Olga Korbut

Korbut's 1972 Olympic performances are widely credited as redefining gymnastics, changing the sport from emphasising ballet and elegance to acrobatics, as well as changing gymnastics from a niche sport to one of the most popular sports in the world. She emigrated to the United States in 1991, where she now lives and trains gymnasts. She became a citizen in 2000.

Olga Korbut studied at Yanka Kupala State University of Grodno. The recorded working language is Belarusian, Russian and English. Distinctions recorded are Order of the Badge of Honour, Order of Friendship of Peoples, Honoured Master of Sports of the USSR and Associated Press Athlete of the Year.

Korbut was born in Grodno to Valentin and Valentina Korbut. After World War II, the family moved to Grodno from Dubniaki (a small town near Kalinkavichy). She started training at age 8, and entered a Belarusian sports school headed by coach Renald Knysh at age 9. There, Korbut's first trainer was Elena Volchetskaya, an Olympic gold medalist (1964), but she was moved to Knysh's group a year later. Initially he found her "lazy and capricious" but he also saw potential in her great talent, unusually supple spine, and charisma. With him, she learned a difficult backward somersault on the balance beam. She debuted this at a competition in the USSR in 1969. The same year, Korbut completed a backflip-to-catch on the uneven bars; this was the first backward release move ever performed by a woman on bars. She finished fifth at her first competition in the 1969 USSR championships, where she was allowed to compete as a 14-year-old. The next year, she won a gold medal in the vault. Due to illness and injury, she was unable to compete in many of the competitions before the 1972 Summer Olympics.

At the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, Korbut's acrobatics and open high-level gymnastics brought her much fame. During the Olympics, Korbut was one of the favorites for the all-around after her dynamic performance in the team competition; however, she missed her mount on bars three times, and the title went to teammate Ludmilla Tourischeva. She went on to win three gold medals for the balance beam, floor exercise, and team competitions. Korbut's first attempt at her uneven bars routine was marred by several mistakes, which all but ended her chances of winning a gold medal in the all-around. The next day, Korbut repeated the same routine in the event finals, although this time successfully. After the boards displayed a score of 9.8, the audience began to whistle and shout vulgar remarks at the judges in disapproval, believing her score to be too low. This carried on for several minutes, but the judges refused to change their score, and she finished with the silver medal. Later, Korbut said she considered it an example of unfair judging she had been subject to. Korbut is most famous for her uneven bars and balance beam routines, as well as her charismatic performances that captivated audiences. In 1973, she won the Russian and World Student (i.e., University) Games, and a silver medal in the all-around at the European Championships. At the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal, Soviet coaches and officials had designated Korbut as the woman who could beat the Romanian prodigy, Nadia Comăneci, but Korbut was injured and her performances in the games were sub-par. She was overshadowed not only by Comăneci, but also by her own teammate Nellie Kim. She did collect a team gold medal, and an individual silver medal for the balance beam.

Korbut graduated from the Grodno Pedagogical Institute in 1977, became a teacher, and retired from gymnastic competition. She married Leonid Bortkevich, a member of Belarusian folk band Pesniary. The couple had a son, Richard, born in 1979. In 1988, Korbut became the first gymnast inducted into the International Gymnastics Hall of Fame. In 1991, she and her family immigrated to the United States, prompted by concerns about the aftereffects of the Chernobyl disaster on Belarus. They settled in New Jersey, where she taught gymnastics. Two years later, the family moved to the U.S. state of Georgia, where she continued to coach. Korbut and Bortkevich divorced in 2000, the same year she became a naturalized U.S. citizen. In 2002, she moved to Scottsdale, Arizona, to become head coach at Scottsdale Gymnastics and Cheerleading. Korbut was also featured on an episode of Celebrity Boxing, which aired on May 22, 2002, with her opponent, Darva Conger, winning by unanimous decision. Since then, Korbut has worked with private gymnastics students and done motivational speaking. During the 2012 Summer Olympics, in London, Korbut appeared on Twitter and Facebook, providing live, on-site commentary on the gymnastics competitions in the North Greenwich Arena. During the games, the Royal Opera House hosted an exhibition created in collaboration with the Olympic Museum in Lausanne, Switzerland, entitled The Olympic Journey, The Story of the Games. Along with historical artifacts, the show featured the personal narratives of 16 Olympic medalists, including Korbut. Her appearance at the exhibition on August 3 of that year marked the 40th anniversary of her Olympic victories. "I didn't even expect this," she said. "I am so honored to be here." In 2017, Korbut sold her 1972 and 1976 Olympic medals, among 32 lots (including two golds and a silver from the Munich Olympics), which fetched $333,500 at Heritage Auctions. In 1999, she spoke out about the sexual assault and rape she had suffered at the hands of her coach, Renald Knysh, which he denied. "The truth was that many of the gymnasts were not just sport machines, but sexual slaves to the trainer," Korbut stated. "We were not just potential gymnasts, but future concubines for himself." Later, in 2018, Korbut appeared on a TV show, in which she again spoke out about several incidents of sexual assault by her coach. As a result of her speaking out publicly, several other gymnasts, who had also trained under Knysh, came forward to reveal their own similar experiences of sexual assault. In 2021, Korbut was named by Carnegie Corporation of New York as an honoree of the Great Immigrants Award.

Korbut has one eponymous vault listed in the Code of Points. She also performed the Korbut flip on both the uneven bars and the balance beam. The uneven bars version was removed from the Code of Points after standing on top of the high bar was banned. The balance beam version is not officially listed under her name due to the low difficulty value.

In a Peanuts comic strip published on 15 May 1973, the character Snoopy is seen doing balance beam positions with flawless precision on top of his doghouse for three panels until coming to a rest in the fourth one saying: "Olga Korbut has been bugging me for lessons!" In X-Men #99 (June 1976), Nightcrawler makes a slight reference to Korbut's gymnastic skills in comparison to his own, and Colossus, a fellow Soviet, admonishes him for it.