Ivana Hong – Vault 9.95

Shocker in progress at the Pac-12 Championships.

Stanford is leading after 3 rotations. They’ve been saving their best stuff for the post-season, obviously.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

Their Beam:

@StanfordWGym:
Becky Wing 9.9
Nicole Pechanec 9.85
Ivana Hong 9.9
Shona Morgan 9.9
Amanda Spinner 9.9
Alyssa Brown 9.9

@SpannyTampson: “Stanford has been hustling us all.” 🙂

197.475 Oklahoma wins Big 12

The second-ranked Oklahoma women’s gymnastics team won its fifth Big 12 Championship Saturday with a season-high score of 197.475 in front of the home crowd at the Lloyd Noble Center. OU finished ahead of Iowa State and Missouri who tied for second with a 196.025. …

Sooner Sports

Nebraska wins Big 10

The No. 6 Nebraska women’s gymnastics team captured the 2012 Big Ten Women’s Gymnastics Championship on Saturday night in Iowa City, Iowa. The Huskers posted a 197.100 and were led by sophomore Emily Wong, who won the all-around Big Ten crown by posting a career-high 39.60, which is the third-highest all-around score in Nebraska history at a conference championship meet.

The Huskers finished ahead of second-place Ohio State (196.225) and third-place Minnesota (195.95). …

Huskers.com

They competed 5 all-arounders, yet again.

Jessie DeZiel is Big Ten Freshman of the Year and Head Coach Dan Kendig wins Big Ten Coach of the Year!

Looks like Nebraska will move ahead of Georgia in the NCAA Team rankings.

Seitz wins Bars at Cottbus

Whenever Elisabeth Seitz competes Bars, I’m keen to watch. She hit her HUGE DIFFICULT routine at home to win the apparatus Final.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube. 6,5 8,325 14,825

Yes, it’s muscled. There are form breaks. But that’s one hard routine. 🙂

He Kexin had a 15.225 in qualifying. But fell in the Final on layout Jaeger. 😦

Check Full Twist – Videos & Results: Cottbus Cup Event Finals Day 1

Videos linked include Philipp Boy winning Floor. And Brittany Rogers winning Vault.

With the elimination of both the Paris and Tokyo World Cups this season, the annual Cottbus tournament has taken on added importance as athletes get ready for this summer’s Olympic Games.

Not only was the start list packed with European favorites and on-the-bubble Olympic team hopefuls, of the 10 disciplines in men’s and women’s gymnastics, the top qualifiers hail from 10 different countries.

Examiner – Notes from Cottbus

Florida wins SECs

I read Balance Beam Situation – Live Blog – Conference Championships:

SEC Final Scores:
1. Florida – 197.150
2. Alabama – 196.775
3. Georgia – 196.475
4. LSU – 196.425
5. Kentucky – 194.350
6. Arkansas – 194.175
7. Auburn – 194.100

Individual winners: VT: Hunter, UB: Johnson, BB: Pisani, FX: Hall, AA: Hunter

With that, Florida clinched the #1 team rank for the season. Congratulations.

Disaster for Auburn. Georgia lucky to hold off LSU for 3rd. Shayla missed Bars, again.

Southeastern Conference Champions 2012
via @UFCoachRhonda

Coach of the Year a tie between Auburn’s Jeff Graba and Florida’s Rhonda Faehn.

SEC Freshman Gymnast of the Year: Kytra Hunter

SEC Gymnast of the Year: Jamie Pisani

Grishina – Floor

Finals at Russian Championships.

Beam – 1 Afanasyeva; 2 Grishina; 3 Goryunova
Floor – 1 Grishina; 2 Afanasyeva; 3 Belokobylskaya

Mustafina did not compete Floor. And had a fall on Beam.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

Read Blythe’s opinion of the new routine.

I like it. But her round-off looks weak. … And, do we really need to see top international gymnasts competing both double tuck and double pike? It’s repetitive.

Thanks Alan.

Brockport / Wisconsin-Whitewater

2012 NCGA Div. III Women’s Gymnastics Championships; March 23; Brockport, N.Y.

tie 1) Brockport – 188.05
tie 1) Wisconsin-Whitewater – 188.05
3) Wisconsin-La Crosse – 187.20
4) Cortland – 185.55
5) Wisconsin-Eau Claire – 183.70
6) Ithaca – 182.65

results

Brockport

Elizabeth Levy from host Brockport took the AA (37.650)
.

Apparatus Finals coming up next. 🙂

Mai Murakami update

Kazukuni Ohno on Facebook:

Today she did perfect floor routine.double layout.double double.front full doublefull.triple full.

Watch some training video of the Japanese supertalent via Couch Gymnast.

She’s been called the next women’s gymnastics superstar … since 2009. 🙂

Hopefully we’ll see her in London. She sounds to be completely recovered from elbow surgery.

Russian Finals day 1

Results via THE ALL AROUND:

… In today’s finals, Ksenia Afanasyeva continued showing the brilliant shape and confidence she has shown all week on beam, taking the title there, but a fall after the triple twist put her in the second place on floor.

Anastasiya Grishina once again hit her new floor routine to take the gold there, although she had (again) problems on beam. …

Afanasyeva, Grishina win at Russian Championships EF Day 1

Click PLAY or watch the Beam Gold on YouTube.

Rewriting Russian Gymnastics has Grishina’s Floor and links to other videos.

Rodionenko : Mustafina is in optimal form, but not at her maximum

NCAA Conference Championships

It’s here. All scheduled for today.

Big 12 Norman, Okla.
Big Ten Iowa City, Iowa
Eastern Conference Athletic Conference Philadelphia
Mid-American Dekalb, Ill.
Pac-12 Salt Lake City
SEC Duluth, Ga.

Conference Championship Central

College Gym Fans has links for video, audio and RESULTS.

SEC is always the strongest Regional.

Balance Beam Situation:

… We have a great contest shaping up between Florida and Alabama, which I expect to be very close and will probably come down to a few tenths either way. …

Not to be totally overlooked, Georgia is also the “host” team, and it wouldn’t be inconceivable for them to challenge. …

SEC Championships Preview

Since Suzanne left Georgia, pretty much every year I predict Florida to win. And underestimate the Tide … who are coming into this one healthy and with momentum.

Click PLAY or watch an Alabama season recap on Gymnastike.

http://www.gymnastike.org/embed/OTU4NjIyMjgy?related=1

Watch more video of 2012 Conference Championships Craze! on gymnastike.org

The Balance Beam Situation:

This year, the Pac-12 will be our guinea pig conference (along with the Big 10) for the eight-team, two-session championship format. I’m very much in favor of this format because it gets rid of those insufferable byes …

As for the AA, I’d like to see it go to either Zamarripa or Mak, both of whom are certainly capable of it, but the safer and more realistic choices are probably Peszek and Lothrop, who can 9.875 the meet all the way to a 49.500-49.550.

Pac-12 Championships Preview

In that preview BBS suggests UCLA should win IF they hit.

But if you’re putting money down, place a side bet for me on Utah. 14,000+ screaming fans at home, help.

Utes seek school’s first Pac-12 title

Manual on Handstands points out:

… Utah’s scores at home have been better than UCLA’s scores on the road. …

Leave a comment if you’ve got any strong predictions.