A second member of the Fierce Five squad that won gold at the London Olympics has said she, too, was sexually abused by USA Gymnastics’ longtime team physician.
Aly Raisman confirmed the abuse in an interview with 60 Minutes, which is to air Sunday night. The three-time gold medalist and captain of the 2012 and 2016 Olympic teams also describes it in her book, Fierce, being released next week. …
Nassar pleaded guilty to federal child pornography charges in July, and he faces 22 to 27 years in prison when he’s sentenced on Dec. 7 …
But was the number of injuries at 2017 Worlds more than usual? I’m not sure. I recall some very bad Worlds.
FIG tracks those numbers. In the past I’ve seen the FIG Worlds medical report. It won’t be published for some weeks, I expect.
But I’ve not seen that report released publicly for many years. I’ve requested a copy from one of the FIG Medical Commission.
This year meet ending injuries were suffered by some of the highest profile gymnasts: Kohei Uchimura (ankle on Vault in competition), Ragan Smith (ankle in training), Larisa Iordache (Achilles on Floor in training), Vanessa Ferrari (Achilles on Floor in competition).
Social media is the main source of competition information for many people. Injuries were very quickly communicated from those in the arena. More so than in the past. Five major injuries occurred in one subdivision of MAG preliminaries. That set off the gymternet alarm. Ready to quit the sport, I had to take a long walk to calm down.
In the cases of Vanessa and Larisa Achilles rupture waspredictable. Both arrived in Montreal knowing there was a chance it could happen. I can’t blame the venue. The same thing happened to Alicia Sacramone at Worlds Tokyo 2011.
Those who jumped on the Montreal broke the gymnasts meme reminded me of the old similarly wrong over-simplification: Marta broke the girls.
Gymnastics is a very dangerous sport. It’s most dangerous when athletes used to landing on mats in the pit have to try to stick a Vault on competition mats. It’s Russian roulette. Audrys Nin Reyes was a favourite to medal on Vault. He was injured on landing just like Kohei.
Kyle Shewfelt had 2 serious injuries over 3 Olympics. One landing on competition Floor. The other landing a competition Vault. (Kyle said Kohei’s injury looked similar to his on Vault.)
If you worry about the health of your favourite gymnast, worry most when they compete Floor and Vault.They are much, much safer training in their own Gym.
Was lighting in the training Gyms or competition Gym a factor?
Possibly. But not a big factor I don’t expect.
Was insufficient practice time in the competition Gym a factor?
Yes. In my opinion.
That facility sat empty much of the time before the start of competition. Why not offer a second podium training? Why not allow more time / gymnast? FIG could easily correct this for Doha.
Podium training was bungled too for some gymnasts. Petrounias, for example. Lack of chalk and timing errors are the fault of the organizing committee. Not FIG.
Did the gymnasts have enough time on the new Gymnova equipment?
No, in some cases. The U.S. men had not used the Gymnova vault horse before arrival in Montreal. Donnell Whittenburg, one of the favourites, said he couldn’t get used to it in time.
On the other hand, some nations planned to get time on the Worlds equipment. China spent a week training on Gymnova in Alberta before arriving Montreal, for example. Smart. Japan and Brazil trained at INS Montreal before the official Worlds training gyms opened.
No. It was a far better than average World Championships. I congratulate FIG, the Worlds organizing committee and all those volunteers for getting 99% of things right.
An article in The Detroit News looks back at Larry Nassar’s life and medical career. Trying to understand how he came to become “one of the most sought-after physicians in the gymnastics world“.
How were so many gymnasts, parents and coaches fooled?
Gymnastics Coaching.com 