After the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster the Soviet policy of glasnost (openness) was greatly expanded. themselves to grueling workouts and seeing how much pain they can endure before Change ), You are commenting using your Facebook account. In one of the most stunning all-around performances in history, she won the gold medal, beating out Olympic Champions Nadia Comăneci and top-ranked Soviet gymnast Nellie Kim, among others. We have plenty of others to take her place.”. Unlike other examples of Mukhina’s criticisms where she is lead into the topic of Soviet misconduct by the interviewer, the letters are a topic she interjects into the conversation on her own initiative. In the 1991 documentary More than a Game, Mukhina spoke of trying to convince her coach that the Thomas salto was a dangerous element: "…my injury could have been expected. We provide you with news from the entertainment industry. It was this particular detail that had allowed the Soviets to so effectively propagate the idea that Mukhina injured herself while training on her own. Mukhina had been out of the hospital to take away her physical ability to move. It is hard to criticize Mukhina for being wrong, but on the topic of asserting she deserves some of the blame, Mukhina absolutely is. The real issue was since the Soviets were unable to engage in a complete coverup, they pivoted to spinning the narrative instead. Mukhina was rushed into surgery that afternoon, but the damage had already been done to her reputation; one of the National Team coaches, she said in the Ogonyok interview, showed up at her bed the day after surgery and outright stated that she "wasn’t conscientious" and that she could still "train in a cast." Change ), You are commenting using your Facebook account. It is not in Mukhina’s style to target specific individuals in her criticisms. As a result fans asked Medvedeva if that was an accurate representation of how often figure skaters drink. follow her commands. It goes completely against Mukhina’s typical behavior and references to the post-injury fan mail appear in Mukhina’s rhetoric in different decades. She also tied for the gold medal in the floor exercise event final, as well as winning the silver in balance beam and uneven bars.

It stated she broke three vertebrae and even goes as far as to use the term “paralysis.” But it specifically avoids making a direct statement on whether it was a temporary or a life-long condition. Titov was forced to backtrack from this statement when it was asked since she would soon be recovered, then why wouldn’t the media soon be able to interview Mukhina and obtain her version of the events that had transpired? At a young age she took an interest in gymnastics and figure skating. During the Olympic television broadcast commentators interviewed Titov and asked about Elena Mukhina. There was little doubt that the Soviet Olympic women’s gymnastics team would get the gold medal in the team competition at the 1980 Summer Olympics, as it did at all previous Olympics.

I had hurt myself badly several times but he (coach Mikhail Klimenko) just replied people like me don’t break their necks.". across Mukhina may not understand how the World Championships relates to the It is important to note every Soviet institution operated in a flawed system that pressured its own administrators into behaving in such a reckless fashion. She also expressed a deep religious faith, and was fond of horses and animated cartoons.

After Mukhina's paralysis and several other close calls with other Olympic-eligible female gymnasts, the Thomas salto has been removed from the Code of Points as an allowed skill for women. In some cases, Soviet athletes who had been victimized by this tactic had suffered mental breakdowns over the way the press was treating them and the pressure to match their previous standards of athletic excellence.