Maria Petrova:
“I expect that Sochi will one day light the Olympic flame. Russia is ready to host the 2014 Olympic Winter Games, we have great experience with large-scale sporting events and we’ll do our best to stage excellent Games that surpass all expectations. Our country is home to many sports champions, and it would be an honor to host the Games for the first time in Russia.“

Alexey Tikhonov:
“It’s a great honor for me to become an Ambassador for Sochi 2014. Our Bid is a unique opportunity to host the Olympic Winter Games in Russia, the world’s largest winter sport country with 143 million people passionate about winter sports. The 2014 Olympic Winter Games will leave a lasting legacy for Russian winter sports, inspiring generations to come with Olympic ideals“.

Maria Petrova and Alexey Tikhonov are 2000 World Champions, European Champions (1999 and 2000), and several time medalists of World, European and Russian Championships.

Maria Petrova started skating at the age of 7. Her coaches were the world famous Ludmila Velikova and Nikolay Velikov. In 1993, in her first junior championship, Maria Petrova won the silver medal in pair skating with her partner Anton Sikharulidze.

In the 1994/1995 season Petrova and Sikharulidze entered the senior National Team, and in the 1995/1996 season they were among the top five of European and world pairs teams. In February, 1996, the Petrova-Siharulidze pair split and Maria began skating with Alexey Tikhonov.

Alexey Tikhonov started his figure skating career at the age of 5. At age the 14, he passed to pair skating and in 1987 started training in Sverdlovsk with Ardo Rennik and Julia Rennik. In 1989, he won the bronze medal at the junior World Championship together with Irina Saifutdinova.

A year later, Tikhonov started training at the Stanislav Zhukov School with Vladimir Zakharov. In 1994, Alexey received an invitation from Tatiana Tarasova to join her "All Stars" Ice Show with Inna Valianskaya as a partner, and he stayed there for three years.

In 1998, Ludmila Velikova created the Maria Petrova-Alexey Tikhonov pair. The same autumn they won their first gold medal at the Grand-Prix in Germany. Seven months later, the pair won the European Champions title, and in 2000 they became World Champions. In 2006, the couple won the Grand-Prix in Paris, and placed second in the Cup of Russia Grand-Prix series.

Maria Petrova was born in 1977 in St. Petersburg, Russia. Alexey Tikhonov was born in 1971, in Samara, Russia.

print version