Evgenia Medvedeva

Evgenia Armanovna Medvedeva (alt. spelling: Yevgenia Medvedeva; Евгения Армановна Медведева; born 19 November 1999), is a retired competitive Russian figure skater.

Around 2007, she joined Eteri Tutberidze at the Olympic Reserve Sports School no. 37, renamed Sambo 70.

Medvedeva made her senior national debut at the 2012 Russian Championships, finishing eighth, and then placed sixth on the junior level.

She sustained an injury at the start of the following season and did not qualify for the senior Russian Nationals.

She finished fourth behind Maria Sotskova at the 2013 Russian Junior Championships.

Medvedeva's international debut came in the 2013–2014 season.

Competing on the ISU Junior Grand Prix series, she won gold first in Riga, Latvia, and then in Gdańsk, Poland.

She qualified to the JGP Final in Fukuoka, Japan, where she won the bronze medal behind Sotskova and Serafima Sakhanovich.

At the 2014 Russian Championships, she finished seventh in her second senior appearance and then fourth on the junior level.

Medvedeva was assigned to replace the injured Sotskova at the 2014 World Junior Championships in Sofia, Bulgaria.

Placing third in both segments, she won the bronze medal while Elena Radionova and Sakhanovich took gold and silver respectively, producing Russia's second consecutive sweep of the World Junior ladies' podium.

Medvedeva's first assignment of the 2014 JGP season was in Courchevel, France, where she won the gold medal by a margin of 21 points over silver medalist Rin Nitaya of Japan.

At her second event, in Ostrava, Czech Republic, she placed second in both segments and edged Japan's Wakaba Higuchi for the gold by 1.44 points.

She qualified for the Junior Grand Prix Final in Barcelona, Spain, where she won gold, placing first in both the short program and free skate.

Earlier in her career, she won the 2015 World Junior Championships, the 2014 Junior Grand Prix Final, and the 2015 Russian Junior Championships.

Medvedeva is the first ladies' singles skater to win senior Worlds the year after winning Junior Worlds, and the first ladies' singles skater to win two consecutive senior Worlds the year after winning Junior Worlds.

She became one of only four ladies to achieve a Grand Slam (winning all the main competitions of the same season), and the first skater (all disciplines included) to complete two Grand Slams in a row (2015–2016; 2016–2017).

Under the ISU Judging System, she has set the world record score 13 times and is the first female skater to surpass the 80-point short program mark, the 160-point free skating mark, and the 230-point and the 240-point total mark.

Evgenia's mother, Zhanna Medvedeva (maiden name — Devyatova ), a former Russian figure skater who quit the sport aged 14, and father Arman Babasyan, an Armenian businessman, are divorced.

Both of her parents wanted her to practice figure skating to improve her figure.

She competes under the surname Medvedeva, which was the maiden name of her maternal grandmother.

Her birth surname is Babasyan.

At the 2015 Russian Championships, she placed third in both segments and won the bronze medal, her first senior national medal, behind Elena Radionova and Elizaveta Tuktamysheva.

She then took gold at the 2015 Russian Junior Championships, finishing almost 20 points ahead of silver medalist Maria Sotskova.

At the 2015 World Junior Championships in Tallinn, Estonia, Medvedeva placed first after the short program and set a new world record of 68.48 points for junior ladies' short program.

In the free program, she placed first again and won gold.

She had no falls on the ice throughout the season in international events.

Medvedeva became age-eligible to compete at the senior international level for the 2015–2016 season.

At the 2017 World Championships, she became the first female skater to win back-to-back world titles in 16 years since Michelle Kwan did so in 2000 and 2001, and is currently the only Russian woman ever to successfully defend her world title.

In 2017, she commenced her university studies and enrolled at the Russian State University of Physical Education, Sport, Youth and Tourism.

Since September 1, 2021 she is a student of Moscow State University.

Medvedeva has stated that she has lepidopterophobia (fear of moths and butterflies).

Her figure skating idols are Evgeni Plushenko and Yuna Kim.

She is known to friends as "Zhenya" and "Janny".

Evgenia speaks English in addition to Russian, as well as basic Japanese.

She is the 2018 PyeongChang Olympic silver medalist (2018 ladies' singles, 2018 team event), a two-time world champion (2016, 2017), a two-time European champion (2016, 2017), a two-time Grand Prix Final champion (2015, 2016), a two-time Russian national champion (2016, 2017), silver medalist at the 2018 European Figure Skating Championships and bronze medalist at the 2019 World Championships.

She relocated to Toronto, Canada in mid-2018 and trained at the Toronto Cricket Skating and Curling Club until September 2020 when she rejoined her old coach in Russia, Eteri Tutberidze.

She has two French Bulldogs, Jerry and Tofu.

She said of Russian invasion of Ukraine, which began on 24 February 2022, "this all [to end] as soon as possible, like a bad dream".

On the ice from the age of three, Medvedeva was taught initially by Elena Proskurina, Lubov Yakovleva, and Elena Selivanova.