Sovetsky Sport. July 19, 1986. From the Sovetsky Sport dossier: Vera Kolesnikova. Voronezh, Spartak. Born 7 October 1968. 1985 world champion in the team classification. High school graduate. Coach: R. Alexandrova.
By today's standards, Vera started doing gymnastics late, when she was a second-grader at one of the Voronezh schools. Physical education teacher Nikolai Tikhonivich Vodyanykh was amazed at the girl's abilities and took her to the 'bride' at the famous Spartak sports school. Coach Rimma Alexeeva Alexandrova also liked Vera. She was flexible, fast and bouncy.
"Everything seemed difficult at the sports school," Vera recalls. "The training is tough, and the training is very intense. I was tired. And I had to travel by bus through the entire city. One winter I had to wait a very long time for the bus and caught a cold. I stayed at home for a week. I missed the gym so much that I started crying. And I realized: gymnastics is forever."
Four years ago, Kolesnikova competed on the adult platform for the first time and took 17th place at the national championship. But already the next year, Vera was part of the Russian team that won the USSR Spartakiad. In the fall, she took third place at the USSR Cup.
Ups and downs are inevitable in sports, it seems. And Vera also had a streak of bad luck. It was only at the end of last year that she finally got into good shape. And she went to Montreal for the world championship. That championship was difficult for her. Kolesnikova competed first on all the apparatuses, and the success of our team depended on her composure and endurance. Vera didn't disappoint; she coped with the excitement. A gold medal is an excellent reward for patience and self-confidence!
Vera had a dream to compete at the Goodwill Games. And again, a dream has come true.