Gymnastics Coaching.com

My Pajama Days is a blogger, writer and gym Mom who’s learning a lot about life alongside her DD (Darling Daughter).

This past season the family was forced to change gyms. Adjusting and adapting to a new gym culture.

The family made new friends. New gym relationships.

DD was injured just before the State Championship, and had to learn to handle accepting a zero score on two apparatus.

I expected my daughter to excel both as an athlete and as a young woman if I provided her with the right environment. I knew a team of good role models and like-minded families would reinforce the values that our family strives to protect everyday. What I didn’t realize, was that by creating this type of environment for my daughter, I was also molding myself into a better individual too.

read more – Gymnastics teaches lessons I didn’t know I needed to learn

Full Twist has results and links to routines.

Russia 177.30
Switzerland 161.55
Great Britain 160.00

Aliya Mustafina 58.95
Anastasia Grishina 57.70
Anna Dementyeva 56.55

Click PLAY or watch Aliya’s Floor on YouTube.

Looks like she’s gaining confidence with her knee after ACL surgery. Good progress. But she’s got a long way to go to be ready to contend for the AA in the Olympics.

Scores from this meet are VERY high. Yet, Valentina Rodionenko keeps insisting that the Russians are underscored:

… The judges exaggerate our small mistakes. And they do the opposite with our rivals. The same error can be penalized in different ways. And when the judges’ alliances begin, the game is on. …

What Alliance?

“… Canada, Australia, Brazil, New Zealand …”

There are a few judges who would be quick to disabuse her on that.

Valentina Rodionenko does a disservice to her Team with these outbursts. One former Russian Team member asked me, “Why is Valentina Rodionenko now a spokesperson for Team Russia?”

I don’t know.

Larissa Iordache 60.15
Sandra Izbasa 56.60
Anne Kuhm 56.35 – FX
Diana Chelaru 55.00
Amelia Racea 54.85
Clara Della Vedova 53.45

… First year senior Larissa Iordache ran away with the All Around title with a score of 60.150. In the Senior Team competition, Romania excelled, scoring over 10 points higher than France. International Gymnast has a great report here with full details and results, including results from the Junior competition. …

Full Twist links to videos from that friendly.

Click PLAY or watch Iordache’s Beam on YouTube.

related – Andy Thornton – Romanian Team Coming Alive For London

This is one sweet, smart routine. With plenty of crowd appeal.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

Her Aussie fans back home feel this was #1.

54 scores were given in the Floor final. And all but one ranged from 9.85 – 9.95.

From the 6 judges, Ding got 5 9.95s. EHH and Stack-Eaton got four. Jones, much less well known, only got three.

None of the top gymnasts distinguished themselves enough to be the clear winner, I thought. So it was a bit of popularity contest, in the end.

CalicoIzzy:

You put Melanie in the UGA leotard with Kat’s name, and she wins floor finals.

Floor final was a joke

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

Class act.

This was the best season ever for Florida Head Coach Rhonda Faehn. They truly did everything right this year. But it turned out to be the toughest, tightest Team finish ever.

http://www.gatorvision.tv/mediaPortal/embed.swf

I’m betting that Florida will be the team to beat again next season.

Google Translate:

.. he Atlanta Olympic champion gymnast 1996 in (Floor), Greek, Ioannis Melissanidis , will be competing in … the World Cup in Osijek, the end of the month …

At 34 the gymnast is in good condition to develop competency in their unit. “I have never ceased to be a gymnast. I train every day, I’m still the same diet that I had when I was competing. So I think you could do well. “Said Ioannis.

He further clarified: “It would be impossible to reach a level to the Olympics, but there are other competitions – European Championships, the World Cup events of the Mediterranean Games … anything is possible.” …

gimnasialatina.com (Spanish)

Here’s his Gold medal routine. Back in the day when execution was required, and shorts were short.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

No problem. He’s young. Jenny Hansen is age-38 and still trying for the U.S. National Team.

Click PLAY or watch McKayla Maroney on YouTube.

Someone handy with editing software has merged the reigning World vault champion’s two vaults from the 2011 U.S. Championships, showing 98 percent of her Amanar and adding in the last half twist of her second vault (layout Podkopayeva) to make it appear that Maroney is doing a triple twisting Yurchenko. What it does achieve is providing a good visual of what the first TTY will look like whenever it gets done.

Examiner Watch this: McKayla Maroney’s “triple twisting Yurchenko”

Ono sends the link to an NCAA Men’s Apparatus Finals recap video.

Here’s the (astonishing Illinois come-from-behind-on-Pommels victory) Team Finals recap video.

The Illini party like it’s 1989.

I’m watching the full replay of Team Finals right now.

I assume those clips don’t have embed codes because geeks cannot figure out how to add the preroll advertisements. Too bad.

There are more videos on NCAA.com.

It’s always bad news when you have to call a lawyer. I fear there will be more legal cases to come.

The Dutch court ruled that Netherlands cannot name Epke Zonderland and Wyomi Masela as their Olympians for London. Instead Netherlands must wait on results from European Championships and two World Cups.

Jeffrey Wammes and Celine van Gerner both challenged that early decision.

My opinion:

1) The Coach / Federation should be empowered to name the Olympians.

2) The Coach / Federation should have waited as long as possible before naming the Olympians.

related – JOHN CRUMLISH commentary

via GYMpower (Dutch)