Evgeny Grebenkin, the new Russian head coach, has just given an interesting interview. You can find it in English here. The first interesting, but perhaps not surprising, point he makes is that he does not have gymnasts to replace the London team..unlike America, who can. The girls will have to compete, except of course Komova, who will be out for about the first half of this year. He also states that they have four good junior gymnasts born 1998-1999 who will be prepared for Rio. They have more than four, but perhaps his words should be taken to mean great, or with great or star potential. Undoubtedly these include Maria Kharenkova, Maria Bondareva and Viktoria Kuzmina. The fourth is harder to pinpoint- I kind of hope it's Daria Spiridonova. Evgeniya Shelgunova, who is now a senior, will be given experience in world cup events. Interesting to see if she lands a Euros spot or not.
Russia's most important senior gymnasts are of course, Aliya Mustafina and Viktoria Komova. Komova is out of Russian Championships and Euros, and too young for Universiade. She will be gunning for worlds. Aliya will probably compete one or two events at Euros, more fully at Universiade and with all guns blazing for worlds. She has said her main priority is Universiade, though that doesn't mean she won't be at Euros..she probably will. She does say other competitions depend on her availability, which I read as doesn't want to say worlds when it's so far away. Ksenia Afanasyeva and Anastasia Grishina could still be core members. It's really hard to know where they are at, especially Grishina. Anna Dementyeva could definitely be a part of major teams if she continues to cope with her growth spurt and really overcomes her former inconsistency. Especially valuable on beam, while Afan if she just continues to be a beam and floor specialist could really compete throughout the quad. Grishina could be right up there as an all-arounder and capable of medalling in three out of four event finals. Hopefully her new coaches can prepare her to realise her full potential.
Who else is there? Anastasia Sidorova, who was injured before London. She's one to watch at Russian Championships to see how useful she could be. Likewise Anna Rodionova, who looks to have grown quite a bit. Maria Paseka is definitely still in the mix, especially as it looks like she's training a much more difficult second vault. Tatiana Nabieva is still on the National Team and a strong prospect for Universiade, but I don't see her making other teams. Maybe as alternate. New seniors Ekaterina Baturina, Yulia Tipaeva and Evgeniya Shelgunova are certainly in the mix, depending on difficulty. Shelgunova remains the brightest prospect, because although she needs a lot of work on her form, she has very good difficulty and a lot of fighting spirit and determination. She could be the Aly Raisman rock for her team this quad I think.
I think at Euros we'll be seeing Aliya Mustafina, Anna Dementyeva, Ksenia Afanasyeva and one of Anastasia Grishina/Evgeniya Shelgunova/Anna Rodionova. Right now I'm leaning towards Shelgunova for it. At Universiade..Aliya Mustafina, Tatiana Nabieva, Ksenia Afanasyeva, Anna Dementyeva and Ekaterina Kramarenko. Worlds is very tough to say, though I know I already did predictions for it.
Who do you want to see shine for Russia this year? This quad? Do you see Viktoria Komova fully regaining her 2010 self? My own favourites are Mustafina, Demy, Rodionova and further on in the quad, the trio of Bondareva, Kharenkova and Kuzmina. I think Russia will struggle in collecting hardware until 2015, when they have their full battalion.
Showing posts with label Paseka. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Paseka. Show all posts
Tuesday, 5 February 2013
Wednesday, 19 September 2012
News- UPDATED Mustafina training video
Aliya Mustafina training beam and some vault timers from Mallorca. Anna Dementyeva can be seen on the other beam. Lovely work from Aliya, she looks very comfortable on all of her skills. Seemed to be the harder acro skills and leaps giving her trouble in London, but she has plenty of time now to get back up to her old level on beam. BEAUTIFUL spins from her and Demy. Her timer is refreshing as without twisting she has great form. Looks like there will be a part 2.
Lexie Priessman and Amelia Hundley are both injured, Lexie training at her gym and Amelia from doing split leaps at camp. Neither sound like very serious injuries, moreso sprains.
Zeng Siqi has won the all-around at Chinese Individual Games. Huang Huidan was second with an error and Shang Shungsong was third, with a few mistakes. Tan Sixin only did bars and beam and Wu Liufang had a pretty bad day, including a fall off beam. Scoring is notoriously harsh at internal competitions- nobody broke a 15 that I can find, however I haven't seen the results of those who did not do AA- ie. Li Yiting on vault probably scored over 15.
Here is a fascinating translated interview of Alexander Alexandrov. http://rewritingrussiangymnastics.blogspot.co.uk/2012/09/lupita-translates-interview-with.html
He never holds back and in this one blasts Anastasia Grishina's coaching- with good reason- and damns the chances of any of them making the 2016 team.
A video of Vika training has emerged. I can't get it to embed here but here is the link- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ELmc1fchr80&feature=player_embedded
The very start is interesting, standing double tuck. If she could train that in combination it would be extremely valuable in the new code, but she doesn't really seem like someone who would have the power or endurance to do that. The uploader has said that a video of Mustafina will appear on Friday.
Word is that Maria Paseka has broken her ankle in Mallorca. Maria is not at 100% this year as she is still coming back from a long list of injuries, so she would probably be more prone to a further setback like this. Unconfirmed as of now. May just be giant fat rumour. Update: Vika has posted on her vk (Russian social media) that Maria does not have a fracture and no need to worry about her ligaments so sounds as if she's fine. Relief!
China's roster has been confirmed for the National Individual Games, prelims for which are taking place now. You can see the full list here:
http://chinesegymnastics.tumblr.com/post/31862842545/chinese-national-gymnastics-individual#disqus_thread
Lots of these names are new to me, but I hope the whole comp is put up- or all routines. Ones to watch are Shang Chungsong, Wu Liufang, Tan Sixin, Luo Peiru, Lou Nina, Xie Wenwei, Li Yiting, Cui Jie, Zeng Siqi and Huang Huidan. WAG takes place on Friday. I'll stick up videos if they are available.
McKayla Maroney has her cast off, still looks quite swollen though. Judging by the location of the scar, people in the know are saying that it is a tibial plateau fracture, which is quite a nasty one apparently. However, McKayla IS rejoining the tour soon and the cast is off so that's good. Most likely she will come out and wave, and maybe do a few dance moves.
Just to clarify my top 10 lists- all of them are individual favourite routines- not all-time favourite floor workers etc. as some of the gymnasts listed never hit the big time, and quite a few were seriously inconsistent or had extremely short careers. If I don't have the seriously big names in them, it is because I prefer other routines, not that I despise Nadia, Olga etc.
Lexie Priessman and Amelia Hundley are both injured, Lexie training at her gym and Amelia from doing split leaps at camp. Neither sound like very serious injuries, moreso sprains.
Zeng Siqi has won the all-around at Chinese Individual Games. Huang Huidan was second with an error and Shang Shungsong was third, with a few mistakes. Tan Sixin only did bars and beam and Wu Liufang had a pretty bad day, including a fall off beam. Scoring is notoriously harsh at internal competitions- nobody broke a 15 that I can find, however I haven't seen the results of those who did not do AA- ie. Li Yiting on vault probably scored over 15.
Here is a fascinating translated interview of Alexander Alexandrov. http://rewritingrussiangymnastics.blogspot.co.uk/2012/09/lupita-translates-interview-with.html
He never holds back and in this one blasts Anastasia Grishina's coaching- with good reason- and damns the chances of any of them making the 2016 team.
A video of Vika training has emerged. I can't get it to embed here but here is the link- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ELmc1fchr80&feature=player_embedded
The very start is interesting, standing double tuck. If she could train that in combination it would be extremely valuable in the new code, but she doesn't really seem like someone who would have the power or endurance to do that. The uploader has said that a video of Mustafina will appear on Friday.
Word is that Maria Paseka has broken her ankle in Mallorca. Maria is not at 100% this year as she is still coming back from a long list of injuries, so she would probably be more prone to a further setback like this. Unconfirmed as of now. May just be giant fat rumour. Update: Vika has posted on her vk (Russian social media) that Maria does not have a fracture and no need to worry about her ligaments so sounds as if she's fine. Relief!
China's roster has been confirmed for the National Individual Games, prelims for which are taking place now. You can see the full list here:
http://chinesegymnastics.tumblr.com/post/31862842545/chinese-national-gymnastics-individual#disqus_thread
Lots of these names are new to me, but I hope the whole comp is put up- or all routines. Ones to watch are Shang Chungsong, Wu Liufang, Tan Sixin, Luo Peiru, Lou Nina, Xie Wenwei, Li Yiting, Cui Jie, Zeng Siqi and Huang Huidan. WAG takes place on Friday. I'll stick up videos if they are available.
McKayla Maroney has her cast off, still looks quite swollen though. Judging by the location of the scar, people in the know are saying that it is a tibial plateau fracture, which is quite a nasty one apparently. However, McKayla IS rejoining the tour soon and the cast is off so that's good. Most likely she will come out and wave, and maybe do a few dance moves.
Just to clarify my top 10 lists- all of them are individual favourite routines- not all-time favourite floor workers etc. as some of the gymnasts listed never hit the big time, and quite a few were seriously inconsistent or had extremely short careers. If I don't have the seriously big names in them, it is because I prefer other routines, not that I despise Nadia, Olga etc.
Wednesday, 15 August 2012
Thoughts on London's podiums
Not literally podiums, though the team finals one could have been bigger of course and they reminded me of Cadbury's (way way nicer than American chocolate). Moving on..
TEAM FINALS
USA on top looked like a foregone conclusion earlier this year, until USA's amanar advantage suddenly seemed to be eaten up by Russia's 2 confirmed and 1 possible amanar which along with their bars advantage made them a formidable threat. This only increased closer to the games when beam and floor upgrades started emerging practically every day. Romania's resurgence with such a small pool of talent was realised probably most forcefully at Euros, which they won. Obviously dismal on bars, the huge start values on beam and floor and the videos of an amanar and cheng made their case for potential gold, especially if mistakes were forthcoming from the other two teams as consistency has long been Romania's greatest weapon in the hunt for medals.
Only a few days before prelims, disaster struck when the news of Larisa's very painful injury came to light. She was immediately struck out of the AA, then reinstated. Doubt over her ability to perform at her best was realised when she watered down in prelims and fell on floor. Romania on the whole played it safe and did not unleash all of their potential upgrades, which lessened their chances of gold or silver even before team finals. Russia did quite well in prelims, but played it safe too and had a good few wobbly beams and a weak floor from Komova to contend with, as well as being one amanar short of USA. USA on the other hand despite showing some errors like Kyla hitting her feet off the low bar (please stop growing Kyla..) and Gabby running out of bounds on floor, fulfilled their promise and stayed ahead of the pack. A great advantage to have going into team finals, even though it did not do their men's team any good in the end.
In the end of course, USA got it together and even though their team had a giant headcase, made no big or even medium errors. Gabby was clearly coached to peak for the right DAYS. Russia had to count a low-scoring amanar from Paseka, very wobbly beams and not one but two disastrous floors from Grishina and Afanasyeva. Romania had a subpar star, who could not do the amanar her team needed to push ahead further, or produce an excellent floor. Bulimar did a beautiful job in Larisa's stead, but counting 5.8 SV when you had a potential 6.7 is galling. Both Russia and Romania played it safe again, while USA fired ahead with all of their long-term upgrades. A closer fight would have been great, but there's no arguing with the final result. Had Russia hit 12/12 they would have gotten a LOT closer, but a 5 point lead is too much. A well deserved win, even if it was heartbreaking to see Russia crumble and Romania unable to fight as hard as they could have done with Larisa at her peak.
Too long, didn't read: Well done USA on a very decisive win, pity Russia and Romania weren't able to give it their all.
ALL- AROUND
This AA was much less exciting than everyone expected heading into the games. In fact, it was anti-climatic and a bit boring. Frustrating too, as overscores were blatant. Not that Gabby was the only culprit- hers were the worst but Komova, Raisman and Mustafina got some gifts too. Larisa Iordache, who could quite convincingly have taken gold had she been able to perform at her best with full difficulty, was placed in the second group. Yao Jinnan fell foul of the two-per-country rule, a thigh injury prevented her from being anywhere near her best, and Deng Linlin and Huang Qiushuang both qualified ahead of her. Not forgetting reigning world champion Jordyn Wieber who also fell foul of it, but much more controversially as she placed 4th, not 19th and did not have an outright 'bad' performance at all. So all in all, a deflating start to the competition, minus three possible stars. Gabby and Vika were always going to be top contenders, as long as both did not headcase in prelims and face the likelihood of being ousted by another all-arounder in their respective teams. Doubt was in evidence as to whether Mustafina had it in her to medal, a bad performance at Euros and a difficult road of recovery being the main reasons fuelling the speculation. Raisman was expected not to qualify at all, with a slim likelihood she could have done so if Gabby had messed up. Surging ahead of Gabby and placing higher than her in prelims, which knocked Jordyn out as she placed behind Gabby- was a huge suprise to everyone. Miss Raisman obviously worked intensely hard to improve her form, and that's all it took. Unfortunately, it also meant she faced a backlash from the media for knocking out the world champion (even though technically Gabby did) and huge attention was placed on Jordyn's plight while Aly's triumph was ignored. Not a great start to the biggest competition of your life.
Gabby retained the quality of performance she showed at team finals, her headcase label was nowhere to be seen. A strong amanar, a steady beam set, great bars and staying in bounds on floor was all it took, 4 great performances in all. Komova unquestionably would have taken the title off her IF she had performed at her best, but she couldn't get it together. A bad landing on her amanar right at the start sunk her, as she scored a huge four-tenths less than she could have done. Great bars, a very strong beam and THE best performed and most beautiful floor of the quad, which nobody thought she had in her..was not enough, she fell just short of Gabby's enormous total. We can argue all day long about whether Komova's higher standard of beauty in her gymnastics should have swung the gold in her favour, but I don't think so..not with THAT vault. Although Gabby got some sickening scores like the second highest beam score from the whole competition, outscoring all of Sui Lu's and Catalina's magnificent team finals beam, and an insane score on bars, Vika was quite frankly gifted in some of her scores too, most notably beam. I would not blame the judges for marking her execution higher there because of her exquisite form and leaps, but it's clear to see that it wasn't just one gymnast being overscored.
Moving on, wow a tiebreaker. The first of five, but we weren't to know that. And how heartbreaking, especially as both Aliya and Aly had to bear the knowledge that they both had big errors. If either had hit all four, it wouldn't have been an issue. Had they both hit, it most likely wouldn't have been either. But to know that if you were in a tiebreak situation because you didn't do your best is really tough. Aly's big error on beam did her in, as it meant her bars had to be counted. Every other time, her beam could be relied on for a nice high score, but not this time. Aliya had to handle the fact that she fell off beam, staying on would have put her substantially ahead of course. Every tiebreaker sucked, this one the worst I think. Both deserved the bronze. Aly had to go back with the knowledge that she missed out on a medal she earned thanks to a ridiculous rule, and knowing there would be lots of smug fuckers thinking 'Should have given her place to Jordyn'. All in all, a very dissapointing competition. Gabby and Vika's positions were correct thanks to the latter's errors but a tiebreaker really sucked the fun out of it in the end,
Too long didn't read: Gutting that Jordyn, Larisa and Yao weren't in it. Gabby's gold deserved due to Vika's crappy vault. Tiebreaker sucked.
VAULT FINAL
There are no words to describe the horror of this event final. It is almost reassuring to note that the biggest proof of Maroney's talent is not that she still managed a silver, it is that had she repeated the amanar she performed in team finals again here, she would have gotten gold. Gold with a fall. That's incredible. It received a three tenth deduction of landing on the red (fascinating to note that the FIG don't care if your vault landing is so bad you have to come off the mat entirely and practically hug the judges- just as long as you land on white there's no deduction!) and another for landing offline. Anyway, it was very dissapointing that the fantastic Giulia Steingruber failed to qualify after falling on hers, that Maksiuta fell also and that Ti Phan's struggles this year were very much in evidence as she bombed as well.
Disaster struck early on when Elsabeth Black crashed her vault and got a zero. Clearly injured, she had the unbelievable determination to line up again for her second vault. Luckily she realised that it wasn't worth it and she ran past the vault, subsequently being treated for her injury. Very sad to see. Tension struck again when Pena arrived to cannonball her way to a deep squat, the best that could be hoped for. Her coaches clearly believe that instead of correcting her technique- she has the power but it is converted into unneccessary distance instead of height- the best way was to teach her to always get her feet to touch first to avoid a zero. Brilliant. Usually thrilled to be alive after her vault, Pena was absolutely devastated, which was not only saddening to see but also to realise that she must have had insane pressure to medal despite the fact that she had never stood up any of her life-endangering handspring double-front's. It should have been a lesson when not even Produnova managed an upright landing more than once.
On it went, with Chuso being the beast she is and landing both of her vaults. The second one was actually really nice in the air. Her Rudi has deteriorated in form but since we are all in awe that she can handle the pounding of vault there's not much you can really criticise. WHAT a career she had had. Janine Berger proved her selection by landing two really well done vaults, the same as Chuso's but much better performed. She has a lot of power, so much that she could not control the landings well. One to watch. Here comes Paskeka with a 2.25 amanar! What a joy it is to note that the judges DID do their job and award it as a DTY but a certain ex-Soviet Nellie Kim overruled it and gave it as an amanar. Oh Nellie. What an absolute travesty. There's also a furore over Paseka's second vault, which although lovely to watch is being debated as to whether it was laid-out or not, the general consensus being that it wasn't. And up comes Maroney and because she nailed the best amanar ever in team finals, it was almost dissapointing to see her amanar here lost a little form on its usual perfection, was offline and landed out of bounds. But no matter, she'll still win..except the unthinkable happened. Although her Mustafina is much lower than her amanar, she herself stated she has never crashed it. Of her vaults total, she crashed the amanar once as a Junior in competition. It was extremely hard to process that she was sitting in the middle of the mat. So what a huge surprise it was when she found it hard to come to terms with and didn't grin like a maniac afterwards. Sandra landed two very good vaults afterwards and her gold was deserved. But it doesn't change anything about Maroney's status as best vaulter in the world, especially since even with the fall a better amanar would have put Sandra in silver and it doesn't negate the horror of seeing crashes, an injury, a death-defying vault, a wrongly awarded amanar and a deserving bronze winner being screwed over.
TL; DR: Awful, awful, awful. Nellie Kim screws Berger over, numerous crashes and an injury. Worst vault final ever. Gold and silver deserved, rightful bronzer winner robbed.
BARS FINAL
How refreshing, and what a deep field. Komova the defending world and euro's bars champion, He Kexin the defending Olympic champion, Beth Tweddle former world champion and Mustafina and Douglas, both national champions. He Kexin proved the doubters wrong, Jinnan redeemed herself after a miserable experience up until then, and Mustafina showed just how valuable all of the extra time she spent training on bars when she was too injured to tumble or vault has been. Crushing to see Vika miss out again after a fluke mistake and to see Beth's steps on dismount cost her a higher medal- but she is very lucky to hold onto that bronze, for which she can thank Komova! Lovely to see her finally medal, great moment.
Not much else to say here, this was a fabulous final even with Vika and Gabby's errors. Fully agree with this podium.
BEAM FINAL
Quick, women's haven't had a tiebreaker in a while! After the awesomeness of bars final, hopes were high for another final with fair scoring and few errors. It was not to be. Iordache, controversially subbed in for the may-or-may-not-have-been-ill (cough low difficulty..?) Bulimar, fell off. Komova gave up entirely, failing to fight to stay on and then sitting the Patterson. A clearly knackered Gabby who had been fighting inconsistency for so long prior to the bars final, returned to her former hit-or-miss self and fell. The veteran Catalina showed nerves and had an error and wobble-filled routine, breaking hearts everywhere. Afanasyeva gave a gloriously elegant performance without much of a chance at medalling due to her low difficulty. Fabulous to watch. Deng Linlin and Sui Lu nailed EVERYTHING, but they got the order wrong..Deng's routine was stiff with too many pauses, compared to Sui Lu's sensational exercise. Lu was robbed. Oh, and they couldn't even get Aly's d-score right, and Mihai was too dense to contest it. Luckily the Karolyi's saved the day and got his ass in gear by screaming at him from the stands. Certainly not the best beam she's ever done, but it deserved bronze in light of the amount of disasters in this final. Along with vault in particular, a huge argument for ONE-TOUCH WARM-UP!! I agree with the three on this podium, but silver and gold should have been switched.
FLOOR FINAL
A mixed final, though not with quite the same disaster level as beam or vault. I had high hopes of Afanasyeva's amazing routine medalling, Raisman or Ferrari clinching the bronze and either Sandra or Cata taking the other medal. A redemption by Jordyn for her non-AA appearance would have been great too, although her difficulty with uncredited leaps would effectively have thrown her outside of the medals anyway. It was tough to see her not at her best, going out of bounds and lacking fire in her eyes. Afan did well to maintain her stamina and land everything, but those out of bounds were a killer. Very dissapointing for this wonderfully choreographed and exciting routine. Crappy to see Sandra fall on her last pass after doing so well also. I would not have put Aly in gold medal position but her performance was mindblowing, amazing landings, the first showing of her phenomenal first pass these games and she had such a sparkle and surety in her oft-contested leaps. No question here, Aly killed it and deserved that medal. Her difficulty was very tough to beat, especially as Cata did not do her full-twisting double layout and the other two main contenders faltered.
Beautiful routine by Mustafina, but Ferrari was really destroyed here. She deserved a higher score. Graceful dancer she is not- but neither are Raisman or Cata. She is furious over being in a position to lose that tiebreaker, which is no surprise as she really was screwed. The fifth tiebreaker, and probably the scabbiest one of all, especially as Aly went on to her own glory after her AA dissapointment.
In case you couldn't tell, writing overly long sentences is an ingrained habit of mine and which required heavy editing of all of my essays in university before printing..ah the frustration before deadlines when I realised there were were sentences of six or more lines. Anyway, I'll try to be more cautious of this in future but I'm too tired to edit it here!
TEAM FINALS
USA on top looked like a foregone conclusion earlier this year, until USA's amanar advantage suddenly seemed to be eaten up by Russia's 2 confirmed and 1 possible amanar which along with their bars advantage made them a formidable threat. This only increased closer to the games when beam and floor upgrades started emerging practically every day. Romania's resurgence with such a small pool of talent was realised probably most forcefully at Euros, which they won. Obviously dismal on bars, the huge start values on beam and floor and the videos of an amanar and cheng made their case for potential gold, especially if mistakes were forthcoming from the other two teams as consistency has long been Romania's greatest weapon in the hunt for medals.
Only a few days before prelims, disaster struck when the news of Larisa's very painful injury came to light. She was immediately struck out of the AA, then reinstated. Doubt over her ability to perform at her best was realised when she watered down in prelims and fell on floor. Romania on the whole played it safe and did not unleash all of their potential upgrades, which lessened their chances of gold or silver even before team finals. Russia did quite well in prelims, but played it safe too and had a good few wobbly beams and a weak floor from Komova to contend with, as well as being one amanar short of USA. USA on the other hand despite showing some errors like Kyla hitting her feet off the low bar (please stop growing Kyla..) and Gabby running out of bounds on floor, fulfilled their promise and stayed ahead of the pack. A great advantage to have going into team finals, even though it did not do their men's team any good in the end.
In the end of course, USA got it together and even though their team had a giant headcase, made no big or even medium errors. Gabby was clearly coached to peak for the right DAYS. Russia had to count a low-scoring amanar from Paseka, very wobbly beams and not one but two disastrous floors from Grishina and Afanasyeva. Romania had a subpar star, who could not do the amanar her team needed to push ahead further, or produce an excellent floor. Bulimar did a beautiful job in Larisa's stead, but counting 5.8 SV when you had a potential 6.7 is galling. Both Russia and Romania played it safe again, while USA fired ahead with all of their long-term upgrades. A closer fight would have been great, but there's no arguing with the final result. Had Russia hit 12/12 they would have gotten a LOT closer, but a 5 point lead is too much. A well deserved win, even if it was heartbreaking to see Russia crumble and Romania unable to fight as hard as they could have done with Larisa at her peak.
Too long, didn't read: Well done USA on a very decisive win, pity Russia and Romania weren't able to give it their all.
ALL- AROUND
This AA was much less exciting than everyone expected heading into the games. In fact, it was anti-climatic and a bit boring. Frustrating too, as overscores were blatant. Not that Gabby was the only culprit- hers were the worst but Komova, Raisman and Mustafina got some gifts too. Larisa Iordache, who could quite convincingly have taken gold had she been able to perform at her best with full difficulty, was placed in the second group. Yao Jinnan fell foul of the two-per-country rule, a thigh injury prevented her from being anywhere near her best, and Deng Linlin and Huang Qiushuang both qualified ahead of her. Not forgetting reigning world champion Jordyn Wieber who also fell foul of it, but much more controversially as she placed 4th, not 19th and did not have an outright 'bad' performance at all. So all in all, a deflating start to the competition, minus three possible stars. Gabby and Vika were always going to be top contenders, as long as both did not headcase in prelims and face the likelihood of being ousted by another all-arounder in their respective teams. Doubt was in evidence as to whether Mustafina had it in her to medal, a bad performance at Euros and a difficult road of recovery being the main reasons fuelling the speculation. Raisman was expected not to qualify at all, with a slim likelihood she could have done so if Gabby had messed up. Surging ahead of Gabby and placing higher than her in prelims, which knocked Jordyn out as she placed behind Gabby- was a huge suprise to everyone. Miss Raisman obviously worked intensely hard to improve her form, and that's all it took. Unfortunately, it also meant she faced a backlash from the media for knocking out the world champion (even though technically Gabby did) and huge attention was placed on Jordyn's plight while Aly's triumph was ignored. Not a great start to the biggest competition of your life.
Gabby retained the quality of performance she showed at team finals, her headcase label was nowhere to be seen. A strong amanar, a steady beam set, great bars and staying in bounds on floor was all it took, 4 great performances in all. Komova unquestionably would have taken the title off her IF she had performed at her best, but she couldn't get it together. A bad landing on her amanar right at the start sunk her, as she scored a huge four-tenths less than she could have done. Great bars, a very strong beam and THE best performed and most beautiful floor of the quad, which nobody thought she had in her..was not enough, she fell just short of Gabby's enormous total. We can argue all day long about whether Komova's higher standard of beauty in her gymnastics should have swung the gold in her favour, but I don't think so..not with THAT vault. Although Gabby got some sickening scores like the second highest beam score from the whole competition, outscoring all of Sui Lu's and Catalina's magnificent team finals beam, and an insane score on bars, Vika was quite frankly gifted in some of her scores too, most notably beam. I would not blame the judges for marking her execution higher there because of her exquisite form and leaps, but it's clear to see that it wasn't just one gymnast being overscored.
Moving on, wow a tiebreaker. The first of five, but we weren't to know that. And how heartbreaking, especially as both Aliya and Aly had to bear the knowledge that they both had big errors. If either had hit all four, it wouldn't have been an issue. Had they both hit, it most likely wouldn't have been either. But to know that if you were in a tiebreak situation because you didn't do your best is really tough. Aly's big error on beam did her in, as it meant her bars had to be counted. Every other time, her beam could be relied on for a nice high score, but not this time. Aliya had to handle the fact that she fell off beam, staying on would have put her substantially ahead of course. Every tiebreaker sucked, this one the worst I think. Both deserved the bronze. Aly had to go back with the knowledge that she missed out on a medal she earned thanks to a ridiculous rule, and knowing there would be lots of smug fuckers thinking 'Should have given her place to Jordyn'. All in all, a very dissapointing competition. Gabby and Vika's positions were correct thanks to the latter's errors but a tiebreaker really sucked the fun out of it in the end,
Too long didn't read: Gutting that Jordyn, Larisa and Yao weren't in it. Gabby's gold deserved due to Vika's crappy vault. Tiebreaker sucked.
VAULT FINAL
There are no words to describe the horror of this event final. It is almost reassuring to note that the biggest proof of Maroney's talent is not that she still managed a silver, it is that had she repeated the amanar she performed in team finals again here, she would have gotten gold. Gold with a fall. That's incredible. It received a three tenth deduction of landing on the red (fascinating to note that the FIG don't care if your vault landing is so bad you have to come off the mat entirely and practically hug the judges- just as long as you land on white there's no deduction!) and another for landing offline. Anyway, it was very dissapointing that the fantastic Giulia Steingruber failed to qualify after falling on hers, that Maksiuta fell also and that Ti Phan's struggles this year were very much in evidence as she bombed as well.
Disaster struck early on when Elsabeth Black crashed her vault and got a zero. Clearly injured, she had the unbelievable determination to line up again for her second vault. Luckily she realised that it wasn't worth it and she ran past the vault, subsequently being treated for her injury. Very sad to see. Tension struck again when Pena arrived to cannonball her way to a deep squat, the best that could be hoped for. Her coaches clearly believe that instead of correcting her technique- she has the power but it is converted into unneccessary distance instead of height- the best way was to teach her to always get her feet to touch first to avoid a zero. Brilliant. Usually thrilled to be alive after her vault, Pena was absolutely devastated, which was not only saddening to see but also to realise that she must have had insane pressure to medal despite the fact that she had never stood up any of her life-endangering handspring double-front's. It should have been a lesson when not even Produnova managed an upright landing more than once.
On it went, with Chuso being the beast she is and landing both of her vaults. The second one was actually really nice in the air. Her Rudi has deteriorated in form but since we are all in awe that she can handle the pounding of vault there's not much you can really criticise. WHAT a career she had had. Janine Berger proved her selection by landing two really well done vaults, the same as Chuso's but much better performed. She has a lot of power, so much that she could not control the landings well. One to watch. Here comes Paskeka with a 2.25 amanar! What a joy it is to note that the judges DID do their job and award it as a DTY but a certain ex-Soviet Nellie Kim overruled it and gave it as an amanar. Oh Nellie. What an absolute travesty. There's also a furore over Paseka's second vault, which although lovely to watch is being debated as to whether it was laid-out or not, the general consensus being that it wasn't. And up comes Maroney and because she nailed the best amanar ever in team finals, it was almost dissapointing to see her amanar here lost a little form on its usual perfection, was offline and landed out of bounds. But no matter, she'll still win..except the unthinkable happened. Although her Mustafina is much lower than her amanar, she herself stated she has never crashed it. Of her vaults total, she crashed the amanar once as a Junior in competition. It was extremely hard to process that she was sitting in the middle of the mat. So what a huge surprise it was when she found it hard to come to terms with and didn't grin like a maniac afterwards. Sandra landed two very good vaults afterwards and her gold was deserved. But it doesn't change anything about Maroney's status as best vaulter in the world, especially since even with the fall a better amanar would have put Sandra in silver and it doesn't negate the horror of seeing crashes, an injury, a death-defying vault, a wrongly awarded amanar and a deserving bronze winner being screwed over.
TL; DR: Awful, awful, awful. Nellie Kim screws Berger over, numerous crashes and an injury. Worst vault final ever. Gold and silver deserved, rightful bronzer winner robbed.
BARS FINAL
How refreshing, and what a deep field. Komova the defending world and euro's bars champion, He Kexin the defending Olympic champion, Beth Tweddle former world champion and Mustafina and Douglas, both national champions. He Kexin proved the doubters wrong, Jinnan redeemed herself after a miserable experience up until then, and Mustafina showed just how valuable all of the extra time she spent training on bars when she was too injured to tumble or vault has been. Crushing to see Vika miss out again after a fluke mistake and to see Beth's steps on dismount cost her a higher medal- but she is very lucky to hold onto that bronze, for which she can thank Komova! Lovely to see her finally medal, great moment.
Not much else to say here, this was a fabulous final even with Vika and Gabby's errors. Fully agree with this podium.
BEAM FINAL
Quick, women's haven't had a tiebreaker in a while! After the awesomeness of bars final, hopes were high for another final with fair scoring and few errors. It was not to be. Iordache, controversially subbed in for the may-or-may-not-have-been-ill (cough low difficulty..?) Bulimar, fell off. Komova gave up entirely, failing to fight to stay on and then sitting the Patterson. A clearly knackered Gabby who had been fighting inconsistency for so long prior to the bars final, returned to her former hit-or-miss self and fell. The veteran Catalina showed nerves and had an error and wobble-filled routine, breaking hearts everywhere. Afanasyeva gave a gloriously elegant performance without much of a chance at medalling due to her low difficulty. Fabulous to watch. Deng Linlin and Sui Lu nailed EVERYTHING, but they got the order wrong..Deng's routine was stiff with too many pauses, compared to Sui Lu's sensational exercise. Lu was robbed. Oh, and they couldn't even get Aly's d-score right, and Mihai was too dense to contest it. Luckily the Karolyi's saved the day and got his ass in gear by screaming at him from the stands. Certainly not the best beam she's ever done, but it deserved bronze in light of the amount of disasters in this final. Along with vault in particular, a huge argument for ONE-TOUCH WARM-UP!! I agree with the three on this podium, but silver and gold should have been switched.
FLOOR FINAL
A mixed final, though not with quite the same disaster level as beam or vault. I had high hopes of Afanasyeva's amazing routine medalling, Raisman or Ferrari clinching the bronze and either Sandra or Cata taking the other medal. A redemption by Jordyn for her non-AA appearance would have been great too, although her difficulty with uncredited leaps would effectively have thrown her outside of the medals anyway. It was tough to see her not at her best, going out of bounds and lacking fire in her eyes. Afan did well to maintain her stamina and land everything, but those out of bounds were a killer. Very dissapointing for this wonderfully choreographed and exciting routine. Crappy to see Sandra fall on her last pass after doing so well also. I would not have put Aly in gold medal position but her performance was mindblowing, amazing landings, the first showing of her phenomenal first pass these games and she had such a sparkle and surety in her oft-contested leaps. No question here, Aly killed it and deserved that medal. Her difficulty was very tough to beat, especially as Cata did not do her full-twisting double layout and the other two main contenders faltered.
Beautiful routine by Mustafina, but Ferrari was really destroyed here. She deserved a higher score. Graceful dancer she is not- but neither are Raisman or Cata. She is furious over being in a position to lose that tiebreaker, which is no surprise as she really was screwed. The fifth tiebreaker, and probably the scabbiest one of all, especially as Aly went on to her own glory after her AA dissapointment.
In case you couldn't tell, writing overly long sentences is an ingrained habit of mine and which required heavy editing of all of my essays in university before printing..ah the frustration before deadlines when I realised there were were sentences of six or more lines. Anyway, I'll try to be more cautious of this in future but I'm too tired to edit it here!
Friday, 13 July 2012
Video: Qiushang's amanar and confirmation of another!
Here is Qiushang's, I can't embed it because youtube won't find it for me, but here's the direct link.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6TmHgrnAMyg
As you can see, it looks safe and decent. Hopefully she can fix up that leg seperation and step to the side. Good for her, it doesn't look dangerous OR tucked.
We all feared this, but Musty has been confirmed to do an amanar in London.
In the team finals against American girls all decide to vault: if our girls will be able to jump 2.5 screws jump Yurchenko, then it will give them a huge advantage on points in front of an American. Otherwise, this advantage will be an American, confidently performing a jump Yurchenko.
"At the moment, this makes great leap Maria Bee Farm - says Valentina Rodionenko. - And thanks largely to a jump Yurchenko, she came to the team. Vic jumps Komova it through training. Alia, received on this daunting leap severe injury, it will jump only in London. Of course, you can not take risks and make the 2 screws instead of 2.5. But we believe that the risks need. We're going to take that risk because he is acquitted. "
- Rodionenko, from Aunt Joyce. Damn! Really didn't want this to happen. Of course it was suspected, but downplayed after she only verified a DTY recently. This means Russia will have 3 amanars (hopefully Paseka can land hers), and are upping their game even more fiercely against USA. Let's all hope Musty's is safe, but the fact that she tore her ACL on one when she was in her prime does not bode well. I highly doubt that they would let her do one if they suspected she was not capable of landing it safely, so let's hope they're right. This brings Musty up to a 25.7 WITH the floor upgrade, 25.5 (tying with Jordyn) if not. Interestingly, the above article says the top contenders for the AA are Musty, Vika and Gabby 'which is called the flying squirrel'. Optimistic of them. Certainly Vika is, Musty will still have her work cut out to get on the podium, but she is capable. But Jordyn and Larisa are still top contenders! Now for Romania! I suspect confirmation that Ponor will do one- she looks capable, but is of course a bit tall for one. We'll see. Maroney isn't really the shortest either, she's lucky hers is the most amazing of all. Height may be Kyla's problem with it as well as rotation. LOL at the profile of Maroney stating she was 160 pounds!!
Here is the Russian team leos. I prefer the blue, but the red looks great too. The red might suit all of the girls better I suppose.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6TmHgrnAMyg
As you can see, it looks safe and decent. Hopefully she can fix up that leg seperation and step to the side. Good for her, it doesn't look dangerous OR tucked.
We all feared this, but Musty has been confirmed to do an amanar in London.
In the team finals against American girls all decide to vault: if our girls will be able to jump 2.5 screws jump Yurchenko, then it will give them a huge advantage on points in front of an American. Otherwise, this advantage will be an American, confidently performing a jump Yurchenko.
"At the moment, this makes great leap Maria Bee Farm - says Valentina Rodionenko. - And thanks largely to a jump Yurchenko, she came to the team. Vic jumps Komova it through training. Alia, received on this daunting leap severe injury, it will jump only in London. Of course, you can not take risks and make the 2 screws instead of 2.5. But we believe that the risks need. We're going to take that risk because he is acquitted. "
- Rodionenko, from Aunt Joyce. Damn! Really didn't want this to happen. Of course it was suspected, but downplayed after she only verified a DTY recently. This means Russia will have 3 amanars (hopefully Paseka can land hers), and are upping their game even more fiercely against USA. Let's all hope Musty's is safe, but the fact that she tore her ACL on one when she was in her prime does not bode well. I highly doubt that they would let her do one if they suspected she was not capable of landing it safely, so let's hope they're right. This brings Musty up to a 25.7 WITH the floor upgrade, 25.5 (tying with Jordyn) if not. Interestingly, the above article says the top contenders for the AA are Musty, Vika and Gabby 'which is called the flying squirrel'. Optimistic of them. Certainly Vika is, Musty will still have her work cut out to get on the podium, but she is capable. But Jordyn and Larisa are still top contenders! Now for Romania! I suspect confirmation that Ponor will do one- she looks capable, but is of course a bit tall for one. We'll see. Maroney isn't really the shortest either, she's lucky hers is the most amazing of all. Height may be Kyla's problem with it as well as rotation. LOL at the profile of Maroney stating she was 160 pounds!!
Here is the Russian team leos. I prefer the blue, but the red looks great too. The red might suit all of the girls better I suppose.
Saturday, 7 July 2012
Russia and Romania teams named!!
Team Russia: Komova, Mustafina, Grishina (like duhh), Afansayeva and..Paseka! Wasn't sure if Afan could do it, but Inshina and Bebelo were dissapointing and Sidorova was injured, so..good for her! Paseka is in a way a surprise, she crashed both her vaults at the Russian cup. Apparently she verified them, including the amanar, the other day. This means Russia have two amanars, maybe a third (though Musty only did a DTY at the verifying), killer bar routines and really good beams, though staying on is slightly questionable. Floor is a bit of a weak spot with this team- Grishina and Afan have beautiful floors, but not with amazing SV. Komova's is weak, Musty's is a tad unusable.
Team Romania: Ponor, Izbasa, Iordache, Bulimar (duhh) and..Chelaru! This differs from the victorious Euros team, replacing Haidu with Chelaru. Haidu has better bars than her, but Chelaru is safer. It doesn't matter a huge amount because the first four are so strong. No amanars or Cheng's were competed at the meet today- their being flung for the first time in comp in London is terrifying.
Team Romania: Ponor, Izbasa, Iordache, Bulimar (duhh) and..Chelaru! This differs from the victorious Euros team, replacing Haidu with Chelaru. Haidu has better bars than her, but Chelaru is safer. It doesn't matter a huge amount because the first four are so strong. No amanars or Cheng's were competed at the meet today- their being flung for the first time in comp in London is terrifying.
Friday, 15 June 2012
Anna Myzdrikova is back!
And I'm thrilled! She unleashed the most spectacularly beautiful floor routine in 2009 with amazing connections and then totally dissapeared after Euros 2010. She came sixth in the Russian Cup today, though floor was quite low, 13.23. Her vault was highest but nothing broke the 14 mark. She's extremely unlikely for this team at the moment but she may make alternate, especially if Sidorova doesn't improve. My Russian team is Komova, Mustafina, Grishina, Inshina and Paseka. Alternates: a bit more murky, especially with no recent footage. Afan, Pavlova/Sidorova and Myzdrikova would be nice. If she can get her floor back to this level she would be very valuable, especially as Musty's floor is full of mistakes these days.
Edit: Just found her floor from Voronin Cup 2011, which was in December. Must have been long after I trawled Youtube for her. Anyway, unfortunately it's pretty bad, she's very tired and out of shape in it. Fingers crossed her not too shabby Russian Cup showing means she's back in the game somewhat.
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