2013 European and Universiade All Around Champion, World beam champion Aliya Mustafina has been awarded a Silver Doe Award in a poll of the best Russian athletes of the year conducted by the Federation of a Russian Sports Journalists. Pole vaulter Elena Isinbayeva won the overall title of athlete of the year.
Maria Filatova – the first ever picture taken of her doing gymnastics! By kind permission of Maria Filatova Kourbatova My first memory of Maria Filatova is a little girl with huge, white ribbons in her hair, so tiny she seemed to have to stand on tiptoe to be able to see over the balance beam. At 4’ 6” tall, she was the smallest competitor at the 1976 Montreal Olympics, yet she was already part of the Soviet senior team, competing alongside such established stars as Ludmilla Tourischeva, Nelli Kim, Elvira Saadi and Olga Korbut. The ‘Siberian Sparrow’, trained in Leninsk-Kuznetsk by Innokenty Mametyev since a very early age, celebrated her 15 th birthday on the 19 th July 1976, the day of the team final. That night, she slept with her first – not her last - Olympic gold medal beneath her pillow. For all her cuteness, Maria Filatova was a fearsome gymnast and competitor. If the crowd were awed by the pyrotechnics of Romanian technician Nadia Comaneci, they we...

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ReplyDeleteI thought her name was Yelena Isinbayeva. And I didn't know she was still pole vaulting I thought she retired. Love her though she's incredible to watch. Aliya reminds me of her and they have a lot in common too.
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