Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva returned to competition on Saturday following her doping ban, making a statement with a quadruple jump nearly four years after disputes over her positive test overshadowed the Beijing Olympics.
The 19-year-old Valieva was skating in the quarterfinals of the Russian jumping championships in Moscow.
She started with a quadruple toeloop jump to cheers from the crowd and qualified for Sunday’s semifinals, as well as placing sixth in a “duets” jump event. The nationally televised event wasn’t a typical skating competition, with points only for jumps.
Valieva cannot qualify for the Milan Cortina Olympics, where another Russian skater, Adeliia Petrosian, is a contender for the women’s gold medal as an Individual Neutral Athlete.
Then aged 15, Valieva was at the center of a legal battle during the 2022 Beijing Games when a sample she gave two months earlier tested positive for the banned substance trimetazidine.
The revelation came after Valieva won team gold with other Russian skaters. She was later disqualified from that event, which upgraded the United States to gold. Valieva was a contender for the women’s gold medal but placed fourth and was criticized rink-side by her coach, Eteri Tutberidze.
Valieva eventually served a ban which expired in December, despite long-running legal efforts to have it overturned, including at the Swiss supreme court last year.
Since the 2022 Olympics, rules have been changed to raise the minimum age for skaters to 17 in time for the Milan Cortina Olympics.
Also returning to action on Saturday was Alexandra Ignatova, who won the silver medal at the 2022 Olympics under her maiden name of Alexandra Trusova. She was competing for the first time since giving birth last year and didn’t reach the semifinals.
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