{"id":3577,"date":"2020-07-09T07:52:32","date_gmt":"2020-07-08T21:52:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/shootingaustralia.org\/in-sight-with-elena-galiabovitch\/"},"modified":"2024-07-24T15:11:47","modified_gmt":"2024-07-24T05:11:47","slug":"in-sight-with-elena-galiabovitch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/shootingaustralia.org\/in-sight-with-elena-galiabovitch\/","title":{"rendered":"In Sight with Elena Galiabovitch"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/player.vimeo.com\/video\/436697121\" width=\"640\" height=\"480\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"autoplay; fullscreen\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<h2><strong>Pistol shooting is the right medicine for Elena<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p><em>By Greg Campbell<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Elena Galiabovitch is equally skilled with a surgical scalpel or sports pistol. Her hands are steady, her concentration is unwavering, and her skills are precise.<\/p>\n<p>As a doctor and an Olympic shooting athlete, Galiabovitch also knows how to juggle her medical career and ongoing studies with her time on the pistol range. With COVID-19 throwing an unforeseen curve ball at the beginning of the year, all plans for the year have been erased and re-drawn.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere hasn\u2019t been a single plan that I have for this year that I haven\u2019t had to re-think,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>But Galiabovitch is used to adapting and re-adapting to suit the circumstance. While studying for a \u00a0master\u2019s degree and undertaking research work in her goal to become a urological surgeon, she has been working as a locum at Monash Health hospitals in Melbourne.<\/p>\n<p>The postponement of the Tokyo Olympic Games by 12 months has seen all domestic and international shooting competitions cancelled and new schedules are yet to be developed.<\/p>\n<p>Despite these obstacles, Galiabovitch remains upbeat saying, \u201cEveryone has had to make their own adjustments. This year has been a lot of adjusting, changing and adapting. That\u2019s fine. You find your way eventually.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Even though her father, Vladimir was a world renown pistol coach, shooting didn\u2019t truly find its way into her life until 2014. As a teenager, Galiabovitch wasn\u2019t serious about shooting.\u201d It felt like a chore to me. There were other things that I wanted to do,\u201d she explained.<\/p>\n<p>But in the lead-up to the 2014 Glasgow Commonwealth Games, Galiabovitch decided to attend various competitions around the country and performed strongly. Intrigued, she decided to review the Games selection criteria and saw how close she was to meeting team qualification. Suddenly, the competitive fire was lit.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI wanted to be selected on these teams. It was a different mindset to what I had participated in shooting before when I was a teenager,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>Two years later, Galiabovitch was selected on the Australian Olympic team for the 2016 Rio Olympics where she competed in the 10m Air Pistol and 25m Sports Pistol.<\/p>\n<p>Her international shooting career continued at the 2018 Gold Coast Commonwealth Games where she claimed the silver medal in the 25m Sports Pistol and the bronze in the 10m Air Pistol.<\/p>\n<p>Days later, and despite yearning for a long overdue break, Galiabovitch decided \u201cbegrudgingly\u201d to use the intensive 13-week build-up to the Gold Coast Games and head to the World Cup event in Changwon in Korea and was rewarded with the 25m Sports Pistol gold medal when shooting a personal best score of 583.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-4935 size-large\" src=\"https:\/\/shootingaustralia.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/07\/Elena-Galiabovitch-1-1024x617-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"640\" height=\"386\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Despite the long hours and the hectic and often unpredictable workload as a doctor, Galiabovitch has continued training as an elite athlete as she finds it positively counterbalances her medical career. She is also aware that many medical professionals face mental health challenges because of the emotional nature of their life-saving work, and that medicine can become all consuming.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSometimes having an extra perspective, or something else in your life, is really helpful to be a balancing factor so you don\u2019t go stir crazy,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI feel it (shooting) gives me something extra in life, something else to focus on. It\u2019s quite a selfish reason why I do it. I obviously feel a great honour and I\u2019m so lucky to represent Australia and that\u2019s a wonderful feeling. But I\u2019ve worked really hard for that as well. It hasn\u2019t been handed to me on a platter,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>Galiabovitch loves her work as a doctor.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s actually a real privilege for people to let you into their lives. It\u2019s not very common to go up to a person and ask them a really personal question without ever having met them before or expect them to respond and give you an honest answer.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere is a privilege and a trust which goes with that relationship. I really enjoy being able to contribute during a stage of someone\u2019s life where they\u2019re not well. I don\u2019t remember the names of all the patients that I have told they have cancer or have had a bad diagnosis, but they will remember me for the rest of their lives. I try to make a difference in that way and at least give them something at that moment that is helpful,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n<p>Galiabovitch sees many similarities between her work as a doctor and her athletic career as a world class pistol athlete. As a doctor, she partners with fellow doctors, nurses and a range of other medical professionals in seeking positive patient outcomes. As a shooter, she is working with coaches, strength and conditioning experts, dieticians and psychologists to excel on the range.<\/p>\n<p>She also believes there are many transferable<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-1459 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/shootingaustralia.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/07\/009_SP.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"720\" height=\"480\" \/><\/p>\n<p>skills between medicine and elite sport and considers shooting to have a different pressure.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI believe things that I have achieved in sport, and the way that I\u2019ve got there, have really helped me as a doctor and really helped me in medicine,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI take lessons from shooting into the workplace. The pressures (on the range) are very different but resilience and ability to cope are transferrable. In the workplace I feel quite certain about my knowledge and I know what I don\u2019t know, and there are other people around to help if you don\u2019t know. I\u2019m still in training and I\u2019m not expected to know everything, or what to do in every circumstance. There are other people there who you can rely on for help. On the (shooting) line, I am the only one responsible,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>With her dad, Vladimir, the National and Olympic team pistol coach, Galiabovitch knows he has a high level of understanding of her ambitions as she aims to advance her medical career while targeting the Tokyo Olympics. And, like all father-daughter coach-athlete combinations, clear boundaries must be set. Thankfully, her mum Victoria and older sister Eugenia, haven\u2019t been forced to play referee!<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019ve got better with our communication over the years, just expressing our opinions to each other and listening to each other. It\u2019s a two-way street and I\u2019ve got to play my part in that as well. I feel like I am becoming more prepared. I am taking more responsibility with the planning of things and being more accountable for my actions,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhen I was younger, I\u2019d just look at his side of it rather than what I can do. But we\u2019re all adults now. We respect each other\u2019s time. I don\u2019t want to intrude on his out of work time and I also try to set that boundary for myself.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>With the Tokyo Olympics postponed to July next year and COVID-19 closing ranges, Galiabovitch has been working closely with the Victorian Institute of Sport\u2019s strength and conditioning staff, swimming twice a week and running on a treadmill while watching one of her favourite TV shows, MasterChef.<\/p>\n<p>While shooting is a sport which allows participants to keep performing at the highest international level for several decades, Galiabovitch has no clear immediate competition plans beyond the 25m Sports Pistol event at the Tokyo Olympics, but retirement isn\u2019t a consideration.<\/p>\n<p>However, advancing her medical career will be the higher priority.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMedicine is very important to me. I don\u2019t see myself being a shooter when I\u2019m 65, but I\u2019d really like to keep being a surgeon until that age. It\u2019s what I hope to do for the rest of my life,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Pistol shooting is the right medicine for Elena By Greg Campbell Elena Galiabovitch is equally skilled with a surgical scalpel or sports pistol. Her hands are steady, her concentration is [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_relevanssi_hide_post":"","_relevanssi_hide_content":"","_relevanssi_pin_for_all":"","_relevanssi_pin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_unpin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_include_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_exclude_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_no_append":"","_relevanssi_related_not_related":"","_relevanssi_related_posts":"","_relevanssi_noindex_reason":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[58],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3577","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-in-sight"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shootingaustralia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3577","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shootingaustralia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shootingaustralia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shootingaustralia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shootingaustralia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3577"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/shootingaustralia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3577\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3580,"href":"https:\/\/shootingaustralia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3577\/revisions\/3580"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shootingaustralia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3577"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shootingaustralia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3577"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shootingaustralia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3577"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}