Asal Saparbaeva's retirement plan after gymnastics – become a B-Girl and a superhero for young Uzbek brides

Asal Saparbaeva is not pointing her toes anymore.

After 17 years as an artistic gymnast, the Uzbekistani athlete has discovered a new sport she describes as “pure freedom” – breaking.

“I have yet to try a sport that is harder than artistic gymnastics because it demands extraordinary control over the body. You not only have to perform a move - you must do it perfectly. But in breaking, you can do it any way you want,” Saparbaeva said.

“You can learn a new element today and throw it into your performance tomorrow, and no matter how well you execute it, if you play around it, it will be a success. Nobody is going to mark you down for errors, like your knees or toes not looking right.

“You are absolutely free and you show yourself as authentically as you can. You offer your style, your energy.”

B-Girl Littos is just one of the many identities Saparbaeva has adopted since retiring from Uzbekistan's gymnastics team. After stints as a wedding performer and circus artist, she has settled into a not-so-secret superhero alter ego that has now become an inspiration for young women across Central Asia.

Olympics.com spoke to the athlete about her transformation from being hand-picked for the national team by the legendary Oksana Chusovitina, to performing fire shows at birthday parties, discovering breaking on a mountain top and empowering women through her viral videos.

Asal Saparbaeva's first life as an artistic gymnast

While nowadays Saparbaeva is most often seen doing head spins and gravity-defying flips, ironically it was her “small” and “fragile” frame which initially persuaded coaches to turn her into a competitive athlete.

She started gymnastics at five years old and enjoyed immediate success.

After half a year of training, Saparbaeva took part in her first competition and finished third ahead of far more experienced girls.

Within a decade she was representing Uzbekistan as one of the six women personally selected by two-time Olympic medallist Oksana Chusovitina.

“This was an incredible experience, an incredible life,” said Saparbaeva whose gymnastics highlights included winning bronze at the 2010 Asian Games, gold at the 2011 Central South Asian Artistic Gymnastics Championships, and another bronze at the 2014 FIG Artistic Gymnastics World Cup.

Ultimately, however, she chose to leave the sport due to a combination of lingering injuries and burnout after her dream of winning gold at the 2014 Asian Games fell through and she left the competition empty-handed.

"When we arrived at the competition, one of our girls was injured, the other withdrew from several apparatuses. And so, the team was no longer complete and it didn't matter how good I felt personally," she recalled. "I got upset, and after that competition I came home and told myself that that’s probably it.”

Discovering a second... and third identity

Saparbaeva’s break from sport did not last long. After a week of “lazing about” the house, she became restless.

"I had to do something," she said. "The amount of energy I had was immense. I walked around the apartment, I walked up and down the street and I didn’t know where to let it out."

Looking for an outlet for her energy, Saparbaeva jumped on an offer from a college friend to try wushu. It didn’t stick, but the hour-long training session had a side benefit – it led to a marriage proposal.

"There were some guys training in the corner. They were parkourists," Saparbaeva recalled. "And I thought, 'Here are the guys who are going to help me stay in shape.'"

Among them, her future husband Yaroslav Nikolenko. Even before making their own vows, Saparbaeva and Nikolenko made it to multiple weddings as entertainers. Their signature number was a blend of acrobatics and dance, and Saparbaeva delighted in this entirely different spotlight.

"I really wanted to perform. I missed my past performances, that adrenaline, the feeling that you are alone in the arena with everyone looking at you, supporting you. I really wanted to experience that again and I only got it in this sphere," Saparbaeva said.

"There were a lot of people who 'gifted' us for birthdays or we had to go and meet someone at the maternity ward, for example. It was a lot of fun. It was the life of an artist."

The pursuit of an artist's life led Saparbaeva to join the circus for a year where she performed daring acrobatics routines.

She and her husband later formed their own troupe and created an acrobatic fire show they took on tour to different countries including the People's Republic of China. They were so successful there that they decided to stay.

From circus acrobats to social media kings

Shortly before the pandemic, Saparbaeva and Nikolenko returned to Uzbekistan. When they heard there would be a lockdown, they went out the same day to buy filming equipment, costumes and backdrops.

And so their new life as social media bloggers began.

"Sometimes he would get a new idea at 3am, and he would wake me up and tell me, 'Listen, I've thought of something. If we film it now, the video will be ready by the morning. We'll post it in the morning and it will get good views.' Well, I got up and we filmed," Saparbaeva recalled.

"Whenever he said that he had some idea that would get 1,000,000 views, that’s exactly what happened," she continued. "We got great numbers in those moments when we filmed very quickly, spontaneously, unexpectedly, with that extra drive."

Nikolenko's sense of the social media world proved spot on. Many of their videos have gone viral and have now earned them a following of more than five million on TikTok, three million on YouTube, and two million on Instagram.

Partnership and advertising offers flooded in, but Saparbaeva was determined not to stop at that. Once more, her restless nature looked for a new creative outlet.

Discovering breaking: No more pointy toes

A year ago, Saparbaeva was on a hiking trip with her friends when the conversation suddenly turned to breaking. The former gymnast had long been intrigued by the sport and even tried some breaking-style moves in her social media videos, but there was never a strong reason to pursue it.

That is, until her hiking friends mentioned that it had become an Olympic sport. Not only that, Uzbekistan's national team in breaking was formed that same year although, at that point, there were only B-Boys on the roster.

"It was the closest to me out of all the dance styles. There are acrobatics, some gymnastic movements, artistry, emotions. And I always wanted to do it, but there was no reason, no motivation to set time aside for this," Saparbaeva said.

"I was looking for an excuse. And this news was that point when I felt that I could set a goal and that goal was to get to the Olympic Games."

And so she started training, trying out the moves at the studio and in the process also escaping her strict gymnastics mindset.

"If you compare this with gymnastics, everything is completely different," Saparbaeva explained. "In gymnastics you memorise a set of movements and you know that you will fall into a rhythm. You just need to execute cleanly and beautifully.

"In breaking, you have to freestyle, you have to feel the music and create your own movement. You are absolutely free. You can do whatever you want, no restrictions, no boundaries.

"In gymnastics, you always have a strict hairstyle. Your leotard is as beautiful as possible, but also strict. There is a special uniform, rules. But here, no, you can even go out in your pyjamas. You can go out in jeans, you can go out in shorts, whatever. The important thing is that you feel comfortable."

Trying to discover her own breaking style, Saparbaeva quickly realised it was her gymnastics background that set her apart. Now gymnastics elements, adapted to the ambience of a breaking battle, have become Saparbaeva’s signature and one of the key factors in her success.

She said, "I began to invent and transform my gymnastics movements into a more street style. People react very positively to them. At my last battle in China, I did an acrobatic sequence as my entrance and all the spectators were just like, 'Whoa!' It was a super cool feeling.

"Kelinka-superhero": Earning mighty status among Uzbekistani brides

Four months after picking up breaking, Saparbaeva was invited to join the national team.

In January 2023, she went to her first international competition. That experience spurred her on to train even more, although it hasn't always been easy to find time with the blogging commitments she has.

"There were cases when we were filming outside of town and during the break, when they were rearranging the lights and equipment, I turned on the music and started dancing," she said. "I've trained on a film set near the pool. There was a small place, two-by-two, and I had to make do without any major tricks because there is a pool right there and I didn't want to fall in with my makeup on."

While blogging takes up much of her energy, Saparbaeva is determined to continue producing videos in order to bring about further positive change.

It started when she received an offer to film an ad campaign featuring a traditional Uzbek song. Thinking of a potential way to play on its romantic undertones, Saparbaeva decided to don a traditional outfit of kelinka, a name given to a young Uzbek bride, and shoot some tricks on the street.

The reaction was instant.

She recalled, "When I started doing tricks with a broom on the street and sweeping, a crowd gathered. Cars stopped. There was a traffic jam. People didn't know how to react. They haven't seen anything like this.

"In our country a kelinka sweeps, she cleans the house, she cooks delicious food, but in a plain way. And here I am, throwing things up, breaking things, doing some somersaults and the splits. It was something unexpected.”

The clips featuring the character Saparbaeva dubbed "kelinka-superhero" made headlines in Uzbekistan as well as other countries in Central Asia, which have a similar culture, and even Türkiye.

The gymnast-turned-breaker has now developed an unlikely fan base among newly-married women and hopes her action videos help the brides she is representing find their own superpowers.

"Many girls, when they get married, they give up on everything - their education, all their dreams," she said. "They completely devote themselves to family. But this persona lets you know that your life does not end there.

"You can be a kelinka and a blogger, you can be a kelinka and an actress. You can be a sporty kelinka. My goal is to show this to people as clearly as possible, so that they go beyond these boundaries."

Many women have already heeded her message. They come with their children to the gym where Saparbaeva trains, show her the different moves they have learned and even film themselves performing these tricks on camera.

"I get a lot of comments where people write that they want their daughter to be like 'kelinka-superhero'. And I would really like for this to happen, so that the girls who now watch my videos get involved in sports, so that they see a future there."