Category: Gymnastics

Findings weren’t as dismal and random as you’d might expect.

Personally, I’d abandon Artistry deductions as too subjective — instead evaluating execution more precisely. Likely we’d need video analysis judging to do that accurately.

– Rick

Marishiba did some analysis into Artistry deductions at Worlds 2023.

… 72 gymnasts for beam, and the top 48 for floor …

Marishiba’s thoughts:

• In some ways, this actually made me feel better about artistry judging, in that I generally feel like the people who subjectively felt artistic and expressive (to me!) tended to get the highest artistry scores, and the people who subjectively felt messy or clunky got low scores, while the people who were pretty/polished but not expressive got scores in the middle. One big exception to this is Chinese gymnasts. I love their artistry, especially on floor, and it’s not being rewarded.
• However, the spread of judging on a single routine is troubling. …

Takeaways:

• All hail Eythora queen of artistry! Competing 3 times each on beam and floor, she had 3 out of 4 of the top beam artistry scores, and all 3 of the top floor artistry scores! In every single routine, at least one judge gave her zero artistry deductions! Pauline’s quals beam was the only routine that bested any of Eythora’s artistry scores!
• Averaging across all competitions, Flavia is top-5 for both beam (3rd) and floor (4th). In the top 10 for both are Jess G. (2nd beam, 6th floor), Rebeca (2nd floor, 9th beam), Pauline (5th beam, 10th floor), and Melanie (7th floor, 8th beam).
• The Americans are really getting dinged on artistry. We knew this, but it really stands out looking at the data. Shilese’s floor stands out as by far the best US artistry (0.29 artistry deductions average, 16th place). Simone is middle of the pack on artistry (26th place on floor, 33rd on beam, with 3 to 4 tenths deduction on each); so much potential for her to improve there.
• Floor artistry deductions were pretty consistent across competitions, beam were not, with quals and AA being notably harsher on artistry than EF or Team.

Read the full report on Reddit.