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Kamila Valieva: Short program routine was worst of the season, but best of her life in wake of doping scandal

The 15-year-old was visibly emotional on the ice after a flawed performance that was still good enough to give her the lead

BEIJING – Kamila Valieva has cried happy tears and sad tears over the week-long rollercoaster that has seen her battle her own doping agency, the International Olympic Committee [IOC] and then the rigours of top-level figure skating. In the end, as she so often has in her short career, she emerged on top.

Five hours before Valieva was due to skate competitively, there were more writers, reporters, camera operators and photographers in the National Indoor Stadium than perhaps at any other point during these Olympic Games. It would only get busier but even Valieva’s last practice session was carefully scrutinised.

The red-haired, red-dressed Alexandra Trusova, one of Valieva’s team-mates, might have created some distraction with her regular falls to the ice during the pre-competition session but all eyes were on Valieva. Trusova could have nailed a quintuple jump while sculpting a perfect statue of Xi Jinping and barely anyone would have batted an eyelid. Every eye, lens and phone was trained on Valieva’s flowing purple dress.

When she came to rehearse her run, she fell after her first jump, a triple axel that is certainly tricky but which she has landed several times as part of the routine that broke the world record at the European Championship last month. She almost beat that mark again in the team event. After hitting the ice, the 15-year-old picked herself up and carried on. Then she fell again. Out of sympathy for a teenager skating with the weight of the world on her shoulders, few gasped. Internally though, everyone did.

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Valieva said on Monday that she felt “emotionally tired”, and revealed she had spent seven hours on the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) hearing on Sunday night, a punishment enough for anyone. Clearly she wanted to compete, but under these circumstances anyone might have forgiven her for faking an injury or simply choosing not to. Meanwhile, other skaters struggled to hide their frustration at the contradictions of the decision to let her skate.

“I wish it was a level playing field and it’s not,” said Britain’s Natasha McKay. Even the IOC would have struggled to argue that it was. Valieva has taken a banned substance. No one disputes that. Only the incompetence of the doping agencies failed to flag it earlier.

In the circumstances, Valieva’s skate was stunning. As has never been under question, she is a fabulous skater and the situation lifted up the performance she produced far beyond any scores on the judges’ scorecards. The short program allows less opportunity for the explosiveness for which she is best known but there was no shortage of accuracy and flair. This is a world-record routine at its best and even at its worst is good enough to beat most of the planet. This was somewhere in between.

The whole arena held its breath as Valieva left the ice to complete her first jump, the triple axel which had twice floored her in warm-up. There was an intake then when she very nearly lost control, touching a hand down to keep her balance. Would Valieva have faltered were it not for the week she has had? You have to assume not.

There were one or two other uncharacteristic errors, albeit none as bad, and the score – 82.16 – was her lowest of the season in the short program.

In fact, of the three Russian stars of this competition, only Anna Shcherbakova lived up to her reputation. Trusova, who had fallen multiple times in warm-up, did so in her routine but was still good enough to beat all bar one of the other non-Russian skaters. These three “Quad Queens” are by far and away the best in the world and only Trusova’s troubles opened the door to Japan’s Kaori Sakamoto, who snuck into third. You would still back a Russian sweep on Thursday night.

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And yet none of them will be given a medal. Now that Valieva is virtually guaranteed one of some colour, the IOC have said they will not hand out the metal. Instead, a lengthy legal process will follow, at the end of which, Olympic medals will arrive in the post. Those moments, as many have pointed out, are the pinnacle of athletes’ careers, some of their lives. About half of figure skaters only get one Olympics, and the medal winners on Thursday will not get that moment. They have been cheated in so many ways – as have we, the audience.

Because figure skating is a sport to get lost in, to luxuriate in, to allow oneself to be totally absorbed into each routine. No other sport has the same level of immersion, performance and whimsy. This scandal has robbed us of that. We have been cheated out of an unparalleled sporting moment.

Nevertheless, we can find succour in one thing: Valieva did rise above it all, and will more than likely win the Olympic title on Thursday. It will require more than the ordinary level of suspension of disbelief, but if you can manage it, the night will be something to savour.

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