Year: 2011

Every want to hear what Dominique Moceanu really thinks about gymnastics?

Now’s your chance.

July 3rd, 2011 departing Galveston Texas.

Click through to their horrible website for details. ($800 – $1200)

Gymnastics BC is pleased to announce the women’s artistic gymnastics team that will represent BC at the 2011 Canada Winter Games in Halifax. The seven athletes are: Tamara Kuno (Flicka), Kerensa Mitchell (Flicka), Shallon Olsen (Omega), Emma Sibson (Omega), Briannah Tsang (Omega) and Shae Zamardi (Omega). Helen Cheung (Flicka) is the alternate. Update: add Taylor Ricci (Flicka).

Shallon is the very young super talent gymnast from Canada. She’s underage for this competition but got special permission to compete. Many coaches feel she’s doing too much, too soon.

There’s a thread on this issue on the Gymn.ca forum.

Certainly the parents and coaches have heard the concerns, yet decided to push forward anyway. Perhaps there’s a plan that she’ll cut back during the peak growth velocity years. I hope so.

A year-in-review was posted by Bronwyn and Clara. Hilarious, profane … and very insightful.

It’s a list of Women’s Artistic Gymnastics highlights and lowlights. Mattie Larson on Floor at US Championships was picked one of the best individual routines. And as a runner up for “Biggest headcase” with her inexplicable misses twice in a row at Worlds.

Another gymnast with big highs and bigger lows was Russia’s Ksenia Afanasyeva. Click PLAY or watch her Floor at Worlds in the Gold medal team final.

Click through for an entertaining read – Stoi – The Very Best of 2010.

Bea on Gymnastics, No Ceiling:

… Two months ago Lili Cosma has left the National Team returned to Deva. I was hoping she was on a vacation or something. This is a bad news… she was invaluable to the team!

Gabriela Dragoi, Anamaria Tamarjan, Ana Porgras, Sandra Izbasa, Stela Nistor, Raluca Haidu, Amelia Racea – all these gymnasts have won medals at Worlds or Europeans with Lili Cosma as their beam coach. …

details – Lili, I already miss you!

It’s widely known that competitive gymnasts have excellent bone density. Some of that research was done at my old stomping grounds, the University of Saskatchewan.

But this was new to me:

… Young recreational and precompetitive gymnasts had, on average, 23% greater bone strength at the wrist compared to children participating in other recreational sports. …

OSTEOPOROSIS INTERNATIONAL – Precompetitive and recreational gymnasts have greater bone density, mass, and estimated strength at the distal radius in young childhood

M. C. Erlandson & S. A. Kontulainen & A. D. G. Baxter-Jones

They surveyed 120 children age 4-9yrs-old.

Of course developing good bone density, especially in the growing female athlete, helps prevent Osteoporosis later in life.

M. C. Erlandson I know as ‘Marta“, one of my gymnasts from some years ago. She’s peeking out from atop the bleachers.

Have you seen this TV show?

Click PLAY or watch the extended trailer on YouTube.

I’d assumed it was yet another teen drama of very little acrobatic interest. Yet it’s gotten some really good reviews.

Hellcats is an American cheerleading comedy-drama series for The CW starring Alyson Michalka, Ashley Tisdale, Robbie Jones, and Matt Barr. Based on the book Cheer: Inside the Secret World of College Cheerleaders by journalist Kate Torgovnick and described as “Election meets Bring It On” by critics, the series follows the life of Marti Perkins, a pre-law college student who has to join the cheerleading team, the Hellcats, in order to maintain her scholarship.

Leave a comment if you have an opinion, positive or negative.

FIG:

World Pommel Horse Champion Krizstian Berki of Hungary and his coach Istvan Kovacs have been named best athlete and coach of the year respectively in Hungary …

Yesterday Great Britain’s Louis Smith joined some other stars of the GBR sporting world to promote BMW as the official automotive partner of the London 2012 Games. …

The trampoline has magically disappeared in that pic. Who’s the trampolinist?

Sweet:

… Each athlete will have the use of a BMW car

See more photos and links to the originals on Full Twist.

Aunt Joyce posted a succinct season preview:

Put on your face paint and whip out your tiger claw: the NCAA season kicks off on Friday and it is a cause for celebration for some and panic for others. Given that the first week’s rankings are determined by high score, the start of the season is always taken with a grain of salt. We’ve seen teams that go on to win conference and national titles score in the 194s and we’ve seen teams open close to a 198. Every year is different and dramatic. …

Some of the meets this weekend:

January 7th
Penn State @ Alabama
Arkansas @ Oklahoma
Nebraska @ Florida
LSU @ Oregon State
Michigan @ Michigan State Quad Meet
UCLA @ Utah

January 8th
Georgia @ Denver Quad Meet

January 9th
UCLA Pac 10 Preview (Vs. Arizona, Arizona State, Cal, Oregon State, Stanford and Washington)

read more – Aunt Joyce – NCAA Preview: Week 1

related – Couch Gymnast – NCAA Update: No Kytra for Florida

Coverage of Women’s gymnastics will be better than ever this season. … But I’m worried, once again, for NCAA Men’s Gymnastics. Everyone needs to promote the guys or we may not have the guys in a few years.

In browsing Blythe’s comprehensive Gymnastics Year in Review on Gymnastics Examiner, one thing was obvious.

It was a GREAT year for Russia. At least for Rhythmic, where they were dominant, and for WAG (Women’s Artistic Gymnastics).

The Russian women overcome three falls on bars in finals to win their first-ever Worlds team title.

Aliya Mustafina is World Champion and early favourite to win the Olympics 2012. The next strongest contender most feel is Viktoria Komova. And there’s Anastasia Grishina coming up behind her. Both were stars at the European Jr. Championships, leading their team to victory.

Russia won the senior European Championships, as well.

Tatiana Nabieva must be the most talked about non-American gymnast in the world. The strongest personality since Khorkina.

On top of all that, fan favourite Anna Pavlova didn’t retire.

Everyone else is chasing Russia right now.

Rewriting Russian Gymnastics posted a theory I’d never heard before … That the current Russian success, and former Soviet success, was not due to stability or consistency, but instead brilliant, innovative, unpredictable and inconsistent innovation.

It’s had to argue. Nabieva could be the poster girl. Check it out for yourself – Success factors of Soviet gymnastics ….