If you, like me, miss the good old days of 2008 when Andrew Thornton was blogging for the still defunct Gymnast.com, good news.
Andy is back as a regular writer for the American-Gymnast.com blog.
He is posting about 3 times a week in a series called Andy’s Angle.
Andy is an original thinker, always insightful.
For example, here’s a sample post he calls China’s Newest Star
If you haven’t met the world’s newest all-around threat on the women’s side, allow me to introduce you! Huang Quishuang won the silver at the recent Chinese Nationals in May behind He Ning (Jiang Yuyuan had a disastrous UB routine and BB dismount). Although He Ning outscored Huang by .35, I think Huang is actually the better gymnast, and one to keep our eyes on in the upcoming World Championships, not to mention the next four years.
First, let’s take a look at the events we would expect her to be strong on, given she’s Chinese:
… hmm.
She needs more in the way of release skills. Unless the Chinese plan under the new code to max out swing difficulty, instead.
7 comments ↓
Her swing is beautiful. Nice double lay too.
More release moves would be nice… but I guess you don’t need them if you can get more difficulty with maxing the swing moves
“Nice double lay”? What? You’re joking, right?
how is this not a nice double layout?
It may be hard but, without release moves, it feels so flat.
Her swings are nice, but everytime she comes through the bottom, her head comes out. She gets a nice tap going with this technique, but because her head comes out, she cannot “scoop” or “kick” into the dismount as powerfully. Therefore, she has to do the common “whip” rotation with the upper body. This is fine, I guess, if you are okay with just making double lays. But there are plenty of gymnasts who do much better, straight, double lays, that too me are much more aesthetically pleasing, because they “tap” and “kick” properly.
Not to mention the fact that she would it impossible to twist that double layout without major changes to the technique.
oops…”would FIND it impossible to twist…”
Leave a Comment