Gymnastics Australia slammed for ‘sloppy’ bullying investigation of Olympic coach

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An Australian Olympic gymnastics coach has been cleared of seven allegations of bullying by the National Sports Tribunal in a judgment which found Gymnastics Australia’s investigation to be “flawed, sloppy and unfair”.

Gymnastics Australia, the national federation for the sport, had in 2024 accepted seven of 12 bullying claims made on behalf of a then-17-year-old gymnast against Olga Belooussov. The allegations and subsequent arbitration were made public in a judgment uploaded to the tribunal’s website this month.

Belooussov and her husband Sasha coached Georgia Godwin, now 28, to the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games and to two gold and three silver medals at the 2022 Commonwealth Games in Birmingham. The couple have coached Australian athletes to 45 international medals since emigrating from Russia in 1991.

Olga Belooussov, Georgia Godwin and Sasha Belooussov at the Australian Gymnastics Championships in 2021. Godwin is not involved in the allegations and is not the complainant.Credit: Instagram

Both were also suspended by the federation for 18 months in 2013 for verbal abuse, the ABC first reported in 2021.

The most recent complaints were only directed at Olga Belooussov, who was investigated and found to have been in breach of the federation’s member protection policy clauses against bullying, according to the arbitration documents.

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The allegations were made by a high-level ex-gymnast who was coached by the couple from eight to 17 years old for 32 hours a week. The seven complaints were based on incidents spanning a period of four months in 2023 when the gymnast was 17. A parent of the gymnast lodged the complaint on her behalf.

Gymnastics Australia found Belooussov had bullied the gymnast by allegedly ignoring her, by not using the gymnast’s name when addressing her, by speaking rudely to her, and that Belooussov called the gymnast and her teammates “princesses” due to their frequent injuries.

“She compared our training regimen in Australia, commenting that it’s the only place she’s been where there’s minimal training and yet a high rate of injuries,” the gymnast wrote in a statement.

Belooussov was first notified of the sanction made against her on June 12, 2024. She was given a six-month supervision order and made to undertake training sessions and attend six meetings with the federation. When she disputed the sanction, the federation referred the matter to the tribunal.