Cirque du Soleil is looking for male gymnasts for a new show directed by a world-renowned director. The show-performed under a big top-will begin in spring 2010 and will afterwards set off on tour.
Selected gymnasts for this role must show excellent skills on the high bar, floor and trampoline. They must also be open artistically (i.e. for acting and dancing)
Now is the time to add your name to their computer database.
Click through to the Work at Cirque link at the top of any page on this site.
Olympic Gold Medalists Nastia Liukin, Nadia Commaneci and Bart Connor took a side trip in Denmark to Hermes Gymnastics Academy. Hermes is the home of the Danish Champion Team, who competed at the most recent European Championships. …
Shani Isseroff reminds us that European Championships is in progress right now in Portugal.
24th European Championships for Seniors and 8th European Championships for Juniors and 4th European Age Group Games in Acrobatic Gymnastics take place from 25th September to 4th October in Vila do Conde (POR).
Russia and Great Britain dominated the Age Group competition (11-16).
Shani points out that it’s not getting much coverage on either old media or the internet. Perhaps Senior finals will be interesting enough to generate some press.
Fact is, Acrobatic Gymnastics is my favourite gymnastics discipline. And there are no athletes more sought after for Circus jobs.
GymNiceTic covers Acrobatic Gymnastics.
FIG does a good job of providing an overview, but not much commentary:
… Some 422 gymnasts from 18 national federations will compete at the Acrobatic Gymnastics European Championships end of September and beginning of October in Vila Do Conde (POR) in the categories Women’s Pairs, Men’s Pairs, Mixed Pairs, Women’s Trios and Men’s Groups. …
Day 1 of the two day Apparatus Finals are complete.
… France was the most successful nation, with Cyril Tomassone winning pommel horse and Pinheiro-Rodrigues earning the gold on still rings.
Competition concludes Wednesday with the remaining five apparatus finals. The Doha World Cup is the final major international competition before the 2009 World Championships, Oct. 13-18 in London.
Viktoria (Viktoriya) Komova scored 59.80 points (results PDF) All-around at the Junior competition in Japan, establishing herself as one of the very best gymnasts in the world. She won’t be age eligible for senior competition until 2011.
His old rival from the 2004 Olympics, Marian Dragulescu, is back in contention for medals at Worlds.
Kyle is in Vancouver, Canada.
I’ve done a ton of speaking gigs and events and the most recent one is happening right now in Surrey. I’m here to do a week and a half of school visits for one of my favourite Charities, Right To Play. …
Coach Ryan Snider of Aerial Athletics shows off the gienger progression he uses on uneven bars. He breaks down the skill into 2 quarter turns. This produces beautiful, high giengers with potential to even upgrade into a def later on …
Special Army soldiers flip simultaneously as they demonstrate their martial arts skills during a rehearsal for the 61st anniversary of Armed Forces Day at the Gyeryong military headquarters, South Korea. South Korea will celebrate the 61st Armed Forces Day on Oct. 1.
The best gymnast on Floor and Vault of the last decade is 28yr-old Marian Dragulescu from Romania.
… world titles on floor (2001, 2002, 2006) and vault (2001, 2005, 2006) …
Andy Thornton:
He’s still got it! Although we’ve seen him do a more difficult first pass (he used to do a punch front 1 ¼ out of that), he looks as controlled and powerful as ever. He made those passes look WAY too easy, and yet every single one of them is extremely difficult. How about that second pass of front full to front full 1 ¾? And he’s still doing a double-double as the SIXTH tumbling pass – unbelievable! He should definitely be in the gold medal mix on floor at worlds next month. …
I’m not convinced. Marian has never had good form tumbling. And he does not look close to peak form here.
Recall that he was badly injured on a roll out skill in the past. Yet he’s still relying on those dangerous tricks … as is everyone else in contention for medals.
I wish the Men would ban roll out skills as the Women did long ago.
Marian is the favourite on vault, as Andy explains his blog post.
The new iPod Nano is also one of the world’s smallest video cameras. We think it could be a game changer. As it turns out, it could also create a new kind of privacy problem. A fitness chain in Minnesota has banned the new Nano from locker rooms in an effort to protect members from the possibility of photos or videos being taken with it. …
Recall coach John Valdez, who coached Justin Spring at the Beijing Olympics?
Jon Valdez, a former gymnastics coach in Illinois, pleaded guilty to a felony charge of unauthorized videotaping. Valdez set up a camera to film a gymnast removing his clothes.
Valdez was captured on a camera positioning his video cam in an open locker in Kenney Gym. Valdez’s camera taped a male gymnast stripping and appearing nude in the locker room. The victim was unaware he was being filmed. This incident happened on September 25, 2008.
Valdez pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 24 months probation.
Gymnastics Saskatchewan in Canada has opened registration for their 2009 Coaching Congress. This event is held only every 3yrs.
Guest speakers are invited in different disciplines. This year the Keynote Speaker is Camille Martins. The closing speaker is Keith Russell. Other presenters include Michel Arsenault, Bev Dickenson, Gord Bennett and Tanya Van Drunen.
