She was the most successful athlete at the 1960 and 1964 Winter Olympics, sharing the honour for 1960 Games with her compatriot Yevgeny Grishin.

In Karuizawa, conditions were excellent, and Skoblikova won all four races, setting a new 1000 m world record in the process.

[citation needed] For the 1964 Olympics, Skoblikova qualified for all four distances, and she won all of them, thereby becoming the first Winter Olympian to win four individual gold medals.

[citation needed] Skoblikova withdrew from speed skating for two seasons, but returned in 1967, setting a new 3000 m world record in January.

In 1968, she skated her third and last Olympics, with the best achievement of 6th place in the 3000 m. During her career she won 15 national titles in various distances, but never the all-around championships.

[4] After her retirement in 1969, Skoblikova moved to Moscow to work as a speed skating coach at Lokomotiv.

In 1996, she was inducted into the International Women's Sports Hall of Fame,[4] and three years later received the Order "For Merit to the Fatherland" from the hands of Boris Yeltsin.