Nataional Champion UCLA Bruin gymnast Anna Li was chosen to speak at the memorial for legendary basketball coach John Wooden.
Congratulations.
The public memorial service was held, appropriately enough, in Pauley Pavilion. It was a venue Wooden loved and in which he won nine of his 10 NCAA basketball championships.
… Athletic Director Dan Guerrero announced that Wooden’s customary seat in Pauley Pavilion — Section 103B, Row 2, Seat 1 — would be retired. No one would ever be allowed to sit there again, a decision that was met with applause. …
provenance
noun
the place of origin or earliest known history of something
On the internet that means trying to “source” where a video, photo or idea started. At minimum, you should link to where you first saw it. Best practice is to link to the original and where you happened to see it first.
On this blog I’d say I’m about 90% successful in crediting a source. Not perfect. But not bad.
Tara Sickmeier of International GymnastHot Headlines is the worst gymnastics blogger I know. If she ever credits where she finds a story it’s only by accident of linking to the originator. If she sees something on Gymnastics Coaching, there’s never a (via Gymnastics Coaching) link on IG.
I’ve several times sent messages to Tara on her unethical blogging behaviour. But have yet to get a response.
Forward a link to this post if you know her personally.
Like Couch Gymnast, I was both surprised and impressed.
Nellie Kim is the current F.I.G. President of the Women’s Artistic Gymnastics Technical Committee.
Nadia’s greatest rival, back in the day, Nellie was the first international gymnast to compete Tsuk 1/1, gainer full off the end of Beam and aerial cartwheel to back tuck.
John Crumlish posted a terrific interview. She makes a lot of sense:
…
IG: What do you think can be done to make gymnastics not only less confusing for media, but more popular to the public, and as popular as it was when you were a gymnast?
NK: I think we are promoting a negative attitude against gymnastics ourselves. I don’t say the FIG, but people who are criticizing gymnastics. For example, how can we request our girls the same as in rhythmic gymnastics – choreography, dance, artistry and feminism on floor — if at the same time they have to do power tumbling in the routine? Because, without power tumbling, it becomes a rhythmic gymnastics routine.
Sometimes, instead of saying how good we are and looking for positive moments, we are saying something negative. We should talk more positively and about how strong our sport is. We should bring respect to ourselves, our gymnasts, coaches and judges, and not punish, punish, punish. In Russia there is an expression, “If you don’t like yourself, nobody else will.” You are the first one who has to respect and love yourself. …
… The Globe and Mail contacted nine Canadian individual gold medalists from the 2010 Games, including the two-woman bobsleigh team of Kaillie Humphries and Heather Moyse. Gold-medal-winning teams such as men’s and women’s hockey, men’s curling, and relay troupes in speed skating and short track were excluded because their medals were not as immediately identifiable with one athlete.
Asked how much the medals would be worth to them in 2010, the athletes gave a range of responses, though most were in the low five-figures, with several responding $20,000.
Moguls champion Alexandre Bilodeau wouldn’t provide specifics, but an informed source said he stood to earn about $200,000 this year. He and skeleton champion Jon Montgomery, who stands to make about the same, are the only gold medalists negotiating endorsement deals, and some athletes, such as speed skater Christine Nesbitt, do not even have agents. …
Find out from an interesting article in her local paper:
Ten years after Elise Ray and the U.S. women’s gymnastics team finished fourth in Sydney, Ray and her teammates are being awarded a bronze medal after an age infraction by the Chinese was discovered by the International Olympic Committee.
“At first I thought, ‘There is no way this is going to happen,'” said Ray, who coaches with Hampstead-based Carroll Gymnastics. “I was just shocked. It’s pretty wild.” …
Missing out on a medal was heartbreaking for Ray, who was 18 at the time. She nearly gave up the sport.
“I was very deflated,” she said. “I didn’t know if I wanted to do it anymore.”
Ray didn’t let up, however, and continued her career at the University of Michigan, where she became the most decorated Wolverine gymnast of all time.
Ray captured the NCAA all-around national title her freshman year. She then flipped, twisted and spun her way to national titles in the beam in 2002 and the bars in 2004. In 2005, she led the Wolverines to the Super Six finals where she took home a silver medal on the beam.
“Michigan was a healing experience for me,” Ray said. “It brought the fun back to it.”
Ray, a 14-time all-American, graduated with an English degree, but she wasn’t ready to give up gymnastics. She spent the next two years performing in Las Vegas for Cirque Du Soleil.
“I loved performing. The work was unbelievable, but Vegas was not my city,” Ray said with a laugh.
So she went from the neon lights of Vegas back to Maryland. She has been with Carroll Gymnastics, which practices at Four Seasons Sports Complex, for more than two years.
Gymnastics Coaching.com 