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The women's singles match of figure skating at the Beijing Winter Olympics ended on February 17, but the storm surrounding this game continues to spread. At the press conference the day after the match, IOC President Bach also expressed his views on the issues related to the match, and he also made it clear that the Valieva incident was far from over.
The course of the match needs no further elaboration, with Vallieva, Serbakova and Trusova from the Russian Olympic team still being the absolute focus of the capital stadium, and even after the game, the story surrounding the three of them continues. As more post-match footage is made public on the Internet, the true emotions of these flower season girls on the ice rink have also surfaced.
In the whole story, the most injured is Camilla Vallieva. Since the official delay in holding the award ceremony for the figure skating team competition, K Bao has become the center of the storm of public opinion. Her psychological pressure reached its limit before the women's singles free skating competition began, and the International Olympic Committee made it clear that if Vallieva, who ranked first in the short program, finally landed on the podium, there would be no women's singles award ceremony. This has actually pushed Valieva into a dilemma, if she is not willing to live up to her past efforts, play to the level, get the top three, it is equivalent to ruining the opportunity for other players to receive cheers in the center of the ice rink, and Valieva's own ranking may eventually be deprived of drugs; not playing her true level, it is obviously difficult for athletes at this level to accept. It was in this context that Vallieva ended up making many mistakes and ranking fourth, which also triggered some viewers and ice fans to speculate about the course and outcome of the game...
Whether Vallieva's fourth is a coincidence or a deliberate one, she is under tremendous pressure. Although she has extraordinary technical ability and psychological quality, she is still a 15-year-old girl after all. The scene captured by the broadcast public signal is also worrying, when Vallieva slid to the sidelines at the end of the game, her coach Tut Berize did not choose to comfort K Bao, but criticized her for why she gave up the fight. This scene was also noticed by IOC President Bach, who watched the broadcast of the game, and at the press conference the next day, Bach criticized the behavior of Vallieva's coaching team.
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I was very upset when I watched the game on TV yesterday, and from Vallieva's performance, I can see how much mental stress she is under. As a former athlete, I understand what it's like to be under pressure, but Valieva is under more stress than I could have imagined, especially for a 15-year-old girl. Then I saw how her closest team treated her, and they were so indifferent instead of trying to comfort her.
— President of the International Olympic Committee Bach
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At the press conference, Bach further said that the drug incident about Vallieva will not be terminated because the competition is over, and the doping incident will not be an isolated incident, not an athlete himself. Illicit drugs should not appear in athletes, and those who let drugs into athletes are truly guilty.
Whoever is responsible for Vallieva's drug involvement, or indeed accidentally ingested it, Valieva's Olympic Games are over. From the spectacular team competition to the women's singles with thousands of fingers on their backs, everything is too heavy for an underage child. The latest news shows that Vallieva did not continue to stay in the Olympic Village, but set off for Russia accompanied by her sister.
Back in the athlete group after the competition, while Valieva was crying bitterly, her teammate, Alexandra Trusova, who won the women's singles runner-up, was also out of control, and she loudly vented her grievances, which was also captured by the camera. Maybe it is out of the despair of not being able to win the championship after challenging the difficulty limit, or it may be that the emotions that have accumulated over the years that think that they have been "pressed" by the referee have erupted in a concentrated way, "Sasha" cried in front of everyone, why does everyone have a gold medal, only they don't? She even shouted "I hate figure skating" and "I don't want to skate again", and she even refused to participate in the post-race flower ceremony for a while.
Although Trusova finally cooperated to complete the flower ceremony, her emotions were still not completely calmed, and at the post-match press conference, when explaining to the media why she was out of control, "Sasha" once again burst into tears.
I haven't won a gold medal in three years, and I've always blamed it on lack of difficulty, so I've added more and more four-week jumps to myself. I think this time at the Beijing Winter Olympics, if I can successfully complete the action, I can win the championship. Unfortunately, it backfired, so I was disappointed.
— Russian Olympic team figure skater Trusova
While everyone was busy taking care of two emotionally out-of-control teammates, champion Anna Serbakova was "ignored". This girl, who should have been surrounded by everyone in the middle and received the best wishes of everyone, stood alone on the sidelines at that moment, accompanied only by the plush teddy bear in her arms. If you don't know the result of the game, just look at the cold atmosphere next to Serbakova, no one will believe that she is the champion.
"Qianjin" has also won many major championships in her career, but the strange scene after winning the Olympic championship this time is probably something she did not expect at all. Indeed, who would have thought that on the night of the championship, they would become the neglected one? When you want to celebrate the rewards of your years of efforts, but see both teammates on the verge of psychological collapse, this complex emotion, not many people have the opportunity to experience.
My emotions are mixed right now. I was in the right place at the right time, I did the right thing, and it was the result of my training. But I can't accept this fact right now, my brain is blank.
— Russian Olympic team figure skater Serbakova
Not far from "Sanwa", bronze medalist, Japan's Hanaori Sakamoto, was supposed to be the only athlete to shed tears of excitement. She herself did not expect to be able to snatch a medal from the Russian "matryoshka doll", even in Sakamoto's own view, this bronze medal also has some "leaks" meaning. But then again, which athlete's honor doesn't come from his own efforts? Even if the strength is not absolutely superior to the opponent, who can tolerate the outside world to identify themselves as "leaky" cards?
After a series of storms, the figure skating women's singles event strangely went to a happy ending where only the third place was the happiest, and this was obviously not the end of the event. International sports organizations will investigate Vallieva's positive drug test and even the indifferent attitude of the coaching team towards her. But unfortunately, for the figure skating girls whose peak careers are often more short-lived, it is difficult to have the opportunity to rewrite this unapologetic story...