Author: Rick Mc

Watch evolution.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

1958 – Larissa Latynina (USSR)
1962 – Vera Caslavska (Czechosovakia)
1966 -Vera Caslavska (Czechosovakia)
1970 – Erika Zucholg (East Germany)
1974 – Olga Korbut (USSR)
1978 – Nelli Kim (USSR)
1979 – Dumitrita Turner (Romania)
1981 – Maxi Gnauck (East Germany)
1983 – Boriana Stoyanova (Bulgaria)
1985 – Elena Shushunova (USSR)
1987 – Elena Shushunova (USSR)
1989 – Olessia Dudnik (USSR)
1991 – Lavinia Milosovici (Romania)
1992 – Henrietta Onodi (Hungary)
1993 – Elena Piskun (Belarus)
1994 – Gina Gogean (Romania)
1995 – Simona Amanar (Romania) + Lilia Podkopayeva (Ukraine)
1996 – Gina Gogean (Romania)
1997 – Simona Amanar (Romania)
1999 – Elena Zamolodchikova (Russia)
2001 – Svetlana Khorkina (Russia)
2002 – Elena Zamolodchikova (Russia)
2003 – Oksana Chusovitina (Uzbekistan)
2005 – Cheng Fei (China)
2006 – Cheng Fei (China)
2007 – Cheng Fei (China)
2009 – Kayla Williams (USA)

related post – European Vault Champions 1971-2009

Aussie National Coach Peggy Liddick posted an upbeat report from the Women’s Training Camp:

After two weeks at camp and a World Championships Trial, we just had our second verification on Wednesday and the girls are really looking like a well prepared team. The stability of their programs is getting better day by day. …

click through to read her report on Gymnastics Australia

One quote caught my eye:

… Georgia Wheeler has the biggest Tkatchev of almost any women I have seen, I love watching her train bars. She swings bars like men’s high bar. Her program is stable …

Click PLAY or watch Georgia on Bars from earlier this season on YouTube.

It’s quite high. She uses a lot of hip flexion.

Click PLAY or watch some video highlights from that final camp on YouTube.

The real question for Peggy is … “Can your team survive both Commonwealth Games and World Championships back-to-back?”

Both Canada and England sent two different teams.

Men’s NCAA gymnastics is now in even greater peril.

Inside Gymnastics has been on the phone. Interviewing Tim McNeill, Barry Weiner, Mark Williams and Justin Spring.

Reaction on Berkeley Athletic Director Sandy Barbour announcement today:

… At the end of this academic year, baseball, men’s and women’s gymnastics, and women’s lacrosse will no longer represent UC Berkeley in intercollegiate competition. …

The number of varsity sports at UC Berkeley will be reduced from 29 to 24 under the new plan. A total of 163 student-athletes of the more than 800 currently participating are directly impacted by the decision – 38 in baseball, 19 in men’s gymnastics, 15 in women’s gymnastics, 30 in women’s lacrosse and 61 in men’s rugby – as well as 13 full-time coaches. …

Andrew Hampy of Cal Gymnastics Forever:

… This is a done deal. There is no possibility of the program’s ever returning again. …

Even if we said, ‘We will fund the entire program [and] it will be zero cost to university,’ you can’t do it, because now Title IX comes into the picture, and they have to reinstate women’s teams too. Title IX was one of the big elements at play here. …

read doom and gloom on Inside Gymnastics – CAL GYMNASTICS CUT

… What Men’s team will be next to feel the axe?

Only 16 NCAA schools will field MAG varsity teams for the 2012 season, down from 129 in 1970.

Last faint hope … What if donations could fund both the Women’s and Men’s teams at Berkeley?

by site editor Rick McCharles

This is a repost, as my friend Barkat from Bangladesh has now completed his 3rd year of an honours University program … and is looking to travel abroad for more education.

Does he look like a “physically challenged” athlete to you?

He is.

Barkat was a full-time gymnast who had competed internationally in Asian regional competitions. One day he decided to do some circles on pommel horse without any matting in place. He slipped, falling as he had thousands of times before, but this time somehow landed in such a way as to damage his upper spine. A fluke.

He was partially paralyzed.

If that happened to you, how would you respond?

It would either crush your spirit. Or you would get SUPER tough.

Today, with the support of family, friends and his Gymnastics Federation, Barkat is one of the most inspirational athletes I know. Charismatic, enthusiastic, well-spoken in English, he has redirected his talent into studies at Jahangirnagar University outside Dhaka.

Within months he became the University champion at able bodied table tennis, the only sport left he could do with limited lower body mobility.

He and I spoke at length about the future of Paralympic sport in his fast developing country. I believe Barkat will be one of the leaders.

I’m researching Paralympic sport right now, encouraging Barkat to get involved as an organizer now, despite his youth. He’s planning on organizing at the two largest Universities in Bangladesh, as a start. Paralympic Table Tennis, as a start.

If you have any advice or information that might help his cause, please leave a comment.

Everyone in the gymnastics community worldwide needs rally around any of our athletes catastrophically injured.

Leave a comment if you have any recommendations for him. A College or University that supports physically challenged athletes. Barkat has some financial backing, but he’d love to apply for any available scholarship.

Update: Stick It Media tells that the programs are “de-funded effective upon completion of the upcoming 2011 season”. … Does that mean they could self-fund for 2012?

… The campus will honor existing scholarship … for those student athletes whose teams have been eliminated, and the campus will support students wishing to transfer to other schools to compete. …

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original post:

Both Men and Women’s teams.

UC Berkeley will eliminate its baseball, men’s and women’s gymnastics and women’s lacrosse teams after this year and will stop fully funding the national-champion men’s rugby team.

The move, announced today, is part of the school’s attempt to trim a nearly $13 million athletics-department deficit. The cuts will save $4 million in 2011-12, the school said.

The decision will affect 163 athletes, and 13 coaches will lose their jobs. University leaders hope to lower the department deficit to $5 million by 2014, …

read more – Matt Krupnick

Contrary to what you might have read, fan favourite Anna Pavlova is still training.

There was speculation she might retire after not being named to the Russian World Championships Team:

Aliya Mustafina, Tatiana Nabieva, Ksenia Afanasyeva, Ksenia Semyonova, Anna Dementyeva, Anna Myzdrikova and Yekaterina Kurbatova

Yet after Anna’s very successful competition at the Russian Cup, she’s decided to continue.

This is confirmed on her official website. Thanks Alan.

Aunt Joyce:

… Anna Pavlova won the AA at the International Dinamo tournament with a 14.8 on vault and a 14.870 on beam. It remains to be seen how big of a mistake it will be leaving her off the world team. …

Action Gymnastics Academy NJ. Looking for coaches for USAG and Tops program. We have over 70 team members and have won over 30 state champion titles over the past 3 seasons. Pay between 20.00-30.00 per hour based on experience. Contact Michele Rogers 732-804-4792

A leaping catch 19ft 10in.

And a high forward pike salto into shoulder roll attenuating the landing force over time and surface area.

Fight Science is a television program shown on the National Geographic Channel in which scientists and martial arts masters work together to analyze the world’s fighting techniques …

Click PLAY or watch a segment on YouTube.

Read the comments on that YouTube video. Many are irked that a “science” show branded with National Geographic sensationalizes a simple shoulder roll.

We live in the era of reality TV.

(via FlipCatch)

Love this pic of Utah’s Kyndal Robarts.

From the Facebook album: Red Rocks Photo Shoot by Preston Norris

(photo via GymFever and Full Twist)