Excitement is building now that teams are being named. Japan, Australia, France and four-fifths of the Chinese team have now all been named. Japan's team was surprising in that almost all of its members are veterans of the 2008 Olympic team and do not include Mai Murakami. Australia's team includes Georgia Banora as the fifth spot, a spot which Mary Anne Monckton and Georgia Rose Brown were supposedly locks for. China's team seems to be taking risks for a medal- Wu Luifang and Huang Huidan are not even in contention for the fifth spot, whereas surprisingly, Huang Quishang has been named.
Britain will name their team on July 4th. They have depth on some events so this isn't very predictable. Hannah Whelan and Beth Tweddle certainly are locks. Rebecca Tunney has a very good chance. Danusia Francis could be picked for her beam alone, which GB are very weak on- but that puts pressure on the rest if she is picked just for beam and Tweddle is picked just for bars, and possibly floor. Jenni Pinches and Ruby Harrold also stand a very good chance, and Becky Downie is still competing for her second chance.
USA will of course name their team at Trials. Whoever wins Trials is guaranteed a spot. This is no longer Jordyn's spot, if Gabby hits she could take it, her difficulty is higher and she is overscored more than Jordyn is inside the US. These two are locks, and so is Aly Raisman. Number four is less guaranteed but is extremely likely to be Kyla Ross, barring injury. Plenty of ideal teams floating around the internet are forgetting her entirely and are using Sacramone and Maroney. That would be nice, but Sacramone's beam is not needed and there are enough decent amanars. She can't be used on bars. Fifth spot is Maroney's to lose. She adds the biggest difference to the team total and does not even need to show more than one event as the other four have those covered. It is however likely she could outscore Gabby on floor in Olympic prelims with a fixed third pass, we shall see. Certainly it is the most elegant and artistic floor routine they have in that team, and should be used. Not forgetting that she was injured at Nationals, but there is no reason to suppose she will miss Trials. Her petition was accepted and she is being monitored closely in the gym. The fact that she never lost consciousness and that the fracture is described as being very minor are both very positive signs. She does not really need to showcase AA at Trials. Her beam is extremely steady and can be used if it comes to it. Her bars are fairly unusuable, though substantially better than Aly's. Her floor can be great and her vault is always perfect- she could get away with only doing the two but hopefully can do all 4.
Showing posts with label Gutted no Mai in London. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Gutted no Mai in London. Show all posts
Thursday, 21 June 2012
Tuesday, 19 June 2012
Great gymnasts we won't see in London
Inconsistency, injury and recovery and sheer depth has done these gymnasts out of their chance to shine in London.
Ana Porgras
Ana is the most artistic gymnast to emerge this quad. Her lines are exquisite and very reminiscent of old-school beautiful lines such as Aurelia Dobre. She could also swing bars like Romanians haven't since the late 1980's. A beautiful bar and beam worker, she also had an elegant floor. Vault was her nemesis into breaking into the AA, as she never really mastered a DTY. Truly a gymnast who would have flourished in the perfect 10 code, Ana was dogged by injuries for most of her senior career and has now retired. With more and more older gymnasts making comebacks, we can hope she will also.
Mariya Livchikova
Mariya is quite similar to Ana, her artistry is evident in her beam and floor, which are works of art. Her beam also showcases great original connections. Unfortunately she also has the Ukrainian tendency to splat all over the place, but it was her injury last year which counted her out of receiving the only WAG place for Ukraine, who shockingly placed so badly they cannot field a time. We can hope Mariya will stick around.
Cheng Fei
Admittedly she had her chance at both the 2004 and 2008 Olympics, but individually failed to shine at both. A huge departure from the Chinese tradition of having petite gymnasts excel at bars and beam, Fei was a powerhouse on vault and floor, with an amanar and a double-double as her highlights as well as a fierce beam routine. This time around, her strengths would have been helpful in complementing those of her team-mates. Unfortunately, Fei has fallen victim to the plague of achilles tendon, ruptured performing a triple twist on floor. Her presence and strength on floor will be missed.
Rebecca Bross
Rebecca Bross peaked in the middle of the quad. Seen as a lock for the US Olympic team two years ago, she will now be very lucky to make alternate. She blew her knee vaulting last year, and it appears to have impacted her greatly. She is now only training two events and neither will score high enough to justify taking her. A sad end for a great gymnast.
Mai Murakami
I've already spoken quite a bit about Mai. In short, she is amazing and has incredible difficulty. Inconsistency was an issue at the Japan nationals so she missed out. Thankfully Japan love sending veterans so we can hope she will be around for the next quad.. 2013 worlds!
Ana Porgras
Ana is the most artistic gymnast to emerge this quad. Her lines are exquisite and very reminiscent of old-school beautiful lines such as Aurelia Dobre. She could also swing bars like Romanians haven't since the late 1980's. A beautiful bar and beam worker, she also had an elegant floor. Vault was her nemesis into breaking into the AA, as she never really mastered a DTY. Truly a gymnast who would have flourished in the perfect 10 code, Ana was dogged by injuries for most of her senior career and has now retired. With more and more older gymnasts making comebacks, we can hope she will also.
Mariya Livchikova
Mariya is quite similar to Ana, her artistry is evident in her beam and floor, which are works of art. Her beam also showcases great original connections. Unfortunately she also has the Ukrainian tendency to splat all over the place, but it was her injury last year which counted her out of receiving the only WAG place for Ukraine, who shockingly placed so badly they cannot field a time. We can hope Mariya will stick around.
Cheng Fei
Admittedly she had her chance at both the 2004 and 2008 Olympics, but individually failed to shine at both. A huge departure from the Chinese tradition of having petite gymnasts excel at bars and beam, Fei was a powerhouse on vault and floor, with an amanar and a double-double as her highlights as well as a fierce beam routine. This time around, her strengths would have been helpful in complementing those of her team-mates. Unfortunately, Fei has fallen victim to the plague of achilles tendon, ruptured performing a triple twist on floor. Her presence and strength on floor will be missed.
Rebecca Bross
Mai Murakami
I've already spoken quite a bit about Mai. In short, she is amazing and has incredible difficulty. Inconsistency was an issue at the Japan nationals so she missed out. Thankfully Japan love sending veterans so we can hope she will be around for the next quad.. 2013 worlds!
Tuesday, 12 June 2012
The amazing Mai Murakami
Mai Murakami vies with McKayla Maroney for the coveted spot of my current favourite gymnast. Unfortunately though she is senior she has been left off the 2012 Japanese Olympic team, which really is devastating. However, Japan have a habit of sending older gymnasts so we can expect to see her as a major contender for 2016. Consistency is a little bit of an issue with her, can't think of any other reason they would count her out. She didn't have a great showing at Nationals this year but did manage to impress on floor, unfortunately not enough. Her difficulty is astounding, hopefully she can tie everything together and be super gymnast some time soon. 2013 worlds would be nice! I pray she will not peak too soon and miss 2016 Olympics. Anyway, here she is for anyone who hasn't heard of her.
Girl is shoooort. We are of course no stranger to tiny powerhouse gymnasts but Mai in particular has that extra quality of 'where did THAT come from?' as she doesn't have the obvious strength and stamina that more muscular gymnasts do. She can give them all a great run for their money.
Check out those awesome tumbling passes! And she has some even more impressive ones cooking...
WOW. Not landed on a competition mat of course, but it may be by now! She is apparently training a Produnova vault (handspring double front). This is an extremely rare vault as it takes such brute power to stand up. We have seen Yamilet Pena land this to her back over and over again, receiving much lower scores than if she landed a clean DTY. Yet Mai looks to be very capable of it. I would put her ahead of any other current powerful gymnasts to land that vault.There IS footage of her training a layout-1 and a half twist vault however. I would and I'm sure everyone would, love to see her land both.
Dance moves have not been neglected in place of pure power either. Here she is performing a beautiful quadruple spin on beam! Betty Okino would be proud. This has since been bettered by a quintuple spin by a teammate, but nevertheless just so impressive.
Unfortunately footage of her beam and bars show weak spots. Her bars are somewhat underwhelming and she just doesn't shine on them. Her beam shows impressive skills but she has difficulty with steadiness. We can of course speculate she will be able to get her bars to a decent clean standard, Japanese bars as a nation tend to have a lovely swing and score pretty well. Beam could be pretty easy to fix. I find it kind of odd to comment on a gymnast's looks BUT I have to say, she is SO CUTE! Especially that reaction when she completes the spin.
Go Mai! Looking forward to seeing her at Worlds.
Update: Apparently an elbow injury hindered her performance at Nationals. What a shame, with clean routines she absolutely would have threatened Wieber, Iordache, Komova and co. I'd also question how early Nationals were, start of April?? Could well be that if they were being held now, she would have performed much better. It will be very tough for her to hang around for the next quad, but there is great precedent in her country and not a huge amount of depth.
Girl is shoooort. We are of course no stranger to tiny powerhouse gymnasts but Mai in particular has that extra quality of 'where did THAT come from?' as she doesn't have the obvious strength and stamina that more muscular gymnasts do. She can give them all a great run for their money.
Check out those awesome tumbling passes! And she has some even more impressive ones cooking...
WOW. Not landed on a competition mat of course, but it may be by now! She is apparently training a Produnova vault (handspring double front). This is an extremely rare vault as it takes such brute power to stand up. We have seen Yamilet Pena land this to her back over and over again, receiving much lower scores than if she landed a clean DTY. Yet Mai looks to be very capable of it. I would put her ahead of any other current powerful gymnasts to land that vault.There IS footage of her training a layout-1 and a half twist vault however. I would and I'm sure everyone would, love to see her land both.
Dance moves have not been neglected in place of pure power either. Here she is performing a beautiful quadruple spin on beam! Betty Okino would be proud. This has since been bettered by a quintuple spin by a teammate, but nevertheless just so impressive.
Unfortunately footage of her beam and bars show weak spots. Her bars are somewhat underwhelming and she just doesn't shine on them. Her beam shows impressive skills but she has difficulty with steadiness. We can of course speculate she will be able to get her bars to a decent clean standard, Japanese bars as a nation tend to have a lovely swing and score pretty well. Beam could be pretty easy to fix. I find it kind of odd to comment on a gymnast's looks BUT I have to say, she is SO CUTE! Especially that reaction when she completes the spin.
Go Mai! Looking forward to seeing her at Worlds.
Update: Apparently an elbow injury hindered her performance at Nationals. What a shame, with clean routines she absolutely would have threatened Wieber, Iordache, Komova and co. I'd also question how early Nationals were, start of April?? Could well be that if they were being held now, she would have performed much better. It will be very tough for her to hang around for the next quad, but there is great precedent in her country and not a huge amount of depth.
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