Valeri Liukin

Valeri Viktorovich Liukin (Russian: Валерий Викторович Люкин, born 17 December 1966 in Aktyubinsk, Kazakh SSR, USSR) is a retired competitive artistic gymnast who competed for the former Soviet Union. Liukin is the 1988 Olympic Champion in the team competition and individually on the horizontal bar and Olympic silver medalist in the all-around and the parallel bars. He is now a coach.

Liukin is the first man to do a triple back flip on floor and both a layout Tkatchev and a Jaeger with full twist on high bar.

Liukin became a U.S. citizen in 2000. He is married to Anna Kotchneva and is the father and coach of 2008 Olympic champion Nastia Liukin. He is co-owner of the World Olympic Gymnastics Academy with Yevgeny Marchenko.

Biography

Liukin began gymnastics when he was 7 years old. He moved to Moscow to join the Soviet Junior National team. His rise in the ranks was consistent and his world debut came at the 1985 Friendship Cup. During his career, he was coached by Eduard Yarov. Liukin was a member of the USSR National Team until the 1991 dissolution of the Soviet Union.

At the 1987 European Championships in Moscow, he won gold medals in the all-around, on the horizontal bar on the floor exercise where he was the first gymnast to perform a tripple back sommersault. He won the silver medal on the still rings and the bronze on the vault. At the 1987 World Artistic Gymnastics Championships in Rotterdam, he won the team competition with the Soviet Union.

At the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, South Korea, Liukin won the gold medal in the team competition, and was the co-champion on the horizontal bar with fellow Soviet gymnast Vladimir Artemov. Liukin won the silver medal in the all-around and on the parallel bars.

At the 1991 World Artistic Gymnastics Championships in Indianapolis, he again was a member of the champion Soviet team in the Team competition. He won the bronze medal in the All-Around.

Following the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Liukin competed for his native Kazakhstan, competing for them most notably at the 1993 World Artistic Gymnastics Championships and the 1994 Asian Games, and did not win a medal at either competition.

He married Anna Kotchneva while still competing. Their daughter, Anastasia Liukina, nicknamed Nastia, and surname later Americanized to Liukin, was born in Moscow in 1989.

In 1992, Liukin moved to the United States and began a coaching career. Liukin originally moved to New Orleans. He and his family later moved to Plano, Texas.

Together with his longtime friend Evgeny Marchenko, Liukin owns and runs three World Olympic Gymnastics Academy locations. Carly Patterson, the 2004 Summer Olympics all-around champion trained in Liukin's gym. Others he has coached include his daughter, Nastia Liukin. Valeri Liukin coached her to the 2008 Summer Olympics, where she won five medals, including the All-Around gold. He is currently coaching Rebecca Bross who placed second in the All Around Competition at the World Championships in London 2009 and Ivana Hong who had been an alternate on the Olympic Team 2008.

He was the International Coach of the Year in 2000 and 2004. He was inducted into the International Gymnastics Hall of Fame in 2005.^[2]

Liukin had a small cameo in the film Stick It as the spotter in his daughter's uneven bars routine.

References

External links

• World Olympic Gymnastics Academy Homepage
• List of Competitive Results at Gymn Forum
• Full Biography
• Valeri Liukin at Fédération Internationale de Gymnastique
• Valeri Liukin Video Interviews on Gymnastike.org