Smooth Skills part 11 this week features the amazing, little remembered gymnast, Aleftina Priakhina.
Check this performance from 1986 Chunichi Cup:
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
The first international woman to compete double double on Floor, I think.
Andrew Thornton:
… Although her double double on floor was absolutely sensational, I’m even more impressed by her beam, which may have been more ahead of its time than any routine I have ever seen. I was truly blown away by the number of elements in this routine that virtually no one else was doing at the time. …
Click through to Gymnast to see her beam routine. What a mount!
Priakhina was first alternate for the Soviet team for 1987 World Championships, I believe. And did not qualify for the 1988 Olympics. Otherwise she would be much more “famous” in gymnastics history. (She’s also the first to compete standing 1/1 on beam, so far as I know.)
There was incredible depth in the former Soviet Union in the late 1980s.
Leave a comment if you know where Aleftina Priakhina is today.
Gymnastics Coaching.com 
She was wonderful–and the *finish* in her movements, like all Soviets from the time (before the obscene deletion of compulsories destroyed the sport…)
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