Real Madrid Girlfriends: Irina Shayk (7)

Irina Shaykhlislamova was born in Yemanzhelinsk, Russia (January 6, 1986). Her late father Valeri was of Tatar origin and her mother is Russian. Shayk says that she got her unusual looks from her father, and she has said that people often think she is South American. “My father was dark skinned, because he was Tatar. Sometimes Tatars can look Brazilian,” she says. “I get my light eyes from my mother”.

Shayk’s mother was a pianist who was the music teacher in a kindergarten, and her father was a coal miner. She has one sibling, an older sister named Tatiana. Shayk started playing piano at age six. At age nine she enrolled in a music school and studied there for seven years, both playing the piano and singing in the choir, as her mother wanted her to study music. Her father died of complications of pneumonia when she was 14, leaving her family with little money and forcing her mother to work two jobs to provide for the family.

After high school, Shayk studied marketing but was bored by it and entered a local beauty school with her elder sister. While there, she was noticed by a person from a local modeling agency who was struck by her unusual beauty. She was urged to participate in the "Miss Chelyabinsk 2004" beauty contest, and she won. The modeling scout Guia Jikidze noticed her and recommended that she become a model.

Irina Shayk

Shayk started her career relatively late for a model, at the age of 19, when she began modeling in Paris. In 2007 she replaced Ana Beatriz Barros as the face of Intimissimi and in the same year debuted in the annual Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue. Since that time, she has appeared in every annual edition, attending photoshoots in such places as St Petersburg, Naples, Grenada and Chile.

After being the image of Intimissimi for three years (six seasons), Shayk was made the official ambassador for the brand in 2010. Her other modeling contracts include Beach Bunny (2009), and Guess spring/summer 2009. Her magazine covers include Annabelle, Bolero, Woman, Jalouse, and Paris Capital.

She signed with modeling agency IMG on May 2009, and since then has not stopped working. Recently, Shayk was the cover model for the 2011 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue. This is the fifth time she has been featured in the magazine, but the first time she has been on the cover.

At the end of the year 2010 she was pictured nude in the GQ Spain December issue; however, she claimed that she had not stripped for the photoshoot, and that the magazine had digitally altered the images to remove her lingerie.

Irina Shayk and Cristiano Ronaldo

Irina Shayk seems to have done what no woman before could reach, that CR7 establishes his head. And the white player, who seems to have found stability with this Russian model, has opened the doors to his girlfriend of his luxurious mansion in the exclusive area of Madrid 'La Finca'.

Far from the image of selfish player, the Portuguese has decided to share his wonderful home with who is his girlfriend for ten months: 'She spent many days here and there and that creates instability", said a friend of the top. The couple, who remains in the forefront of the media since their relationship became known, is a tandem model envied by many and wide open to speculation. Among the rumors of marriage and the regulars appearances of the couple, the gossip is assured.