Elena Eremina has just officially announced her retirement from gymnastics. "A difficult and important decision in my life. I made it t...
Elena Eremina has just officially announced her retirement from gymnastics.
"A difficult and important decision in my life. I made it together with my coach in November 2021 and now I would like to announce it. I am done for health reasons," the Russian retired gymnast wrote on her Telegram channel.
"I wanted to go on, I had goals, desires and ambitions. I wanted to achieve more. My body was no longer able to tolerate constant pain all over my body, endure it everyday, live on pain medications. Moral health was not good either," she continued.
In 2017, her first senior year, Eremina enjoyed success. She became a European and World silver medalist on uneven bars, and bronze medalist in the all around.
The former athlete wrote that a spinal surgery, she had in early 2018, had consequences on her sports career.
"I continued to practice. It was a very long and hard recovery. I literally had to get in shape from scratch. It was the hardest time of my life."
Other injuries and hitting puberty took a toll on her body. Nevertheless, she continued training and setting new goals for herself.
"But half a year ago, I realized that my body's resources had run out, and it could no longer handle the load and endure the pain."
"I came to the gym to be patient, not to improve my program, because of the pain - I lost the desire to do something. Mentally I broke down. I was burned out.... I understood that my back pain would not go away, no matter how much I wanted it to."
She added that her back stops hurting when she is not training.
The 20 year old retired gymnast has been putting off her decision to retire hoping for her health situation to improve, up until her coaches had a talk with her.
Nevertheless, she stressed that she is proud of her sports achievements and for representing her country at a World level.
"Yes, it's sad when you didn't reach the highest award in sports - the Olympics. Every professional athlete burns for it and sacrifices everything for that title. And I was burning and was going towards that goal, but fate decided otherwise."
Eremina went on to advise other athletes to cherish and appreciate their small victories as everything could change tomorrow, and to take good care of their health as it cannot be bought by money.
The World medalist ended her lengthy post by thanking her fans and coaches who believed and rooted for her.
Photo Ginnastica Artistica Italiana
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