Valentina Golubenko was born in Volgograd, Russia to a chess family. Her father, Valery Golubenko is a mathematician and chess player who was champion of Estonia in rapid chess from 1993 to 1995 and a triple winner on board one in the Estonian Team Championships.
Although a resident of Estonia, Golubenko plays under the Croatian flag as she is not qualified to represent Estonia owing to her Russian citizenship. In six of those tournaments she obtained 100% score by winning all the games. She was awarded the Woman Grandmaster title in Antalya in November 2007, thanks to her results at the Mediterranean Flower WGM Tournament in Rijeka 2006 and at the European Women"s Championship 2007 in Dresden, becoming the first ever resident Estonian to receive lieutenant
She took part in the Women"s World Chess Championship 2008, where she lost to Viktorija Čmilytė from Lithuania in the first round.
Golubenko"s family claims that the decision of the Federation contradicts FIDE"s General Rules for participation in FIDE events. Estonia"s leading grandmaster Jaan Ehlvest agrees with this opinion.
Still the Estonian Chess Federation has not allowed Golubenko to play under the Estonian flag despite open letters to FIDE written by both Golubenko"s parents, because of the requirement of citizenship set in the Sport Acting. As a solution, the Estonian Chess Federation proposed Golubenko to apply for Estonian citizenship.
This proposal was rejected by the Golubenko"s family.
As Golubenko was denied to play for Estonia and her strength was not enough for Russia she decided to play under the flag of Croatia, which was allowed by FIDE.
Golubenko is the first and only World youth chess champion from Estonia thus far. Valentina was coached by her parents and won several youth titles. She won the Estonian championship in different age categories: three times for girls under 10 (1998–2000), once for boys under 10 (1999), five for girls under 12 (1998–2002), four for girls under 14 (2001–2004), twice for girls under 16 (2003–2004), and once for girls under 18 (2004). She was also Estonian rapid chess champion six times (for U18 girls in 2001-2005 and for U18 in 2007) and junior team champion for boys (2003) and for girls (2003 and 2004). In October 2008 Valentina Golubenko won the gold medal at the World Youth Chess Championship in the under 18 girls category by scoring 9 points out of 11, one point ahead of the runner-up. In 2014 she won the Croatian women"s championship.
