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Home > Olympics > Gold Medalists > Natalia Mishkutenok
Natalia Mishkutenok
The Olympic Games, or Olympics, is an international multi-sport event taking place every four years which comprises of summer and winter games. Though the first ancient games were held in 776 B.C, the modern games started from 1896.The unity of the 5 continents is shown on the Olympic flag by five colorful intertwined rings of red, blue, green, yellow, and black, created by Baron Pierre de Coubertin to represent atleast one color of the participating country’s national flag.
Natalia Mishkutenok or Natalja Mishkutienok, a Russian pairs figure skating champion, was born on the 14th of July 1970 in Minsk, Belarus. She competed for the Soviet Union, Russia, and the Unified Team. She trained in St. Petersburg with renowned Russian pairs coach Tamara Moskvina. She skated with partner Artur Dmitriev from 1987 to 1994, together, they won the 1991 and 1992 World and European Championships, and Olympic gold at the 1992 Winter Olympics in Albertville, France. They performed to Franz Liszt's, Liebestraum, which became one of the most noted programs of their career. They turned professional shortly after the Olympics.
Mishkutenok and Dmitriev chose to reinstate as amateurs after the ban against such actions was lifted. They attempted to defend their Olympic title in the 1994 Winter Olympics held in Lillehammer, Norway, but were narrowly defeated by good friends and fellow countrymen Ekaterina Gordeeva and Sergei Grinkov.
One hallmark of Mishkutenok and Dmitriev's style was their creative spins, especially one in which Mishkutenok would do a split and point down, with an arm around Dmitriev's calf so that they were both vertical and aligned; this signature move was incorporated into virtually every one of their programs. Mishkutenok in particular was distinguished for her flexibility.
Mishkutenok and Dmitriev amicably parted soon after their second-place finish in Lillehammer, where many believed they should have won the gold medal. Dmitriev went on to skate with Oksana Kazakova and won the gold at the 1998 Olympics held in Nagano, Japan. Mishkutenok moved to the U.S. to learn English and married American hockey player Craig Shephard, with whom she has skated professionally on occasion. She divorced Shepherd and remarried. She had a daughter on January 16, 2006 and is currently coaching in the Fort Worth area of Dallas, Texas.
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