tumbling, tramp, diving, acrobatics, circus, cheer, dance, martial arts, X sports … and more
Both pending appeal.
Fong and Barutyan’s suspensions are active and enforceable as of the date of issuance: December 22, 2025. They retain the right to appeal the sanctions, which could result in the suspensions being upheld, modified, reduced, or otherwise altered.
Here’s the only response I’ve seen, so far.
Gymnastics is dangerous.
This severe injury resulted in a lawsuit in Arizona.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
Skate Canada says it will no longer host major events in Alberta following a review of the province’s legislation on the participation of transgender athletes in women’s sport. …
Opponents of the bill (including me) say it’s more about stigmatizing and punishing those in the transgender community, and using them as a political football to advance the UCP’s agenda while appealing to a conservative voter base. …
Skate Canada to stop holding national, international events in Alberta
The current Alberta government is right leaning. This legislation is simply pandering to a base that hates minorities.
I feel sports organizations should decide eligibility, not politicians.
IF Skate Canada bans transgender athletes, I’d be OK with that. IF they allow transgender athletes under some kind of criteria, I’d be happy with that, as well.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
When Hofmann died of COVID-19 in April 2020, the international gymnastics community remembered him as an innovator and mentor.
The tributes focused on his technical knowledge shared generously, on a coach “always willing and eager” to help programs worldwide.
None mentioned “The Rose.” None referenced the Stasi files or the pharmaceutical protocols. …
I attended a number of Hofmann’s coaching courses.
He was a coaches coach. Very good at planning. A proven winner. His team won no fewer than 52 medals at Olympic Games, World and European Championships.
I have no doubt that his main passion was beating the USSR.
BUT in that era of the DDR, you cooperated with the Stasi (secret police) or lost your job.
In that era of the DDR, if higher-ups told you to test new drugs on gymnasts, you did it.
I knew very little about all these new revelations — aside from the drugs he told us about at one coaching course. Some kind of steroids. They tried them on junior male gymnasts ultimately deciding that the benefits weren’t worth the risk.
Uncle Tim put together a career retrospective on Dieter Hoffman. So far as I can verify with contemporaries, it’s very accurate. Uncle Tim is a terrific researcher.
Read more …
Gymnastics-History.com – Code Name “Rose”: The Double Life of East Germany’s Head Coach
Personally, I would have voted against.
Putin is solely responsible for mass murder. He started this war. He could end it tomorrow.
It’s clear FIG wants AIN gymnasts back in official competition including the Olympics.
European Gymnastics has lifted its blanket ban on Russian and Belarusian athletes, clearing the way for them to return to continental competitions for the first time since the invasion of Ukraine.
The decision came on Friday at the 2025 European Gymnastics Congress in Prague.
A vote took place with 46 countries reportedly participating: 27 voted in favor of lifting the ban, 15 voted against, and four abstained. …
European Gymnastics lifts total ban on Russian, Belarusian athletes
Putin’s war has between 400,000 and 1.5 million Ukrainian estimated casualties (killed and wounded) during the Russian invasion of Ukraine from February 24, 2022 till November, 2025.
Casualties of the Russo-Ukrainian war
An excellent podcast.
Patrick Kiens and Daymon Jones, now at WCC Texas, previously coach the Romanian team.
Camelia Voinea competed for Romania between 1984 and 1988. The first gymnast to tumble a double layout to punch front on Floor.
Today Camelia coaches her daughter Sabrina, born 2007. Yes, that’s the excellent gymnast who would have won a Bronze medal on Floor in Paris IF her mother / coach had submitted an inquiry on time. Romania — at the time — thought Sabrina would win the Bronze medal, even with the wrongfully assessed 0.1 out of bounds deduction so they didn’t appeal.
Coach Camelia Voinea, we are told, is not up on the Code of Points. She tried to appeal the E-score, at one competition, for example. Not allowed, as every other coach knows.
Always controversial, Camelia is back in the headlines after recent allegations of physical, verbal, and mental abuse by multiple former gymnasts.
To get caught up, listen to the GymCastic podcast interview with former Romanian national team coaches Daymon Jones and Patrick Kiens.
Romanian Gymnastics administration remains a dumpster fire.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
Czech gymnast Věra Čáslavská won a total of 22 international titles between 1959 and 1968 including seven Olympic gold medals, four world titles and eleven European championships.
Čáslavská was known for her outspoken support of the Czechoslovak democratization movement and her opposition to the 1968 Soviet-led invasion of Czechoslovakia.
At the 1968 Olympics in Mexico City, she took this protest to the world stage by quietly looking down and away while the Soviet national anthem was played during the medal ceremonies for the balance beam and floor exercise event finals.
Click PLAY or watch the trailer on YouTube.
Make sport.
Not war.
Nagornyy became head of the Young Army Cadets National Movement (Putin Youth) in 2020. Training young people to kill Ukrainians.
Banned from entering my nation, for life.
I hope he never competes again in an FIG competition.
BUT he is still very involved with Gymnastics in Putin’s dictatorship.
Read a recent interview.
Gymnastics Coaching.com 