CHATEAUROUX, France (AP) — Georgian shooter Nino Salukvadze has become the first woman to compete at 10 Olympic Games in a career which began representing the Soviet Union.
The 55-year-old Salukvadze has competed at every Summer Olympics since 1988 — when she won gold as a 19-year-old Soviet prodigy. She set her latest record when she stepped into the shooting range for qualification in the women’s 10-meter air pistol Saturday.
Salukvadze placed 38th and didn’t advance to Sunday’s eight-shooter final, but she gets another shot at a medal Friday in qualification for the 25-meter pistol event.
Salukvadze already had the record for most Olympic appearances by a female athlete and is now tied with Canadian showjumper Ian Millar for the most of any athlete.
“Only one man from Canada, and now it’s gender equality,” she said.
Salukvadze added she was feeling fresh despite having slept on a bus after attending Friday’s rain-soaked opening ceremony in Paris. She didn’t get back to her accommodation until 3 a.m.
Most Olympic athletes hope for the honor of being their country’s flag bearer at an opening ceremony once, if they’re lucky. Salukvadze has carried the Georgian flag three times — in 2012, 2021 and on Friday.
In a career spanning five decades, Salukvadze has competed on three different Olympic teams — first with the Soviet Union in 1988, then the Unified Team which was organized for ex-Soviet athletes in Barcelona in 1992 after the Soviet Union collapsed. For the last eight Summer Olympics, she’s represented her home country of Georgia following its independence.
Salukvadze was in the spotlight again in 2008, when Russia fought a brief war with Georgia during the Beijing Olympics. Salukvadze won bronze and embraced Russian silver medalist Natalia Paderina on the podium in what was widely seen as a gesture for peace.
“Why did this gesture surprise everyone? We are athletes, there is no conflict between us,” she said at the time.
In 2016, Salukvadze and her son Tsotne Machavariani, who’s also a pistol shooter, became the first mother-and-son duo in Olympic history to compete at the same Games.
Salukvadze had considered retiring after the last Summer Olympics in Tokyo three years ago but was persuaded to continue by her father and coach Vakhtang, who died this year.
Salukvadze is the only Olympian to compete at 10 Summer Games in a row, unlike Millar, whose appearances weren’t consecutive because Canada boycotted the 1980 Olympics in Moscow.
Despite her record-breaking career, Salukvadze mused Saturday she might have been one-and-done with the Olympics if only she’d won two gold medals, instead of one gold and one silver, in Seoul 36 years ago.
