There have long been pictures showing Tutberidze on the edge of the ice rink in Milan. She was an absolute eye-catcher in the team competition. When she appeared on the boards in the final of the team competition, several spectators pulled out their smartphones to take a picture of her. In the great emotional theater of figure skating, where people often scream and cry uninhibitedly on and off the ice, she is guaranteed a leading role – that of the beast who works for the beauty of her sport.