Yulia Lipnitskaya: From Olympic Gold to Family Life
This native of Yekaterinburg is remembered as the 15-year-old girl in a red dress on the Olympic ice in Sochi, dancing to the piercing melody from «Schindler»s List.« At that moment, figure skater Yulia Lipnitskaya burst into the world»s sports rankings and news feeds.
The stunning success of the girl performing crazy pirouettes and the most complex jumps soon ended, and a few years later Yulia ended her professional career altogether. In time, she gave birth to two children and immersed herself in family life. E1.RU decided to recall the story of the talented athlete and find out what she is doing now.
Her Mother Raised the Future Champion Alone
Yulia was born in 1998 in Yekaterinburg. Her mother, Daniela Lipnitskaya, raised her daughter alone. The girl«s father, Vyacheslav, left to serve in the army even before she was born and never returned to the family.
«When Yulia»s mother became pregnant, Slavka was drafted into the army. He never came back from there,« family friend Valentina Popova said about the skater»s father. «They say he moved to another city right after his service. Daniela raised the girl alone, gave her her surname. She had to work several jobs, even at the market. I remember Daniela would come home frozen. But she endured it all.»
The girl grew up as an active child and, while still a toddler, roller-skated boldly. Her mother saw talent in her four-year-old daughter and took her to the local sports school «Lokomotiv.» Working several jobs, Daniela Leonidovna rented a cheap apartment near the stadium so it would be more convenient for Yulia to go to training.
«She Never Cried When She Fell»
Yulia«s first coaches were Elena Levkovets and Marina Voitsekhovskaya. The teachers immediately noticed that the girl stood out from her peers with her seriousness.
«In 2002, her mother brought her to our school. Everyone was left in the hall; there was a selection process: some were scared, some cried, some were shy, except for one girl — that was Yulia. She sat up high on the Swedish wall and watched all the children. During the testing, Yulia performed all the exercises and passed the selection with a grade of »five.« I remember how in training she would fall, get up, and run on. She didn»t even cry when she fell at four years old. Never!« Yulia»s first coach told E1.RU in an interview.
When Yulia was little, she did not lose a single tournament in Yekaterinburg. The young athlete performed well in competitions and at the Russian Junior Championships.
«She was always among the winners. She even placed 8th or 9th at the Russian nationals when she was nine, I don»t remember exactly. Even then, Yulia stood out with her flexibility, stretch, and gorgeous spins. Specialists were already looking at her, and that little star had already lit up,« shared Elena Levkovets.
In 2009, when Lipnitskaya had already reached her ceiling in Yekaterinburg, she moved to the capital with her mother. In Moscow, she managed to get into Eteri Tutberidze«s group and within a few months mastered all the triple jumps.
«Yulia was about eight years old when she came to me for a tryout. Probably every coach looks for the right material to work with. But material alone isn»t enough; parents are also important,« Tutberidze explained.
At the 2009/2010 Russian Junior Championships, the skater placed fifth, and a year later she was fourth at the senior national championships. She also won the Grand Prix in Poland and took gold medals in Italy and Canada.
The pre-Olympic season the athlete started with a triumph in Finland, then won competitions in China, France, and Paris. Yulia did not compete in the Grand Prix Final due to injury, returning to the ice only in the second half of the 2012/2013 season.
Another landmark victory for the athlete was gold at the 2014 European Championships. It was not easy for Yulia Lipnitskaya then, but her coach and mother were always by her side:
«Yulia is having a very hard time even now, she fights with her weight every day. I have never encountered anything like this in my work — she just absolutely cannot eat. And I»m very sorry she has to endure so much, but I can«t do anything about it. She»s great for dealing with it. When she needs to lose weight, she only eats «Squizy» powder — it«s fiber that gives energy. It»s hard for her, and the weight goes down very slowly — by 100 grams a day. But she manages, thank God,« the coach said in an interview with Team Russia 2014.
Won Gold at 15
At 15, Yulia Lipnitskaya became the main hope of the Russian figure skating team. The young girl became a hero of the Sochi Olympics, brilliantly skating the short and free programs in the team competition.
She climbed to the top step of the podium and became the second-youngest Olympic figure skating champion in the history of the Winter Games.
On February 20, 2014, Yulia performed her free program to music from the famous film «Schindler»s List.« Viewers around the world admired the athlete»s talent and wondered how a fragile girl could be so restrained.
President Vladimir Putin personally congratulated the skater on her victory. Her performance also moved director Steven Spielberg, who wrote Yulia a thank-you letter.
«So I»m Supposed to Weigh 37 kg My Whole Life to Please You?«
Lipnitskaya continued skating after Sochi but never achieved the same serious success as before the Olympics. In the 2014 Grand Prix Final, she placed fifth; at the 2015 Russian Championships — ninth.
A year after the Olympics, Yulia disappeared from the national team and stopped showing high results.
In January 2015, rumors spread about a conflict between Lipnitskaya and Eteri Tutberidze, and by the end of the year it became known that the skater was moving to coach Alexei Urmanov. With him, Yulia won silver at the Cup of Russia and victory at the Tyrol Cup.
«Lipnitskaya will never return to me. Three hundred percent — she won»t take that step, she left for too long. Moreover, she understands I won«t change. You have to work. And why should I take her back if she won»t? So she can be an extra? But she is not the girl who should just be on the roster,« Tutberidze fumed.
At the 2016 Russian Grand Prix, Yulia placed 12th — that performance was her last.
After the Olympics, Lipnitskaya was also promised a 70-square-meter apartment in Moscow, but she only received the keys in 2017. The athlete«s home is located in the southwest of the capital.
In photos from receiving the apartment keys, fans noticed the skater had gained weight. This became grounds for gossip that she was expecting a child.
«I»m not pregnant, enough already. Have a conscience,« the athlete wrote. »So I«m supposed to weigh 37 kilograms (81.5 lbs) my whole life to please you? I»ve lost enough weight already, that«s it.»
«Put the Skates in the Closet and Went to a Clinic»
On August 28, 2017, Yulia«s mother announced that her daughter had ended her sports career. The skater had undergone three months of treatment for anorexia.
Later, in an interview published on the Figure Skating Federation website, when asked what prevented her from fully realizing her potential in sports, Lipnitskaya admitted: «99 percent — health problems. And the rest, obviously, was added to that. After my diagnosis was announced, people started writing to me, asking why I did it. But even if I hadn»t said it myself, the information would have leaked anyway. Anorexia is a disease of the 21st century, it«s quite common. Unfortunately, not everyone copes with it… After the Cup of Russia, I came home, put my skates in the closet, and haven»t seen them since. I«m not drawn to the ice anymore. In January, I went to a clinic. That»s the whole story.«
That same year, a former soldier named Vyacheslav went on air on Channel One and claimed to be the parent of the famous skater: «In 2014, there was the Olympics in Sochi. I noticed the surname of one of the participants. I saw myself… I am 100 percent sure of this. I googled online and saw that Yulia»s mother is Daniela, and I immediately understood it was my girl. All the dates when I was with her match perfectly. They got me a phone number, and I made contact. Yulia picked up the phone, I recognized her voice immediately. She passed the phone to her mom, who told me not to call,« the man shared.
Later, Yulia stated that this man had no relation to her.
«What he was saying about me — I just want to shove a gag in his mouth. It»s impossible to listen to such things! As for my father, I know perfectly well who he is and where he lives. So I«m warning you: if such cases are repeated, if my »daddies or relatives,« obsessed with the desire to get publicity at my expense, start appearing on channels, then we»ll meet them in court,« Lipnitskaya said.
But Yulia did not abandon her skates completely. In 2018, together with athlete Elena Ilinykh, she decided to open a «Champions Academy» to train children and adults. The skater also worked as a sports commentator and performed in ice shows.
In an interview with E1.RU, Ilya Averbukh explained why Yulia Lipnitskaya disappeared after ending her career: «Despite having a public sport, she is a rather modest and even perhaps slightly private person. She always, even at her peak, felt awkward with this giant popularity. After ending her career, she quietly moved on to family life. She has a wonderful family, she works very well as a coach. She has no internal need to keep the attention on herself. Such a position certainly commands respect.»
Currently, the athlete is part of the «Angels of Plushenko» figure skating academy.
Two Husbands and Having Children
In 2020, it became known that Yulia Lipnitskaya had become a mother for the first time. The father of baby Katalina was Vladislav Tarasenko, with whom she had been in a relationship for several years by then. The young parents long hid that they were expecting a child.
Vladislav Tarasenko trained under Alexei and Tatyana Mishin, and Eteri Tutberidze. In 2015, he won the Russian Cup Final among juniors, and spent his last season in pair skating under the guidance of Tamara Moskvina.
In 2022, Lipnitskaya«s common-law husband was mobilized to participate in the special military operation. In the fall, he received a draft notice and was then sent to a training ground in Alabino near Moscow. Two years later, the couple broke up.
In 2024, Yulia gave birth to her second child — a son named Arseny. However, the boy«s father was another famous figure skater and coach of Alexandra Trusova — Dmitry Mikhailov. Lipnitskaya married him in June of that year. The couple»s wedding took place in the summer in a prestigious area on Rublyovka Highway, and the newlyweds invited only their closest people to the celebration.
«For both of us, this marriage is the first. We recently had a wonderful child, and this is true happiness! We would have calmly talked about it when we considered it necessary,» the athlete explained on social media.
Now Yulia continues to lead a quiet, private life with her husband and two children. She still works as a children«s figure skating coach.
We collect stories of world and Russian stars who were born and raised in Sverdlovsk Oblast in a special feature.
* The social network is banned in the Russian Federation.
