Valieva Returns: The Ice is Finally Calling Back
Do you remember watching the Beijing Olympics in 2022? It’s one of those sports memories that feels etched in acid. We weren’t just watching a competition; we were watching a 15-year-old girl completely unravel on the world’s biggest stage. It was uncomfortable, it was heartbreaking, and honestly, it felt like we might never see Kamila Valieva skate again.
This past Saturday, nearly four years after that chaotic winter in Beijing, Valieva stepped back onto the ice. She isn’t a kid anymore. She’s 19 now, and she made her return at the Russian jumping championships in Moscow. If you were wondering if she still had “it,” she wasted no time giving an answer. She opened with a quadruple toeloop—a massive, difficult jump that most skaters only dream of landing—and the crowd absolutely lost it.
Valieva Feels the Love in Moscow
You have to imagine the nerves she felt. After serving a four-year ban for doping, stepping back into the spotlight takes a certain kind of guts. But the atmosphere in Moscow wasn’t hostile; it was a homecoming.
Fans unfurled a massive banner that simply read, “We waited.” When she finished her set, the ice was littered with soft toys thrown from the stands—a figure skating tradition that screams affection. She told reporters she was just happy to be there, and honestly, you could see it. Despite placing sixth in the “duets” event and fourth in the individual category, just being there was the victory.
“I love this sport,” she said. And for the first time in a long time, it looked like the sport loved her back.
The Shadow of the Beijing Scandal
To understand the weight of this weekend, you have to look back at why she was gone in the first place. Valieva was the prodigy of the 2022 Games. She was doing things on the ice that defied physics. But then came the news that changed everything: a positive test for trimetazidine, a heart medication banned because it can boost endurance.
The defense offered at the time was complicated. There were stories about a strawberry dessert prepared by her grandfather on a chopping board contaminated by his heart medication. There were theories about shared glasses. It was a mess of explanations that the Court of Arbitration for Sport eventually rejected due to a lack of concrete evidence.
She was stripped of her team gold medal (which eventually went to the United States), faced a disqualification backdated to December 2021, and was essentially erased from the sport for four years. For a teenager, four years is a lifetime. It’s high school. It’s growing up.
Missing Out on Milan Cortina
Here is the bittersweet part of the story. Even though Valieva is back, the timing is just slightly off. The ban expired in December, but she missed the qualifiers for the upcoming Winter Olympics in Milan Cortina.
So, while she’s landing quads in Moscow, she’ll be watching the Olympics from home next week. It’s a tough pill to swallow for an athlete who was arguably the best in the world. In her place, skaters like Adeliia Petrosian will be chasing gold as Individual Neutral Athletes.
It’s also worth noting how much the sport has changed because of her case. The minimum age for skaters at the Olympics has been raised to 17, a direct response to the pressure put on Valieva when she was just 15.
A Reunion of Sorts
Saturday wasn’t just about Valieva, though she was certainly the headline. It felt like a reunion of that 2022 squad. Alexandra Ignatova—who you might remember as the silver medalist Alexandra Trusova, the “Quad Queen” herself—was also back on the ice. She’s been through a lot too, including getting married and having a baby last year. She didn’t make the semifinals, but seeing them both out there felt like turning a page on a very difficult chapter.
What Comes Next for Valieva?
So, where does she go from here? If she wants Olympic redemption, she has to wait until 2030. That is a long time in figure skating years. Bodies change, injuries happen, and new prodigies emerge every season.
But for now, I think it’s enough that she’s skating. Whatever you think about the scandal, the ban, or the politics of Russian sports, it’s hard not to feel a little bit of warmth seeing a young woman do the thing she loves after having her world turned upside down.
She’s back. She’s skating. And for the fans in Moscow holding those banners, that was worth the wait.
