What's next for Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva after her Beijing Winter Olympics campaign?

This was not supposed to be the way story ended. Not in anybody's book.

International Olympic Committee (IOC) president Thomas Bach on Friday opened his final Olympic Games press conference referring to some of the magical moments of the Beijing Winter Games before detailing at length «the very sad story about Kamila Valieva».

The 15-year-old figure skating prodigy from Russia came to Beijing to be crowned Olympic champion. Instead, her journey ended in public humiliation and a performance that resembled a Shakespearean tragedy on ice, with a doping allegation yet to be resolved.

It was her teammate, instead, who won gold. And yet world champion Anna Shcherbakova said the experience left her with «a hollow feeling».

The IOC avoided the embarrassment of having to postpone a medal ceremony, which it would have done if Valieva finished in the top three, but the Olympic president broke with tradition by watching it elsewhere rather than at the venue.

He described what he saw as disturbing.

Bach said there was «tremendous coldness» between the teenager and her coaches following her fourth-placed finish.

«I was very, very disturbed … when I watched the competition on TV,» the former Olympic fencer said.

«I know from my athlete time a little bit about pressure, but this pressure is beyond my imagination.

»But this was not all. When I saw afterwards how she was received by her closest entourage … with what appeared to be a tremendous coldness, it was chilling."

While the athlete's coach, Eteri Tutberidze, may have been giving her best ice-queen impersonation, the reaction of other Russians was red-hot fury.

They feel they are being singled out again, still paying the price for a state-sanctioned doping program that unravelled after the