CLASSES TAUGHT: Stretch & Condition
WITH PPAC FOR: 3 years
Olga Korbut was born on May 16th, 1955 in Grodno (Hrodna), Belarus. She is the youngest daughter of Valentin Korbut and Valentina Korbut.
Olga was noticed for her athletic ability in elementary school. Olga was the smallest in her class but she could run faster and jump higher than any of the other girls and many of the boys. When she had her first gymnastics lesson she fell in love with the demanding sport.
When Olga was eight years old she tried out for a place in the sports school run by Renald Knysh who had a reputation for being an innovative coach. With him, she learned a difficult backward somersault on the balance beam.
She ended fifth at her first competition in the 1969 USSR championships. The next year, she won a gold medal in the vault.
At the 1972 Olympics in Munich, she became the darling of the games by captivating audiences with her acrobatics and open display of emotion. She became the first person ever to do a backward somersault on the balance beam, the first to do standing backward somersault on bars, and the first to do a back somersault to swingdown on beam(now known as “The Korbut Flip”). Some of her moves including the tuck back and “Korbut Flip” still remain very popular.
She won 3 gold medals at the ’72 Olympics for the balance beam, floor exercise and team, as well as one silver medal in the uneven bars. Her Olympic achievement also earned her title of Athlete of the Year by ABC's Wide World of Sports.
She returned to the Olympics in 1976 at Montreal where she won another gold medal in team competition as well as an individual silver medal for the balance beam.
In 1977 Olga Korbut completed college and retired from gymnastic competition.
Her charisma and performance during the Olympics changed the sport of gymnastics dramatically. The media whirl that surrounded her after her Olympic debut in 1972 caused a surge of young girls to join their local gymnastic clubs. A sport which had previously seldom been noticed now made headlines. Prior to 1972, the athletes were rather older and there was a greater focus on elegance than on acrobatics. In the decade after Korbut first came to the world's attention, this completely changed.
In 1988 Korbut became the first inductee into the International Gymnastics Hall of Fame.
She immigrated with her family to U.S. in 1991 and she now resides in Scottsdale, AZ where she teaches at the Plumb Performing Arts Center exclusively.
