Maria Abakumova: golden explosion. Vice-champion of the Beijing Games won the bronze medal in the javelin throw Katrina Prayer Germany

- one of those athletes with whom experts are justified athletics our country is pinned by the medal hopes of London. Maria was born in Stavropol, January 15, 1986. As a seven-year-old girl, she began to play sports, the parents brought the first-grader to the pool for swimming. But there she stayed, after swimming there were classes artistic gymnastics, tennis, and only already, being a third-grader, Maria, came to athletics, to the group of coach Irina Komarova.

At first, Maria performed in the hurdle race, then she jumped in length and even pushed the core. By the way, the girl got this look most successfully, it was here that she won her first significant award - gold medal national champion in 1998. The next year, Maria began to act as a javelin thrower and already in the first starts showed good results - at the national championship among juniors, she was able to improve the country's record by 4 meters at once. Maria Abakumova and to this day own the highest achievements of Russia in javelin throwing among juniors and youth. In 2005, Maria started at the Continental Youth Championship in Kaunas. By sending a projectile to 57 meters 11 centimeters in the last attempt, Maria won. This year, the young athlete sent the javelin seven more times over 59 meters, which made the coaches of the national team pay attention to her to include her in the adult team.

World Championships in Athletics in Berlin (Germany), August 18, 2009

As an adult thrower, Maria Abakumova performed for the first time at the European Cup in Florence. In the company of the strongest throwers in the world, the young Stavropol woman was not an extra and took seventh place.

From that time on, Maria Abakumova began to enter the world athletics elite in her kind of athletics. In 2007, the athlete takes a high seventh place in the finals of the planetary championship, and the next year makes her way to the country's Olympic team.

Olympic Games in Beijing (China), August 21, 2008

Maria's Olympic debut was not only sensational, but also dramatic. And the point is not only that the competitions on August 21, 2008 in the capital of China were held in pouring rain. As Maria herself admitted after the end of the competition, throughout the tournament she experienced the strongest psychological pressure. All the spectators were rooting for Spotakova, it happened obtrusively and demonstratively - they talked to her, greeted her - they knew her as a leader and wanted to see her as a winner. But in the very first attempt, Maria Abakumova sends a projectile at 69 m 32 cm and becomes the leader. In the fourth, Mary sets new record Europe and before the last attempt is ahead of the main rival by more than one and a half meters. In her last throw, Spotakova did almost incredible - she threw a javelin at 71 m 42 cm and became an Olympic champion. Nevertheless, in the final of the Olympiad alone, Maria managed to improve her personal best by more than 5 meters - also a kind of record. Maria does not regard her performance in Beijing as a sensation; she claims that she was in "amazing" shape at that moment.

European Athletics Championships in Barcelona (Spain), July 27, 2010

In the 2009 post-Olympic season, Abakumova took third place at the world championship in Berlin, and two years later she triumphantly became the world champion in Daegu. Maria in the second attempt of the final showed the result of 71 m 25 cm, and in the fifth she threw a shell at 71 m 99 cm. This was the second longest javelin throw in women's athletics in history. Then only the world record holder Spotakova threw.

Maria Abakumova - Honored Master of Sports of Russia, she was awarded the Medal of the Order of Merit for the Fatherland, II degree.

Coached by Maria A. Sinitsyn, G. Abakumova and Irina Komarova.

World Athletics Championships in Daegu (South Korea), September 2, 2011

Today, the thoughts of the athlete and her coaches are entirely focused on preparing for the London Olympics. Once, even after the World Championships in Daegu, in an interview, Maria said that she dreams of surpassing the Russian record. According to Maria and her coaches, today she has everything necessary for a successful performance in London - skill, experience, psychological stability. Maria believes that if luck accompanies her, then in London, not only a new Russian record can be born, she is ready for this.

Yuri Danilov

WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP

Yesterday in Daegu, 25-year-old Russian Maria Abakumova defeated in an incredible fight Olympic champion Beijing in javelin throw to Barbora Shpotakova, becoming the world champion for the first time in her career.

Sergey BUTOV
from Daegu

Abakumova prepared for this championship with all the thoroughness sent down to her by the Creator. Here's a simple story for you. Shortly before leaving for Korea, Maria sat on a bench in her favorite sweatpants - the same ones in which she went to the Olympic sector in 2008, where she won silver. There was tar on the bench, Abakumova got her lucky pants dirty, and she threw all her inexhaustible energy into returning them to a competitive look. I washed, rubbed the tar stain with acetone in my free time. Patience and work will grind everything - in short, Abakumova won. And yesterday, in these very pants, I became the world champion.

Russian reporters surrounded Abakumova after the press conference, pushed her against the wall and closed the ring, cutting her off from the rest of the world. And they started talking, since this did not require asking a single question. I listened to Maria, unleashing all her tremendous charm on us, and thought: "What is she talking about? What the hell are pants?" And then suddenly I remembered the famous Barbora Shpotakova, the Olympic champion and the current world record holder, who was crawling on all fours right in the sector - looking for an earring that had flown out of her ear.

No, just imagine the situation. Just a minute ago, Abakumova made the best shot of her life, sending her spear to 71.99. She set a new record for Russia, a new record for the world championships. The best result of the season in the world, finally. Shpotakova, whom the entire athletics world considered a strong, cold-blooded, calculating woman, a kind of Margaret Thatcher with a spear, had only one throw left in order to change history. Well, when there is an attempt, this is not a defeat: the German David Storl has just proved it, pushing his heavy core in the last approach to a personal record - 21.78 - and snatching the gold medal from the hands of Canadian Dylan Armstrong.

The legendary javelin thrower, Shpotakova's coach Jan Zhelezny was already rushing about the podium, ready to tell the ward how many steps to take on the run or how to put the foot correctly. Czech fans have already started playing the war songs. And our Margaret Thatcher continued to crawl around the sector in search of an earring.

And then I started to respect Abakumova's pants. I saw in them real strength and a serious factor that most directly influenced the outcome of her incredible battle with Shpotakova, and in general I understood a lot about the female spear. I understood what it is like to train the best javelin thrower in the world, the wonderful coach Alexander Sinitsyna, who chewed his lips with a stone face for an hour and a half at the coaching exchange. I realized what it was worth dancing together this champion tango, if not the calmness, the worldly wisdom of Sinitsyn, who manages to conquer the emotional Everests of Abakumova every time, this box of dynamite, ready to explode at every minute, scatter to pieces.

We do not know how Abakumova managed to win yesterday, when, a day before the final, she could not step on her sore leg. We don't know how it was possible at all to remain such a cheerful human being after she was still a beginner athlete who ran after the mice who declared war on Abakumova on the 8-meter territory entrusted to her in the hostel, where she ate, washed clothes, dried them and accepted for two years in a row. guests. Lived, in a word!

We only know that Sinitsyn promised to shave off his musketeer mustache, which he has worn for many years, in honor of the victory of his favorite at the Olympic Games. And we understand: if the darling really wants, the death sentence will be signed to Sinitsyn's mustache.

A SPEAR. Women

The best results in the history of the Spear. Women

Maria Abakumova was born on January 15, 1986 in the city of Stavropol. For the first time, a girl took up a spear at the age of ten. At first, the classes did not bring the desired results, but a few years later, the athlete began to train more seriously. Irina Vladimirovna Komarova became the first coach of the athlete. Then her mother Galina Abakumova and the resident of Krasnodar Alexander Sinitsyn became her mentors.

At the junior world championship in 2003, Maria Abakumova was able to throw a javelin at 51, 41 m. As a result, she took fourth place. However, in 2005, in the same competitions, the athlete won gold with a result of 57.11 m.

Two years later, the athlete managed to take only seventh place at the World Championship, but a year later Abakumova became the champion of Russia and received an Olympic license.

At the Olympic Games in Beijing on August 21, 2008 at the National Stadium, the women's javelin throw final took place under the incessant rain. On the first attempt, twenty-two-year-old Abakumova seized the lead, sending a projectile at 69 meters 32 cm.In the second attempt, Maria threw 69 meters 8 cm, and in the fourth attempt, a throw of 70 meters 78 cm was successful, which became a new European record and only 92 cm worse than the world record of Cuban Osleidis Menendez.

Before the last sixth attempt, Abakumova was 1 meter 56 cm ahead of the running second world champion of 2007, Czech Barbora Shpotakova, by 1 meter 56 cm. Only Shpotakova's shot remained. And the Czech woman managed to accomplish the almost incredible: she threw 71 meters 42 cm and took the lead, breaking the European record set a few minutes earlier. Abakumova had the last chance to snatch gold with her last throw, but Maria sent her spear 67 meters 52 cm and remained second.

It should be noted that before the start of the Beijing Games, Maria's personal record was 65 meters 71 cm. Thus, at the Olympics, Abakumova threw more than her previous personal record five times, improving it by more than five meters.

At the 2011 World Championships in Daegu, Maria in the second attempt at the final set a new record for Russia: 71 m 25 cm.In the fifth attempt, Shpotakova came out on top, sending a spear at 71 m 58 cm, but immediately Maria threw 71 m 99 cm, once again updating the record of Russia, and showing the second result in the history of women's javelin throw. Only Shpotakova's world record is higher. As a result, Maria was the first Russian woman to become the world champion in this discipline, setting a national record and a world championship record.

In 2013, Maria Abakumova performed at the World Championships in Moscow, where she won a bronze medal. In the same year, the athlete became the winner of the World Summer Universiade in Kazan.

In February 2014, Maria Vasilievna was a torchbearer in the Krasnodar stage of the Olympic torch relay.

A year later, the athlete became the winner of the international athletics tournament Valter Kalami Memorial, which was held in Estonia. In the same year, at the 2015 Russian Championship in Cheboksary, the athlete took the second position.

In February 2016, at the Winter Championship and the Russian Championship in Long Throwing in Adler, Maria took second place with a score of 59 meters 55 cm.

She is married to Russian spear thrower Dmitry Tarabin. They are raising three children. They live in the sunny city of Krasnodar.

Athlete's height: 179 cm; weight: 80 kg.

Sports career:

Maria began to play sports when she was little. Maria's parents are also athletes, so there was someone to take an example from. Since childhood, she went to competitions with her mother Galina Viktorovna Abakumova. Now Galina Viktorovna is engaged in coaching, has the title of Master of Sports in heptathlon.

In 2003, at the World Youth Championship, Maria Abakumova was able to throw a javelin 51 meters 41 centimeters. But, the rivals were stronger that time, and she took only fourth place. But in 2005, at the same championship, Maria took the first positions and won gold. Her result was 57 meters 11 cm.

In 2004 and 2005, the athlete competed mainly at the junior level, with all that - even then she demonstrated her own skills and abilities.

After that, there was still a sea of ​​competitions in which the athlete was repeatedly awarded prestigious awards. For example, in 2007, the athlete took part in the World Championship and took the seventh place, and a year later she attracted the sympathy of athletics fans and became the winner of the Russian Championship.

In addition, in 2008, the athlete received an Olympic license and in August of the same year went to olympic tournament- as part of the Russian national team.

On August 21, 2008, Maria Abakumova competed in the final match and showed an excellent result. Before the Olympic "gold", the athlete lacked only a little bit, and due to the fact that she won the second prize.

Before arriving in Beijing, Maria had her own personal record of 65 meters and 71 centimeters. Performing at the 2008 Olympics, the athlete threw the javelin five times and, as a result, improved her record. Now it is more than the previous one by as much as five meters. On Summer Olympic Games she took second place, adding another silver medal to her piggy bank. She threw her spear at 67.52 meters, and before that her personal best was 65.71 m.

In 2011, at the World Championships, held in the city of Daegu, South Korea, Maria Abakumova set the Maria Abakumovanov record in Russia. She threw a javelin at 71, 99 meters. Thus, Maria Abakumova became the first Russian female athlete to become a world champion (the world record is 72.28 meters, owned by the Czech athlete Barbora Shpotakova).

At the 2012 Olympics in London, Maria Abakumova threw a javelin 59.34 meters. as a result, she took only 10th place.

World Championships in Athletics

The silver medalist of the Beijing Olympics in javelin throw Maria Abakumova and Antonina Krivoshapka in the 400 m race won two bronze medals at the World Championships in the German capital on Wednesday. Abakumova was disappointed with the result. Krivoshapka, on the contrary, was happy to yield only to the leaders of the species - American Sanie Richards and Sherike Williams from Jamaica. VALERIA MIRONOVA from Berlin.

Maria Abakumova was registered as champion immediately after in the first qualifying attempt she easily and naturally threw her spear at best result seasons in the world - 68.92 m. And the more people congratulated and predicted her to be a champion, the stronger the internal tension grew. True, experience prompted that her main rival Barbora Shpotakova was not doing well this year and her health was not all right - she injured her elbow, which means that you can win against her. And 37-year-old Steffi Nerius, she did not take into account at all.

"When I asked myself the question, where is it harder: in Beijing, where no one paid any attention to me, or here, in Berlin, where I arrived already with regalia and instead of modestly fulfilling the qualification standard, it is not clear why I showed off, the answer was on the surface. Here, "Abakumova said. The overall alarming situation was exacerbated by widespread doping tests. Urine is usually taken from the throwers before the competition, but a blood sample was taken from Abakumova immediately upon her arrival in Berlin. And in the winter, according to her, they visited her home in the Krasnodar apartment a total of eight times a month. "In general, I will say this: if they call at your door at six in the morning, you should know - this is doping control," said the athlete.

In the final, to which Maria Abakumova approached in the role of the unconditional leader, she felt that everything went wrong. And the general tone of the performance was set by the first attempts: the most successful at 67.30 m Nerius and, on the contrary, the most unsuccessful Abakumova - at 63.01 m. well, at least in the area of ​​64-65 m, then it would be much easier. The thrower needs to feel the throw, but I did not feel it in the final, I did not find it until the very end of the competition. me, I managed to dispose of it correctly, purely technically, oh, how far I could throw here - exactly 70 m. And calmly win. Honestly, in my dreams I imagined that this is how everything would happen. But, like Lena Isinbayeva was not her day, so, you see, it was with me. Morality - you need to be more modest and learn to correctly lay out your physical and moral strength. " And luck smiled with all its teeth at 37-year-old Steffi Nerius, who had never before achieved noticeable success in the international arena, who was finishing her career in a month. Gold was brought to her by the very first throw of six.

Antonina Krivoshapka, who has run out of 50 seconds four times in official competitions to date, arrived at her first world championship, having the second 400 m result in the history of Russian athletics - 49.29 seconds. She showed it in July at the national championship in Cheboksary. The run in the finals of the world championship of the student of Vladimir Tipaev turned out to be a little slower - the third in the annals of domestic achievements (49.71). However, the most important thing is that the 22-year-old runner from Volgograd did not hesitate in the company of eminent rivals, led by the season leader American Sania Richards, and pulled her best urine straight from the starting blocks. In the middle of the distance, she even was in the lead. And on the finish line ran nose to nose with the bronze medalist of the Beijing Olympics from the USA and the silver one - Sherika Williams from Jamaica. However, she lacked the experience to fight on equal terms with Richards - the leader of the species, who set a new highest achievement of the season here (49.00 sec.), And the Jamaican runner, who ran for a personal record. Anastasia Kapachinskaya showed the seventh time - 50.53.

At the end of the race, in which, according to the Cheboksary schedule, she could have become a silver medalist, Antonina Krivoshapka regretted that, due to a too fast start, she did not have enough strength for an even faster finish. But she was also happy with the bronze medal, as she almost lost third place to Novlen Williams-Mills from Jamaica. The third-fourth places were distributed by the photo finish. “I got an absolutely wonderful lesson here and realized that Sania Richards, Jamaican and other authoritative athletes are not so unattainable. Already now I can fight with them on equal terms, but I’ll become a little more experienced, I’ll overtake,” concluded Antonina Krivoshapka.