Nikolai Yulievich Kuksenkov (russian: Николай Юльевич Куксенков, uk, Микола Юлійович Куксенков; born 2 June 1989) is a retired Russian gymnast who won a silver medal in the team event at the

2016 Summer Olympics The 2016 Summer Olympics ( pt, Jogos Olímpicos de Verão de 2016), officially the Games of the XXXI Olympiad ( pt, Jogos da XXXI Olimpíada) and also known as Rio 2016, was an international multi-sport event held from 5 to 21 August 20 ...

. He competed for

Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...

for many years and moved to Russia after the

2012 Summer Olympics The 2012 Summer Olympics (officially the Games of the XXX Olympiad and also known as London 2012) was an international multi-sport event held from 27 July to 12 August 2012 in London, England, United Kingdom. The first event, the ...

in London, where he placed fourth in the all-around and fourth with the team.

Personal life

Kuksenkov was born on 2 June 1989 in

Kiev Kyiv, also spelled Kiev, is the capital and most populous city of Ukraine. It is in north-central Ukraine along the Dnieper, Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2021, its population was 2,962,180, making Kyiv the List of European cities by populat ...

Ukraine SSR The Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic ( uk, Украї́нська Радя́нська Соціалісти́чна Респу́бліка, ; russian: Украи́нская Сове́тская Социалисти́ческая Респ ...

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...

. He received Russian citizenship on 23 April 2013.

Career

For Ukraine

Kuksenkov was a member of the junior Ukrainian team that won team gold at the

European Championships The European Championships is a multi-sport tournament which brings together the existing European Championships of some of the continent's leading sports every four years. The inaugural edition in 2018 was staged by the host cities of Berlin, ...

. In 2008, he finished 4th in all-around at the 2008 European Championships, Kuksenkov missed qualifying in the Ukrainian Team for the

2008 Summer Olympics The 2008 Summer Olympics (), officially the Games of the XXIX Olympiad () and also known as Beijing 2008 (), were an international multisport event held from 8 to 24 August 2008, in Beijing, China. A total of 10,942 athletes from 204 Na ...

because of an injury where he underwent surgery and took a while for the recovery. He won gold in All-around and silver in Horizontal Bar at the

2011 Summer Universiade The 2011 Summer Universiade ( zh, c=2011年夏季世界大学生运动会, p=Èr líng yī yī Nián xiàjì shìjiè dàxuéshēng yùndònghuì), the XXVI Summer Universiade ( zh, c=第二十六届夏季世界大学生运动会, p=Dì Èrshíl ...

. He won bronze medal in All-around at the 2011 European Championships. He competed for Ukraine's national team at the

in the Men's artistic team all-around and the Men's artistic individual all-around. The Ukrainian team, consisting of Kuksenkov,

Igor Radivilov Ihor (Igor) Vitaliyovych Radivilov ( uk, Ігор Віталійович Радівілов; born 19 October 1992) is a Ukrainian gymnast and three-time Olympian, having competed at the 2012, 2016, and 2020 Olympic Games. Although he competes on ...

Vitalii Nakonechnyi Vitalii Nakonechnyi (Ukrainian: Віталій Наконечний, born 2 August 1986 in Kalush) is a Ukrainian gymnast. At the 2011 World Artistic Gymnastics Championships, he competed in the team all-around event, joining Oleg Verniaiev, Ni ...

Oleg Stepko Oleg Stepko ( uk, Олег Степко, born 25 March 1994 in Zaporizhzhya) is a Ukrainian (until 2014), Azerbaijani (2014–2018) and Russian (since March 2018) gymnast. Career Oleg competed for the national team at the 2012 Summer Olympics ...

and

Oleg Verniaiev Oleg Yuriyovych Verniaiev ( uk, Олег Юрійович Верняєв; born 29 September 1993) is a Ukrainian artistic gymnast. He is the 2016 Olympic parallel bars champion and individual all-around silver medalist. Verniaiev is also the ...

finished in 4th place in the team final. They were initially awarded 3rd position although a successful appeal from the Japanese team over one of their athletes scores resulted in Japan being promoted from 4th to 2nd place, displacing Ukraine from the medals. In the individual final Kuksenkov also finished in 4th position, again just missing out on a medal.

For Russia

In December 2012, Kuksenkov decided to switch to the Russian team for family reasons. Now competing for Russia, he returned to international competition at the

2013 Summer Universiade The 2013 Summer Universiade, officially known as the XXVII Summer Universiade (russian: XXVII Летняя Универсиада), was held in the city of Kazan, Russia, the most northerly city ever to host a Summer Universiade. Over 10,400 un ...

, in Kazan. Kuksenkov, alongside the Russian team (

Emin Garibov Emin Nadirovich Garibov (russian: Эмин Надирович Гарибов; az, Emin Nadir oğlu Qəribov; born 8 September 1990 in Moscow) is a retired Russian artistic gymnast of Azerbaijani descent. He is the two-time (2013, 2012) European ...

David Belyavskiy David Sagitovich Belyavskiy ( rus, Давид Сагитович Белявский, , dɐˈvʲid bʲɪˈlʲafskʲɪɪ̯; born 23 February 1992) is a Russian artistic gymnast and three-time Olympian, representing Russia in 2012 and 2016 and RO ...

Denis Ablyazin Denis Mikhailovich Ablyazin ( rus, Денис Михайлович Аблязин, , dʲɪˈnʲis ɐˈblʲæzʲɪn, born 3 August 1992) is a Russian artistic gymnast. Ablyazin is Olympic Champion 2020 in Tokyo and a seven-time Olympic Games med ...

and

Nikita Ignatyev Nikita Alekseevich Ignatyev (russian: Никита Алексеевич Игнатьев, born 21 June 1992 in Novosibirsk, Novosibirsk Oblast, Russia) is a Russian artistic gymnast. He is the 2015 European Games All-around bronze medalist. Comp ...

) won Russia the team gold medal. He won gold medal in Pommel Horse and defended his All-around title in

Kazan Kazan ( ; rus, Казань, p=kɐˈzanʲ; tt-Cyrl, Казан, ''Qazan'', IPA: ɑzan is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Tatarstan in Russia. The city lies at the confluence of the Volga and the Kazanka rivers, covering a ...

winning another gold medal. On May 19–25, at the 2014 European Championships in

Sofia Sofia ( ; bg, София, Sofiya, ) is the capital and largest city of Bulgaria. It is situated in the Sofia Valley at the foot of the Vitosha mountain in the western parts of the country. The city is built west of the Iskar river, and ha ...

, Kuksenkov contributed scores of 15.133 (pommel horse), 15.066 (rings), 14.866 (parallel bar) and 14.833 (horizontal bar) for Russia and along with teammates (

, Aleksandr Balandin,

) won Russia the Team Event gold medal with a total score of 267.959 ahead of

Great Britain Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the northwest coast of continental Europe. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the largest European island and the ninth-largest island in the world. It is ...

. At the 2014 World Championships in

Nanning Nanning (; ; za, Namzningz) is the capital and largest city by population of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region in Southern China. It is known as the "Green City" because of its abundance of lush subtropical foliage. Located in the South of ...

, Kuksenkov also competed along teammates (

, Daniil Kazachkov and

Ivan Stretovich Ivan Alexeyevich Stretovich (russian: Иван Алексеевич Стретович; born 6 October 1996) is a Russian artistic gymnast. He won a silver medal in the team event at the 2016 Summer Olympics. Competitive history Career Str ...

) with Team Russia finishing 5th in the Team Final. In June 2015, Kuksenkov competed in the

2015 European Games The 2015 European Games, also known as Baku 2015 or Baku 2015 European Games ( az, Bakı 2015 Avropa Oyunları), were the inaugural edition of the European Games, an international multi-sport event for athletes representing the National Olympic ...

, winning gold in the Team Competition (with teammates

and

). In April 2016, Kuksenkov became the subject of turmoil with the news spreading that he had tested positive for

meldonium Meldonium (INN; trade name Mildronate, among others) is a limited-market pharmaceutical, developed in 1970 by Ivars Kalviņš at the USSR Latvia Institute of Organic Synthesis, and now manufactured by the Latvian pharmaceutical company Grin ...

in a failed

drugs test A drug test is a technical analysis of a biological specimen, for example urine, hair, blood, breath, sweat, or oral fluid/saliva—to determine the presence or absence of specified parent drugs or their metabolites. Major applications of drug ...

. The announcement came a day after he was crowned the Russian National champion, leading to his withdrawal from the remainder of the competition. He was temporarily suspended from Competition, however On April 13, the

World Anti-Doping Agency The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA; french: Agence mondiale antidopage, AMA) is a foundation initiated by the International Olympic Committee based in Canada to promote, coordinate, and monitor the fight against drugs in sports. The agency's key ...

gave amnesty to athletes with the presence of less than 1 microgram of meldonium in doping samples in tests conducted on athletes before March 1, 2016 is acceptable, WADA cites due to uncertainties and lack of studies for how long

stays in the body., his suspension was lifted and he was allowed to train with the Russian Team for the 2016 European Championships. At the 2016 European Championships in May, Kuksenkov competed on pommel horse (15.066), parallel bars (14.266) and high bar (14.200) to help the Russia team gold with a score of 271.378. He also qualified to the pommel horse final where he finished 5th with a score of 14.566 after a fall. Kuksenkov won his first Olympic silver medal at the

in Team event (together with

Nikita Nagornyy Nikita Vladimirovich Nagornyy ( rus, Никита Владимирович Нагорный, , nʲɪˈkʲitə nɐˈɡornɨɪ̯, born 12 February 1997 in Rostov-on-Don, Rostov Oblast, Russia) is a Russian artistic gymnast and two-time Olympian, r ...

and

). In December 2019, Kuksenkov announced his retirement from competitive gymnastics in an Instagram post, stating that he would start working as a coach for the National Russian team.

Competitive history

References

External links

*
Nikolai Kuksenkov Profile

Gymnastics Results
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Kuksenkov, Mykola 1989 births Gymnasts from Kyiv Living people Doping cases in gymnastics Olympic gymnasts of Russia Olympic gymnasts of Ukraine Gymnasts at the 2012 Summer Olympics Gymnasts at the 2016 Summer Olympics Russian male artistic gymnasts Ukrainian male artistic gymnasts Ukrainian emigrants to Russia Naturalised citizens of Russia Gymnasts at the 2015 European Games European Games medalists in gymnastics European Games gold medalists for Russia Medalists at the 2016 Summer Olympics Olympic silver medalists for Russia Olympic medalists in gymnastics Universiade medalists in gymnastics Russian sportspeople in doping cases Universiade gold medalists for Russia Universiade gold medalists for Ukraine Universiade silver medalists for Ukraine Medalists at the 2013 Summer Universiade