Maria Olaru
She Rules the World
Maria Olaru was born on the 4th of June in 1982 in Falticeni. Her father died when she was four years old, and she lived at home with her mom, Verona, and two sisters, 3 and 8 years older for only three more years before she went to train at Deva. Maria began gymnastics at the national training center and trained alongside gymnasts such as Lavinia Milosovici and Gina Gogean. She's truly a homegrown girl of Deva.
Because of her age, Maria was too young to compete in the 1997 World Championships, although she probably would have made the team had she been eligible. But, she gained much valuable experience as a junior which helped her compete well as a senior. Maria turned sixteen in 1998, but she was out for some of that year and early 1999 because of a knee surgery.
The coaches at Cetate Deva didn't believe that Maria would every recover from her surgery, but she proved them very wrong by making the 1999 Worlds team and winning the All Around. By doing that she became only the 2nd Romanian woman ever to win a World Championships. Aurelia Dobre was the first. Her results surprised coach Octavian Belu very much, because he did not think that she was the most talented gymnast on his team. Maria's height also sets her apart from many of her teammates and gives her quite a graceful look on an event like the balance beam. For her win, Maria was presented with an apartment in Deva.
Maria's success carried over into 2000 with a win at the Romanian International, but she did not get a chance to compete at the Europeans because of a bad back and ankle injury. She was required to stay in the hospital for eight days connected to an IV, but was visited by her teammates and coaches. They even brought her some gifts.
Maria healed up in time for the Romanian Nationals, but was not in her top shape. She finished fourth. Coming into the 2000 Olympic Games, many people did not think that Maria looked as sharp as she had in Tianjin, China, but nonetheless she was a great asset to Romania's winning team and qualified to the All Around and the beam final. Maria performed very well in the all around and found herself in third place at the end of the night. It was a Romanian sweep of the all around! She also went on to place 5th on the beam, but the Olympics was not over yet.
When it was revealed that the all around winner, Maria's teammate and best friend, Andreea Raducan had been given a cold pill containing a banned substance before the all around, Andreea was stripped of her medal. Therefore, Simona Amanar was upgraded to gold and Maria to silver. Both gymnasts felt that they were not the winners, but accepted their medals on behalf of their country. Once back home in Romania, on national television, Simona Amanar returned Andreea's gold medal to her, and Maria returned the silver to Simona. This left Maria with no all around medal, because Liu Xuan of China had was the next finisher after Maria.
Like the other members of the Olympic team, Maria received much prize money and a new car. Maria retired at the end of 2000, and is currently studying at the University of Timisoara to become a coach. Maria spent St. Nikolaus Day (December 6th) of this year taking gifts to Romanian orphanages along with Claudia Presacan. Then the two of them spent a week in Sibiu and went to see the Stalinskaya Cup, a soccer tournament.
Favorites...
- Hobbies-Tennis
- Country Visited-Italy
- Apparatus-Likes all four
- Music-Spice Girls, Bryan Adams, Backstreet Boys
Etc.
- In Romanian, Maria's last name, "Olaru" translates to "Potter"
- In 1996 she trained with the Junior Team in Bucharest from February to September to prepare for the Jr. Europeans
- Maria can speak Romanian, English, and Italian, and has a Siamese Cat
Results
- 1995 China Cup: 5th A-A
- 1996 China Cup: 2nd A-A
- 1996 Jr. Euros: 6th Team, 5th A-A, 1st V, 7th FX
- 1996 Top Gym Junior Tournament: 1st A-A
- 1996 Trophee Massilia: 1st Team, 5th A-A
- 1997 International Team Championships: 1st Team, 1st A-A, 1st FX
- 1997 Spain vs Romania: 1st A-A
- 1997 Glasgow Grand Prix: 3rd V
- 1997 European Youth Olympic Days: 2nd Te, 5th A-A
- 1997 International Junior Mees: 1st A-A, 1st FX
- 1997 Arthur Gander Memorial: 3rd A-A
- 1997 Marseille: 1st Team, 1st A-A, 1st FX
- 1998 Visa American Cup: 5th A-A
- 1998 ITC: 2nd Team
- 1998 Romanian International: 1st V, 2nd A-A
- 1998 Europeans: 1st T, 2nd V
- 1998 Goodwill Games: 2nd A-A, 4th V
- 1999 ITC: 1st T, 21st A-A
- 1999 Hungarian International: 1st FX, 3rd V
- ROM v.s. SPN v.s. GER: 1st Team, 2nd A-A,
- ROM v.s. NED: 1st Team, 1st A-A,
- 1999 Romanian Nationals: 2nd Team, 1st A-A, 1st V, 2nd FX, 1st UB, 1st BB
- 1999 World Championships: 1st Team, 1st A-A, 3rd V, 4th BB, 6=5th UB
- 1999 Trophy Massilia: 1st Team, 1st A-A
- 1999 Chunchi CUp: 1st A-A, 3rd V, 3rd FX, 2nd BB, 5th UB
- 2000 Hungarian International: 1st A-A, 1st UB, 1st Bb, 1st FX
- 2000 Romanian International: 1st A-A, 1st BB, 1st UB, 1st FX, 3rd V
- 2000 Romanian Nationals: 4th A-A
- 2000 Olympic Games: 1st Team, 2nd A-A, 5th BB
- 2000 Swiss Cup: 3rd Team(paired with Marian Dragulescu)
- 2000 Arthur Gander Memorial-2nd A-A
- 2000 Trophy Massilia: 1st Team, 2nd UB, 1st BB