Kabaeva was the first: why the leotards of Russian gymnasts became 2 kg heavier

Today, it is in Russia that the workshops for tailoring the best leotards for the stars and stars of rhythmic gymnastics work, and teams from other countries turn to our craftswomen, whose participants have set themselves the goal to impress spectators and judges not only with flexibility and stamina, but also with an impressive appearance.

The pioneer in this field is known with certainty – this is the legendary Irina Viner-Usmanova, head of the All-Russian Rhythmic Gymnastics Federation. Brilliant and extravagant, she brought to sports management her own vision of what our gymnasts should look like. The swimsuits of the Averin sisters “Petrushka” and “Roses” made an indelible impression even on skeptics!

Viner personally coordinates outfits for key competitions and can say a firm no if the swimsuit isn’t right for you. Her simple checklist consists of just three items, but creating a matching performance outfit can be tricky.

A competition leotard must:

The average price of a finished swimsuit is at least 100,000 rubles, but here materials and workmanship are taken into account, not artistic value or history. And they form added value: for example, one of Alina Kabaeva’s swimsuits was sold at a charity auction for 600,000 rubles.

And it was Kabaeva who became the tester for the bold decision of Wiener, the head coach of the Russian rhythmic gymnastics team.

In the mid-2000s (as it turned out later, on the threshold of the end of her sports career), Alina was preparing to participate in the World Championships. Swimsuit for her in charge of sewing Marina Gogua, craftswoman from Nizhny Novgorod. And Gogua gave Wiener something unheard of: decorating the outfit with Swarovski crystals. They were actively used to decorate dresses for ballroom dancing, but “artists” at that time wore only sequins – it was believed that heavy stones would affect the movements of athletes.

Irina Viner-Usmanova studied the matter and realized that it would turn out well. The increased weight of the leotard did not bother her, and ultimately an experienced gymnast is able to cope with such weighting without compromising her performance.

Since then, rhinestones have “registered” in the fashionable arsenal of Russian gymnasts and gradually changed the world standard of preparing outfits for competitions. Because of the stones, the swimsuits of the “artists” began to weigh 1.5-2 kg more, but the effect they produce cannot be measured. Incomparably!

Photo: EPA, Getty Images, SPORT-EXPRESS/ITAR-TASS