10 Reasons You Should Cheer For Tugba Karademir At The Vancouver Olympics

Now that friends and family know that I am cheering for and supporting a 48 year old freestyle skier from Argentina, a 45 year old skeleton racer from Japan and an Ethiopian cross country skier (not to mention a women's skeleton racer from New Zealand even though she unfortunately failed to qualify) at the upcoming Vancouver Winter Olympics, they take me a little more seriously when I explain that I'm also supporting an ice skater from Turkey. Here are 10 reasons why you should consider cheering for Tugba Karademir at the Vancouver Olympic games:

10. She had an opportunity to make if financially easier on herself and family, but decided that representing her home country was more important.



9. It's always more fun to cheer for the underdog.

8. The smile



7. She has her sights set on a top ten finish which she believes is possible if she performs 2 clean routines.

6. How many other ice skaters are also studying for an honours degree in Biotechnology?

5. It's much more fun to be a trend setter than a trend follower.

4. Talent beyond figure skating.

3. While other ice skaters are treated like rock stars, she's happy to try and teach her country more about the sport of figure skating.

2. How can you not support an ice skater that claims she's happier on the ice than anywhere else?

And the number one reason that you should be rooting for Tugba Karademir at the Vancouver Olympics is:

1. Just watch

Tugba Karademir Finishes 12th in European Championships

At the end of the free program Tugba Karademir finished in 12th place in the European Figure Skating Championships with a total of 82.54 points.

Tugba said that she believed she represented Turkey the best that she could. Her next destination is Vancouver for the Olympics where she hopes to place well. Tugba received a score of 35.74 for technical merit, and a score of 46.80 for artistic merit for a total of 82.54 points and a 12th place finish.

Translated from NTV Sports

Skating for the Love of It and Country: Tugba Karademir

In many Asian countries, ice skaters are treated as rock stars. When you come from Turkey, it's a challenge to find any sponsors, let alone find adequate coaches and training time. Those are some of the difficulties that 24 year old Tugba Karademir has had to overcome as she became the first winter skating Olympian for Turkey.

To keep her dream alive, her and her parents made the difficult choice to move to Canada to find better training and more ice time. When the Canadians asked Tugba to represent them, she declined preferring to represent her native Turkey:




Tubga finished in 21st place out of 24 at the 2006 Torino Olympic Winter Games and hopes to greatly improve on that result in Vancouver. She has already qualified so we'll see her competing in February. You can follow her blog and also become a fan on facebook to support her efforts and dreams.