There were some good performances at the World Cup last weekend, especially Daria JOURA from Australia.
But the bigger story was how many top athletes did not show:
For the 25th time, the “DTB-Cup 2007” took place in Stuttgart (Porsche Arena).
Altogether 69 men and 33 women … participated at this event, which took place right in between the world championships in the wake of September and the pre-Olympic Games in Beijing in the end of November.
Beside the three mentioned world champions, there were only 8 of 48 World Championships-finalists participating in Stuttgart…
GYMmedia points out another interesting trend in the Men’s competition:
Out of 69 competitors, not one did all six or rather five apparatuses. One single gymnast – Samuel Piasecky from Slovakia did four qualification starts: on floor, horse and qualified for parallel bars (3rd) and high bar (7th). Only eleven gymnasts did a kind of “small all around” competition performing on three apparatuses. The vast majority (54) cultivated “world cup tourism”, doing only one or two apparatuses…!
Sure the timing is bad for athletes focused on Olympic preparation. In my mind, though, I feel it’s the extreme physical demand of the new code on All-around gymnasts which is convincing so many TOP men to opt out of doing all 6 apparatus.
Jade Barbosa from Brazil performs in … vault at the 25th DTB Cup, a gymnastics World Cup competition, in Stuttgart, southwestern Germany, Sunday, Oct. 28, 2007. Barbosa took second place behind Germany’s Oksana Chusovitina.
(AP Photo/Thomas Kienzle)
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