Golden Lilia

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5. President's Applause
"The President of the USA shook my hand and congratulated me on my victory." Lilia Podkopayeva

• The AA competition is the battle for the title of absolute Olympic champion. People arrived almost two hours before the competition
• USA President Bill Clinton, wife Hillary, and daughter Chelsea took their seats in the arena. The President of the International Olympic Committee, Juan Antonio Samaranch, was ready to award the gold medal. 36 girls were divided into their rotation groups.
• Losinskaya: The lot was favorable to us. Lilia started on vault and finished with her 'crown' floor exercise
• Lilia's group included Ukrainian teammate Svetlana Zelepukina, Belarussian Yelena Piskun, Romanian Lavinia Milosovici, and China's Mo Huilan. Rivals in other groups were Oksana Chusovitina, Svetlana Khorkina, Dina Kochetkova, Roza Galiyeva, Svetlana Boginskaya, and three Americans. There were 10 candidates with a serious chance of winning
• Lilia got through vault well enough; she had a mistake on the first attempt, but the second was better. She had a 9.75 and 9.8, for a 9.781 average. She moved into sixth place
• Losinskaya: I was worrying horribly. I started to bring our third Ukrainian gymnast, Lyuba Sheremeta, out for her floor
• Lilia: I believed in my ultimate success, especially taking into account I was third on vault. Judges save the good scores for the gymnasts at the end of the rotation–that was normal. But when I vaulted well I felt better. It was like Sabae in 1995–I managed to do everything from the start and things went smoothly from there. Sixth place did not disappoint me; I was sure things would improve.
• Dominique Dawes scored a 9.812 on UB and she and Rosa Galieyva were at the top of the standings. Khorkina and Kochetkova were ahead of Lilia too.
• In the second rotation, Miller gained one of the highest marks of the day, a 9.862 on beam. Dawes followed her with a 9.825. The audience was delirious with delight. Galiyeva, Boginskaya, and China's Xiao Ya all made mistakes. Lilia got 9.8 on bars
• Losinskaya: Lilia was doing her first element when she made a mistake and bent her legs. My heart sunk
• Lilia: I had a bad time on bars. I couldn't recover after warm up and I had no time to treat my palms. The day before in training, I got a bloody callous on my palm. I was afraid to do bars, but the girls said, "When you go up to the apparatus you will forget everything and feel nothing." They were right. During the warm up I broke the callous and blood ran through my hand guard and I didn't feel pain. When I got down the doctor treated my palm and I was able to continue. This was normal for bars; I moved up to fifth place.
• Dawes, Miller, Mo, and Kochetkova were ahead after two rotations
• The third rotation was floor for the Americans. But Miller went out of bounds, and the Dawes fell. They got a 9.475 and 9.000 respectively and were out of the running for medals. No one would have predicted these mistakes
• Lilia's third event was beam. She got a 9.787, placing her third behind Mo and Kochetkova. Mo seemed like she'd repeated Li Xiaoshuang's AA win from the day before
• Lilia was the 1995 and the European 1996 champion, and no one in recent history had won the Olympic AA after similar victories at Worlds and Europeans
• Kochetkova scored only a 9.581 on vault and dropped to sixth
• Mo and Lilia were the last candidates for the gold, and Mo had the advantage of performing last
• Lilia: Before floor, I was behind Mo by 0.033. She was in my rotation and was to follow me. I started my routine and as I finished my first tumbling pass, with the skill named after me, I understood I must do everything very carefully and smile to get a good score. So I did, but the score was not so high, in my mind. Maybe the judges were saving a higher score for Mo?
• Lilia's floor was extraordinarily inspired and sincere, and won over the 30,000 spectators. They applauded like Lilia was an American. Her 9.887 was the highest in Atlanta.
• Lilia: Ostepenko told me after my floor, "That's my girl, now you are surely second." I got offended–why second?
• Losinskaya: Ostapenko was the senior coach of the national team and traditionally near Lilia at all major competitions. He was with Lilia in Atlanta, I was with Lyuba Sheremeta. I was trying to see Lilia, Mo, and Lyuba, who was on balance beam. I never wished Mo failure, because I knew how much and how hard gymnasts work
• Lilia: When more was performing on floor, I saw nothing. I put my face in Lena Piskun's shoulder. She was whispering in my ear about what was happening on the podium. When Mo went out of bounds, I thought, "I'll probably be first" but I even felt sorry for Mo. In Lena's arms I heard the announcement that I was the Olympic champion
• The crowd had grown fond of Lilia and cheered for her. Three Romanians shared the rest of the medals (Gogean took silver, Amanar and Milosovici shared the bronze). Juan Antonio Samaranch presented the gold medal to Lilia. The Clinton family stood and applauded
• Lilia: I was so bitter that my grandmother could not see me on the podium. It was hard not to cry. After receiving the medal, I was invited to a separate hall where the American team and Clinton were. We shook hands and were photographed. Later there were greetings and autographs. Ukrainian pole vaulting star Sergei Bubka and his brother Vasily came to congratulate me. At that moment, I couldn't feel like the Olympic champion–it was like after ordinary competitions. I saw things through a haze.
• Losinskaya: The ascent to Olympic gold is super difficult. Lilia wasn't super gifted and had to work very hard. Sometimes in training we would do the same balance beam routine up to 20 times
• Pugacheva: She achieved so much due to her diligence, obedience, and belief in her coach. She listened attentively and performed every task. Being the champion of Europe, she still looked in her coach's eyes, which not all athletes will do

 

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I think this is the first recap I've ever read of the 1996 team final that didn't mention Kerri Strug.

 

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Chapter 16

6. Invisible Tears

• The components of Lilia's success were sophisticated technical elements, perfect purity of performance, unique skills, and wonderful stability in the all around. She stood apart because she combined sports and art. Everyone already knew Figaro, but Dubova created the "gymnastics Figaro" in Lilia
• Dubova was not in Atlanta for Lilia's victory; the delegation had decided it was not necessary to bring the choreographer who had worked daily with Lilia for ten years.
• Dubova: I was awfully glad for Lilia, Galena, and a little for myself, because in Lilia's victory there is a part of our national choreography. She was just 10 when I asked Donetsk journalists to write about her and show her on television. One Romanian coach used to say, "I accept only gymnasts of Podkopayeva's type."
• The Americans anticipated Lilia's ascension. During the tv reports from Atlanta, producers inserted pictures of the gymnasts with different background images, and they associated Lilia with a star. The image was beautiful–rays of rising sun, then a rainbow, then an intense blue sky with white and blue clouds. A star appeared in the sky with Lilia flying around it.
• Friends and family at home were anxious. Lilia's mother couldn't bring herself to watch the competition–she left the house for half the night
• Lyudmila, Lilia's mother: My neighbors helped me set the VCR to record the program in Atlanta. As soon as the competition started I left the house and walked around praying until 2 am. Suddenly my neighbor ran out shouting, "Lucy, your daughter is the champion!" We ran home and everyone was crying. My son saw the tears and asked what was wrong, and I couldn't answer him. In the morning, I visited the church. We all love Lilia very much. I was afraid I would never be able to stand other competitions.
• Three days passed before the stress began again with the individual event finals
• Losinskaya: It was easier to compete in the finals because the main medal was already behind us
• Ukrainian officials were slightly worried before the EF began. The day before countryman Rustam Sharipov won the gold medal on PB. They were afraid the judges would not give Ukraine another gold
• In the BB final, Lilia finished slightly behind Miller for silver
• In FX, Lilia was scheduled to go second-to-last. All the main contenders did well. Lilia's Figaro was again perfect and her score was the highest one--9.887. Four of the six judges awarded her a 9.9. This meant one more gold for Lilia
• Eurosport commentators loved her dance, saying, "It's no wonder, since Podopayeva's coach is the prima ballerina of Donizk Opera, Svetlana Dubova."
• According to tradition, the Ukrainian delegation gathered to spray Lilia's two new medals with champagne, as they had done two days earlier with the AA medal
• As usual, Lilia carried two good luck charms in her bag: a Japanese paper crane and a worn-out travel bag
• Lilia: Sometime in 1990, I needed a gym bag for a competition. My grandfather and I went to market and he bought me a very simple blue bag made of raincoat material. I competed well at that competition and traveled with that bag until 1995. Now I carry it with me as a good luck charm. I have on more charm: my green leo, the Olympic one. I wore it first at 1996 European championships where I won. They made a set of leos for the Olympics. On the second day I wore the wine colored one and made a mistake, so I rejected it for all other competitions. I put it on for the exhibition and made a mistake again. There are lucky and unlucky leotards and I do not compete in an unlucky one. I wore the green leotard in both the AA and event finals
• The Olympic AA gold is the 60th of its color in her collection. Lyudmila Turischeva, 1972, was the most recent person before Lilia to be reining European and Olympic champion.
• Fans from the host country often ignore foreign competitors, but Lilia was an exception. They fell in love with her
• Losinskaya: At the Olympics, we were only there for gymnastics. The schedule for our training and competition was so tight that we could not watch our athletes in other sports. Just after the gymnastics competition, we went home