Why did Kamila Valieva appear unusually pale after the team event at the Beijing Winter Olympics? Opinions among foreign netizens vary.

Recently, the well-known American social news site Reddit posed the question of why Russian figure skating star Kamila Valieva looked extremely upset or exhausted after her free skate performance in the team event at the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics. Opinions among foreign users on this matter are divided. Some believe that the figure skater was under immense pressure at the time and felt frustrated for not being able to skate perfectly. Others think that Valieva found it harder to perform than usual because she was not using performance-enhancing drugs this time. Here are some comments from Reddit users summarized.

Valieva during the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics

Puzzleheaded-Rope-27: "To me, she looks more tired than sad. Maybe it's because she made some mistakes. If I remember correctly, she fell on one occasion. I wouldn't be surprised if people expected her to deliver a perfect performance. But I still think she looks more fatigued than sorrowful. She attempted several difficult jumps in the free skate, so she must have been trying to rest afterward. Is this the pressure of the Olympics? I know some figure skaters make mistakes at their first Olympics."

NICE-LACK9939: "Skating without performance enhancers is more challenging."

Mapeducational5058: "Exactly. Skating without beta-blockers, which selectively bind to beta-adrenergic receptors and counteract the effects of neurotransmitters and catecholamines, can be exhausting."

Macaroni_Rascal42: "She's just a kid, and her previous experiences might have made things worse when she made mistakes on the ice. It's either perfection or nothing."

Valieva watching domestic ice hockey matches in Russia during her leisure time

Pale_Neighborhood731: "That's true. I remember there was a post about Eteri (coach Tutberidze) giving 13-year-old Kamila 'instructions,' and Kamila ended up crying, which was really sad."

Nostebestuh: "She was in shock. She had been waiting her whole life for this moment at the Olympics."

Some Crazy Nonsense: "This could be a climax: 1. The Olympics, which she has trained for her whole life, 2. It's a team event where the focus is not just on her performance but on the team's success, and she doesn't want to bear that burden, etc."

Amara90: "I wonder if the pressure also comes from the fact that both programs featured female skaters. Trusova clearly expressed that she felt deprived of the chance to participate in the team event. So after making a mistake, Kamila might have thought, 'We should give others a chance.'"

Anna_Sofia98: "I think she wanted to show her absolute best and was under a lot of tension. She also looked very tired, which is understandable in such a complex event. She might have known that serious consequences could follow the (doping) test results."

Valieva recently vacationing in Italy

Worth-Nectarine-5968: "As they mentioned, she made a mistake in the second half, and for an athlete under pressure to be absolutely perfect, she might feel like she let down her country and herself."

Recall that after the conclusion of the figure skating team event at the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics, it was announced that Valieva had tested positive for a banned substance during the Russian Figure Skating Championships in December 2021. At the end of January 2024, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) banned Valieva for four years for violating anti-doping rules, with the ban starting from December 25, 2021. From that day on, all of Valieva's results at the Olympics, including both the individual and team events, were annulled.