tumbling, tramp, diving, acrobatics, circus, cheer, dance, martial arts, X sports … and more
Read a good wrap-up by Talitha Ilacqua:
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
I’m hoping women and girls will feel empowered to strive for their goals in 2018.
At this point I still don’t have much understanding of where Watanabe wants to lead the International Gymnastics Federation.
His statements are often cryptic. Almost poetic.
He’s enthusiastic. Energetic. Encouraging. I’m still hopefully for great things during his tenure.
Here’s a timeline he presented in the autumn of 2017.
President Watanabe:
Nine months have passed since I assumed the position of FIG President. The matter I have been struggling with most in this period is the FIG Statutes. Although we are aiming to promote various reforms, almost no reforms can be realised before the year 2021 because of the FIG Statutes. …
Times are changing at a speed beyond our imagining. The sports community is not an exception. The IOC has decided to introduce Urban Sports as “the new pillar of the Olympics” from 2020 onward. Even in the case of the Olympics, if they rely only on the existing sports, they will become endangered.
The FIG has been engaged in implementing Parkour, one such Urban Sport as its new discipline …
… it’s not as easy as people may think. Aimee (Boorman) did such an incredible job in the past 12 years of Simone’s life. …
… “I’m not going to change Simone Biles; I would be a very bad coach if I would do that. I will help her as much as I can with my technical knowledge and my understanding of how to plan and how to produce at the right time. I’m not going to change who she is.” …
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
An excellent summary by Jeff Mitchell.
Every coach should be a mentor. Every coach needs at least one mentor.
Keith Russell has been my most important mentor. Of many.
Q: When Aliya Mustafina put this line on her Instagram profile: “Contact Emin Garibov with any questions”, what did it mean for you?
A: I felt like it was a very trusting step on the part of Aliya.I really appreciate that she agreed to work with me as her manager. …
Athletes may have illnesses or conditions that require them to take particular medications.
If the medication an athlete is required to take to treat an illness or condition happens to fall under the Prohibited List, a Therapeutic Use Exemption (TUE) may give that athlete the authorization to take the needed medicine. …
A few examples:
This list evolves over time “based on the evolution of medical best practice“.
Athlete medical records should be private. But in 2016 Russian hackers broke into the WAG database and revealed that athletes including Serena Williams, Venus Williams and Simone Biles had received TUEs.
Russian boxer Mikhail Aloyan, who won a silver medal in Rio, had one, as well.
Simone had received an exemption for her attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
There are those who feel that some TUEs are another form of cheating. If you agree, lobby to have those medications taken off the list.
For now, TUEs are legal.
Everyone I know agrees that Răducan, 2000 Olympic Champion, should not have been stripped of the gold medal for testing positive for pseudoephedrine, a banned substance at the time. Some medications should be allowed.
___ In a separate issue …
The International Olympic Committee finally took meaningful action against what it acknowledged had been “systematic” cheating by the nation at London 2012 and Sochi 2014, outlawing its flag, uniform and anthem from Pyeongchang 2018. …
Russian deputy prime minister Vitaly Mutko, who was sports minister at the time of the scandal, was also handed a lifetime Olympic ban …
Better late than never.
It’s false equivalency to claim that what Simone did is the same as a nationally organized, top down deliberate system of cheating.
I’m very unhappy for the clean Russian athletes, including all of the Artistic gymnasts. But I support the IOC sanction. Otherwise Putin’s team would continue deliberate cheating as vigorously as possible.
Gymnastics Coaching.com 