KORBUT, OLGA VALENTINOVNA

born May 16, 1956, Grodno, Belorussia, U.S.S.R. [now in Belarus] Soviet gymnast who won three gold medals and a silver medal at the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich. At the age of 11, Korbut entered a Soviet sports school of which Renald Knysh, who later became her coach, was head. He taught her the difficult backward somersault on the balance beam. Using this maneuver, she first competed in the 1969 U.S.S.R. championships, placing fifth. In the 1970 meet she won a gold medal in the vault. In 1972 she gave an exhibition at the world championships but was out of competition for much of 1972 before the Olympics owing to illness and injury. At the Olympics, her diminutive prettiness captivated the Munich audiences, and there she became the first person ever to do a backward somersault on the uneven parallel bars. She won individual gold medals in the balance beam and the floor exercise and an individual silver in the uneven parallel bars, as well as a gold with the Soviet team. In 1973 she won the Russian and World Student games and a silver medal in the European championships. In the 1976 Olympic Games at Montreal, she won a team gold medal and an individual silver medal for the balance beam. She graduated from the Grodno Pedagogical Institute in 1977 and retired from Olympic competition thereafter.