Article by Andra Mocanu – Published Sunday, January 11, 2026, 7:54 p.m. / Updated Sunday, January 11, 2026, 7:54 p.m.
Maria Olaru (43 years old), Olympic champion in 2000, in Sydney, with the national gymnastics team, faced the negative temperatures in the thermometers and took a bath in the pool.
10 kilometers away from Timișoara, where she has lived for many years, in Giroc, former gymnast Maria Olaru, along with dozens of other brave people, met to bathe in the pool.
PHOTO GALLERY. Maria Olaru took a bath at Copca, near Timișoara
Among the participants was the Olympic champion, Maria Olaru, who entered the frozen water at minus six degrees Celsius.
“It's a new challenge, but I've always liked to push my limits. I've been coming for five years and it's the first time I've managed to go all the way in. But I have the experience of cold showers, of going out in the snow, but I've never been prepared to go all the way in like that”said Maria Olaru for Antena 1.
Before entering the cold water, the participants turned to the Dutchman Wim Hof's method, which includes the practice of bathing in freezing waters as a form of training for the body and mind.
Through controlled exposure to extreme cold, proponents of the method say the body improves its resistance to stress, circulation and adaptability, turning discomfort into a tool of self-control and discipline.
According to the cited source, after leaving the frozen lake, the participants went straight to the sauna, where the body was gradually brought back to a normal temperature.
Who is Maria Olaru?
Maria Olaru is a reference name for Romanian sport. He started practicing gymnastics in Fălticeni, then he arrived in Deva.
At the World Championships in Tianjin, in 1999, she contributed to winning the fourth consecutive world title of the Romanian team and, although she was a debutante at a competition of such scope, she won the world title in the individual compound and the bronze medal in jumping.
In 2000, she became an Olympic champion in Sydney, with the national gymnastics team, and at the end of the same year she decided to retire from the activity.
