Author: Rick Mc

I read he kissed the Ring frame after scoring 15.900 to beat his second-placed teammate, Yan’s 15.700.

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Amy on The All Around:

… He Kexin’s floor routine from team qualifications is a delight to watch! I am shocked! I knew the girl could swing bars but I had no idea she was any real use on the other events. But sure enough, she went up in qualifications and delivered a very clean routine! …

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

In training she seemed to do far less on Floor than the other girls. I was thinking she was “reserve” for Team China on this apparatus.

Not. China can use this routine. Nice.

Money.

For most of my lifetime the best gymnasts were from the Soviet Union. The best coaches. … Then the collapse of the Soviet Union. And the diaspora of Soviet coaches around the world.

Rodionenko, for example, went to Western Australia. Then Canada. Then was convinced to return home, to help rebuild the Russian gymnastics program.

… I’m thinking Andrei is happy this one is over.

He hired back Alexander Alexandrov as Women’s National Coach. Here’s a very interesting interview from the past.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

It worked. The Russian women are World Champions in 2010, the team to beat for London.

And the Men are fast on the rise. They might have been on the podium this year if not for the tragic death of Yuri Ryazanov after Worlds 2009.

via @LHgymnastics Liriel Higa

If you are one of those dissecting the scores on that apparatus, check a good photo set chosen by Blythe, on Gymnastics Examiner.

Did the women’s judges stay consistent on differentiating between pike and layout position at Worlds 2010?

Epke Zonderland brought the house down with this extreme routine in his home nation, Netherlands. I’d not heard that he’d even trained the Gaylord 2 this week, never mind putting it in for finals.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

In the end, almost everyone I spoke with thought this a surprisingly excellent Worlds. Fantastic Gymnastics. That includes Hardy Fink, who’s been at more WCs than anyone else.

It’s easy to find fault. Point out terrible form, especially twisting. … Bad technique. Cheap difficulty.

But there were far more positives than negatives.

How many times did I saw “WOW” out loud? … Hundreds. Hundreds of times. For gymnasts from all over the world.

Uematsu Koji during the H Bar final. This is fight. This is gymnastics at the highest level. One of the best routines I saw in Rotterdam. And he fell.

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We’re seeing some positions that don’t make divers wince. (As much.)

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And Ring leaps that wouldn’t be out of place in Rhythmic.

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Women’s Vault is shockingly weak compared with Men’s Vault. But I’d compete Alica against guys and win more often than not. She’s excellent. … Look at the form in the preflight of Yurchenko. That’s cleaner than Shewfelt.

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Though there’s virtually no reward for being artistic in Artistic gymnastics these days, we still have many wonderfully artistic gymnasts, including Longines winners Tanaka and Boy.

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I’m starting to like Beam again. The girls are better than ever before in history. But rules must be changed so that they are not allowed to pause between every skill. If that happened we’d see better routines than the late 1980s, for sure.

Men’s Horizontal Bar is my least favourite apparatus, the rules idiotic right now. But you can’t watch these fearless guys trying to connect Kovacs skills without admiration. It’s not fun to miss. No coach is going to slow you down.

Where’s that Epke Horizontal Bar finals video? One of the extreme routines of all time. Wow.

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Women’s Artistic Gymnastics, all-around, is nearly impossible in 2010. You can do 4 long, hard routines. But how can you train enough of them to be “ready” without getting injured.

Mustafina and Bross are incredible. So tough, durable and focused. We will never see very many young women achieve this level.

And Beth Tweddle. You can’t say enough about her. To my mind she’s an average international genetic talent, who persisted to become multiple World Champion by a supernatural psychological skill set.

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Ask a male gymnast to try Beth’s Bar routine. They’ll tell you where to go.

Bars in 2010 is a completely different apparatus than even 6yrs ago. Astonishing.

What about this guy?

Sick. Injured. Tired. On a bad day, … Uchimura’s still the greatest gymnast who ever lived.

I’m honoured to be alive in his era.

Fantastic gymnastics.

I am.

Even more so after some investigation was done by bloggers at Gimnastas and Full Twist.

Click through to watch the VIDEO and get in on the discussion – Should Mustafina & Nabieva’s Vaults have been downgraded?

Two questions:

1) Why were the D values devalued? … not stretched enough, we all assume

2) What was the 0.1 penalty?

When I have both answers, I’ll post it on this site. With video.

Shout out to one of the great ones.

Anastasia Umeh, a Canadian transplant down under, choreographer of World Champion Lauren Mitchell‘s Floor routine. And many others.

Stacy on Facebook:

I have been crying for hours! Well done Lauren…couldn’t have happened to a nicer girl. Congratulations to the WAIS program…and the AUS National Team

Click PLAY or watch the World Champion’s routine on YouTube.

Pretty. Unique finish. More than anything else, I appreciate that she doesn’t walk back into the corners.

History: Competition home page (results). FIG. USAG. Full Twist. WAG videos. Gymnastike. Photos.

If you live for the drama, there were plenty of drama queens in Rotterdam.

Personally I like the discipline displayed, in general, by the American girls. No matter what goes wrong, you fight back tears. You respect your competitors. You respect the sport.

It’s bad sportsmanship to make a display of yourself, off the apparatus.

If underscored, you shake the hand of the victor, and congratulate.

I was shocked all week at lack of discipline shown by the Russian girls. I guarantee you that the boss, Rodienenko, hates this stuff. He’s benched gymnasts his entire career for any one of the dozen nonsense moments we’ve seen out of Nabieva.

Just when we should be celebrating that Russia is back, instead there’s a backlash. Check Couch Gymnast’s post – MORE RUSSIAN HISTRIONICS….OR JUST PLAIN RUDE?

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More controversy …

Once again, the judging of the E panel sucks.

Andy Thorton weighs in … The Floor final:

… a perfect example of the problem in women’s judging today. If we take out Afanasyeva, every other E-score of the final was between 8.883 and 9.1 – not nearly enough to reflect the true differences in the landings (Izbasa’s 0.8 penalty is in a different category) …

The judges “box” the scores to be sure they are not out of range.

Ferrari’s E score should have been several tenths higher than anyone else. But the judges are too gutless to throw a high number.

On Beam:

… of the gymnasts who hit, the E-scores ranged from 8.6 to 8.966 …

Same thing.

Andy has more. Zonderland’s stupid great Horizontal Bar routine, included.

American Gymnast – Event Finals Day 2 Filled With Controversy…

Worst of all, Tandori Chicken got interviewed by Gymnastike. A foul fowl.