Quick round-up

Sadly the rumour is true, no Larisa Iordache at LRSY this weekend. This makes it her fourth missed world cup. She is still slated to compete at Doha and Cottbus world cups, and is expected to be a certainty for Euros. I'm not sure why they bothered overloading her with assignments as now they face more indignity in pulling her out of this one- and at a very late stage too. A slight injury was cited as the cause, I'd be more inclined to believe her March and April schedule is packed enough moreso than an injury. If it is, then hopefully it's a very swift recovery. We have to see her this year sometime..she can't withdraw from everything...right? Maria Paseka is not there either, the reason seems to be another visa problem- which makes it the third in quick succession, Mei Jie could not attend Massilia and Andreea Iridon could not attend Gymnix for the same reason. Sort it out, major gymnastics federations...

The good news is, Diana Bulimar has been added to the LRSY floor line-up. She is also down for Cottbus, Doha and is another almost-certainty for Euros. However she has less pressure on her and is not as of yet a brilliant all-arounder- though she has upped her game on vault. Really looking forward to her floor. The impressions from training report states that she is using her choreography and music from London. Fine by me. You can read it here, in French. I'm proud I understood without translating. Finally!

Update: What a splatfest. Really sad to see gymnast after gymnast come to grief at the hands of bars, vault and beam. Not to mention Janine Berger and Kristian Thomas who injured themselves on vault. The prognosis on Janine is that she will be out for two weeks. I was most dissapointed to hear that Becky Downie had a disastrous time on bars and that Diana Bulimar fell off beam twice. Bars and beam were a case of whoever doesn't fall, qualifies. Well done to Ksenia Afanasyeva for hitting both of her routines. However, I am disgusted she was wrongly awarded 0.5 CR for a front/sidewards element on floor as she did not perform it, she left out her front aerial. Her turn combination was beautiful though. I was a little dissapointed with her beam as she left out a very pretty connection from Russian Nationals. The routine seemed like a fight, it wasn't anywhere near as graceful as it could have been, but there's plenty of time to iron that out, hopefully. Ugly dismount too, sigh. Afan's floor being judged incorrectly means that Diana Bulimar should have won floor by a landslide. Which would have been nice considering her beam. I didn't see anything wrong with her leaps, two of which failed to get credit. Will have to rewatch. Although Anne Kuhm's beam was a meltdown, her BHS-LOSO-LOSO looks like it will be absolutely beautiful. Carlotta Ferlito's beam was another highlight, very strong and it looks like she has absolutely nailed the new arm-swing rules. Her acro line was totally Li Ya-esque in its lack of arm swing, brilliant to see. I've no idea how this rule physically affects gymnasts, but it seemed like it set Marine Brevet off balance..

Our winners are:

UB- Giulia Steingruber
VT- Giulia Steingruber
BB- Carlotta Ferlito
FX- Ksenia Afanasyeva

Afan fell off beam, handing the title to Carlotta. I haven't seen Afan's floor yet (issues with the livestream..) but she did have an aerial in apparently. Didi scored just one-tenth lower, I don't know yet if she had her leaps credited. Her tumbling was a little scrappy, especially in slow-motion. Bit of a dissapointing competition given all the falls and some odd judging. Here's to Jesolo being better!

And for the day that's in it (it's a disaster zone and I avoid it like the plague here. Tip: If you're ever visiting Ireland, don't coincide your trip with Paddy's Day); here is Kim Zmeskal with the best example of an Irish music floor routine that I've seen yet. I really love this music, and it works so well. She even has little movements inspired by the dance..not many, just the ones after her second and third passes, but still. She changed this routine for nationals and had different music. Boo. This one rocks.

I'm too late for the old news that Beth Tweddle has won Dancing on Ice. I wonder if the gymnasts lucky streak will continue for Aly Raisman though. Really looking forward to seeing her first dance. I think she will at least initially face the same criticism Beth did- too much focus on technicality, not enough on losing herself in the dance and her presentation. I think it's hard for gymnasts to do the opposite of what they do so much of- keeping the body tense and being incredibly focused on technicality. Obviously not that hard, since they're winning everything they enter, but still..

I am so thrilled at the vast improvement of Andreea Munteanu. Andreea is a 2014 senior, whose strengths are floor and beam..no surprise there for a Romanian. Thankfully, she also has superb toepoint, leaps and extension. She stood out on beam in particular last year at Junior Euros but has really come on since then. I could look at her 1/4 straddle all day long. And she already has a (nice and high) tuck full! Much as I enjoy Larisa Iordache's superb beam work, her toepoint is severely lacking and her leaps aren't a patch on Munteanu's. So I'd have no problem for her to be surpassed on beam by the girl with superior form. Really great to see her comeback after a vastly dissapointing TF and AA and take the beam and floor titles and a bronze on vault. Hopefully Laura Jurca can recover quickly, she aggravated an old injury on floor and then scratched vault..the reason why they finished last with 2/3 in their vault rotation. Andreea herself would have easily claimed the AA had she not had a disaster on bars. A modest score of 12.8 would have given her a generous lead. Sigh.

This is the greatest thing I have seen on twitter, ever.

Looks like me with my teammates from Olympics hahahah twitter.com/CPonor/status/…
— ponor catalina (@CPonor) March 14, 2013

There's a meet in May that I've never heard of before, but it sounds very interesting. The Professional Gymnastics Challenge will pit two groups- USA Vs The World- of mixed gymnasts against each other. Gymnasts will compete head-to-head in an offence against defence format where the first group devise a skill or series and the other team must better the originators effort in order to be the new offending team. Tumbling is one category, there are plenty of others. I can't wait to see how it pans out. It's not new, but it is to me! On the US side will be Jana Bieger (still training..?), Anna Li, Kat Ding and a whole bunch of big enough MAG names. The international team includes Oksana Chusovitina, Anna Pavlova, Jade Barbosa, Jessica Lopez and Lisa Mason. Jade's gym has dropped their professional programme and fired a whole bunch of staff, leaving her, the Hypolito's and a few more in the lurch. (It's not clear how this affects Rebeca Andrade who is too old for the recreational programme for younger kids which is being kept, but is not a senior pro and is not named as being affected. Nevertheless, the coaching situation will impact her if nothing else). So if Jade has not withdrawn as of yet, hopefully that's good news and she has somewhere good to train. The website is here, for a better explanation of how the competition will work. I'm most excited about Anna Li as there is an uneven bars bit..and Jade Barbosa anything.

Chantysha Netteb and Noel van Klaveren will compete for the Netherlands at Euros. Absolutely thrilled Chantysha rebounded quickly from her scary fall at her first attempt to qualify, but dissapointed they are not sending more. After all, they're sending six MAG. Sanne Wevers (queen of turns) still scores high on beam and Daphne Slingerland could do with the experience. Hmm. Elizabeth Seitz, Tabea Alt and Sophie Scheder will compete at Chemnitz. Sophie is the reigning junior Euros bars champion, looking forward to seeing what she has up her sleeve for her senior debut, and Tabea too. Mariya Livchikova and new senior Darya Matveyeva placed first and second respectively at Ukrainian Cup. Presumably both will be headed to Moscow. Darya was very flaky last year at Junior Euros, though very promising as is usual with Ukraine. Let's all pray to something that Mariya can stay on the beam as her original and daring routine is probably worth more in this code...