page_title: Yevgeniya Kanayeva
section_title: 2008 Olympics season
hierarchical_section_title: Yevgeniya Kanayeva / Career / 2008 Olympics season
caption_attribution_description: English: VII World Cup Finals RG (Benidorm ESP)
context_page_description: Yevgeniya Olegovna Kanayeva OMF is a Russian retired individual rhythmic gymnast, known for her consistency, elegant routines and high level of technical difficulty. She is the only individual rhythmic gymnast in history to win two Olympic all-around gold medals, winning at the 2008 Summer Olympics, where she finished with 3.75 points ahead of silver medalist Inna Zhukova, and at the 2012 Summer Olympics, where she also became the oldest gymnast to win the Olympic gold. On 4 July 2013, Kanayeva received the International Fair Play Award for "Sport and Life".
  Kanayeva holds the record for most World titles with seventeen and thirteen European titles. Kanayeva shares the record for most individual world all-around titles with Maria Petrova, Maria Gigova and fellow Russian gymnasts Yana Kudryavtseva and Dina Averina, and Kanayeva is the one of only three gymnasts to have won all three titles without being tied, impossible due to the tie breaking system even though she never was tied for a title.
  At the 2009 World Championship in Mie, Japan, Kanayeva became the first rhythmic gymnast to win all six titles.
context_section_description: With the opportunity to take part in the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games growing, all of Kanayeva 's routines (hoop, clubs, rope and ribbon) were designed with high difficulties and her music was selected to bring out her uniqueness, one of which was her ribbon routine performed with the special edited piano version of ‘Moscow Nights (Подмосковные вечера)’.
  In the beginning of 2008 season, Kanayeva still faced tough competition from veteran teammates Sessina, Kapranova and Ukrainian rhythmic gymnast, the then-World Champion, Anna Bessonova. However, by mid-spring, Kanayeva began to establish herself by winning all the individual all-around titles in the Grand Prix and World Cup series, as well as the Russian National Championship. At the European Championship in Turin, Italy, she established herself as the number one senior rhythmic gymnast of the Russian national team. She defeated Bessonova and Kapranova with high scores in all her routines ( 18.875 in rope, 18.925 in hoop, 18.875 in ribbon and scored a 19.050 in clubs).
  At the 2008 European Championships she became the All-around champion. Viner selected Kanyaeva and Kapranova as Russia's entries for the Olympic rhythmic gymnastics competition.
  Kanaeva was the youngest among all the finalists in the Olympic rhythmic gymnastics competition. However, she remained calm and made only a few mistakes. In her words, the Olympic Games were "different from all other competitions. You just have to concentrate on yourself, the apparatus and the carpet. You should not pay attention on anything else. I persuaded myself that everything would be alright, that I should not worry." With this mentality and her high level of Technical Difficulty, Kanaeva won the Olympic title with a score of 75.50, ahead of second place Inna Zhukova of Belarus by a margin of 3.50 points.
caption: Kanayeva in 2008
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