Kamila Valieva at the Winter Olympics.Photo: David Ramos/Getty
Tara Lipinski, a gold medalist at the 1998 Nagano Olympics, is a commentator for NBC Sports.
More than a month afterthe women’s singles figure skating competitionat theBeijing Winter Olympics, I still find myself thinking about what I saw that night on the ice.
A big part of me would like to think that I know exactly how Kamila was feeling that night at the Capital Indoor Ice Arena in Beijing — because I, too, was once a 15-year-old girl skating at the Olympics. I’ll never forget quivering uncontrollably just before my program started. I’d been skating my whole life, had even won a World Championship, and I’d never experienced anything like it. That’s what the Olympics can do to you.
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But what Kamila endured in Beijing is still bothering me because of everything I don’tknow. Which is everything that must have transpired for herto test positive for a banned substance, a heart medication, six weeks before the Olympics? I wonder who gave it to her, and under what circumstances she took it? Why wasn’t the positive test revealed until after the Olympics were already underway? And exactly what were the members of the Court of Arbitration for Sport thinking when they decided that it was best for Kamila to be allowed to continue competing in Beijing? I’m not sure we’ll ever learn the answers to all of those questions.
But what I do know is that when Kamila skated out onto the ice for her final Olympic performance, the women’s singles free skate, she was in the same place I was 24 years ago: as alone as any athlete in any sport could ever be.
It was clear how distraught she was, even in training sessions, and it all culminated in a performance that left her in fourth place. The other athletes who landed on the podium in front of her, including two teammates from Russia, painted an uncomfortable portrait of a wide mix of emotions. What was supposed to be one of the greatest moments of the Olympics had been shattered.
The Beijing Winter Olympic women’s figure skating medalists (from left) after Thursday’s free skate: Alexandra Trusova and Anna Shcherbakova of the Russian Olympic Committee and Japan’s Kaori Sakamoto.Matthew Stockman/Getty Images
After her skate, when she came off the ice, Kamila collapsed into the arms of her coach, who rather than comfort her, immediately began assailing her with questions. It was a scene where the only thing required was nowhere to be seen — simple humanity.
The result, of course, was awful not just for Kamila, but for my sport, for the Olympics, and for the athletes competing alongside her.
The rest of the world has moved on, and for good reason. A sports controversy seems like a trite affair in the shadow of the war in Ukraine. But as the figure skating world gathers again in France, debates are continuing about what should happen in response to what we saw in Beijing.
There have been calls to raise the minimum age to compete in the Olympics. To me, that’s not the answer. It’s a quick fix that will deny athletes a performance on the biggest stage, and ultimately not make much of a difference.
Even as Russian athletes have been banned from the Worlds because of the war, there have been renewed recommendations to ban the country more fully from international competition — not just because of current events, but because of their history of systematic cheating. But I’m still not sure that actually gets at the heart of what was so disturbing about what we saw Kamila go through in Beijing.
Over the past few years, star athletes like Simone Biles, Michael Phelps, Naomi Osaka, Kevin Love and othershave spoken eloquently and bravely about the mental health challengesthat come with competing in sports at the highest level. They’ve spoken about the need for putting better systems in place to support them, and for a course change on how we treat athletes who grapple with the pressures and complexities of competing on mainstream stages.
I consider myself incredibly fortunate to have had the coaches, mentors, and family that I did, who guided me through my time in the spotlight, and the years since as well. But not everyone is so lucky. And it’s certainly not their fault.
From gymnastics to figure skating and far beyond, in the United States and all over the world, the story remains the same: It’s not the athletes who need to change, it’s the system. And that was laid bare for the world to see in the reaction from Kamila’s coach, who was seemingly blind to the fact that the young skater’s errors on the ice weren’t technical. It wasn’t about a few bad takeoffs, or catching an edge, or the placement of an arm, or an under-rotation. It was the weight of the world on the shoulders of a beautiful figure skater, left completely alone in an already lonely place.
source: people.com
