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Winter Olympics: Kamila Valieva breaks record with quad jump

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Take a look at Kamila Valieva's record-breaking routine

Could Kamila Valieva be the Simone Biles of figure skating?!

At 15-years-old, Russian figure skater Kamila has just won a gold medal for her routine in the women's free skate at the Winter Olympics with a whopping score of 178.92 points.

Not only that, but she broke a record for landing not one, but TWO quadruple jumps!

This means that she is the first female figure skater in history to land a quadruple jump at an Olympic Games.

Take a look below to find out more about her.

What is a quad jump, and why are they so hard?

Image source, Getty Images
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Kamila is the first woman to land a quad jump in the Olympics

Quadruple jumps - or quad jumps for short, are when a figure skater jumps into the air, and spins their whole body around (whilst still in the air) four times before they land - phew!

The first person to ever land this incredibly tricky move in a competition was Canadian Kurt Browning in 1988, and Miko Ando became the first woman to do so in 2002.

Did you know?

So far, only six women have ever landed a quad jump in an international competition.

Kamila Valieva had three quad jumps in her routine at the Winter Olympics, and she successfully landed two of them: a quadruple salchow, and a quadruple toe-loop.

There is an even harder move called a quadruple axel, which has never been landed in any competition, but double-gold medal winner and figure-skating GOAT Yuzuru Hanyu is attempting it in his routine this year.

Who is Kamila Valieva?

Image source, Getty Images

Kamila Valieva is 15-years-old and was born in Kazan in Russia, before moving to Moscow. Kamila took ballet and gymnastics classes as a child before switching to figure skating.

This is Kamila's first time competing in the women's category at the Winter Olympics.

Image source, @kamilavalieva26/Instagram
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Kamila has a pet dog, a Pomeranian called L毛va, who was given to her as a gift in 2019 by her fans.

So far, she has set nine world records during her skating career including: women's short program, free skating and total scores!

She said one of her figure skating heroes is Nathen Chen, the Olympic Silver Medallist and three time World Champion, from Team USA.