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If you’d asked me a year ago if Ellie Black and Hugh Smith from Halifax would be “in the mix” for the Canadian Olympic team, I’d have said … no.
Hugh is age-28. Ellie had disappeared. …
They’ll be in Regina at Nationals. Showing international level routines.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
1. Russia
2. Italy
3. Romania
4. Great Britain
5. Germany
6. Netherlands
1. Maria Kharenkova
2. Elisa Meneghini
3. Yevgenia Shelgunova
4. Andreea E. Munteanu
5. Sophie Scheder
6. Enus Mariani
… The Russian women’s team has been undefeated at the Junior European championships since 2000. …
Blythe:
Biggest surprise of the day — team: Germany
Biggest surprise of the day — individual: Evgenia Shelgunova, RUS.
Standout routines of the day…
Vault: Roxana Popa, ESP. Nailed a terrific DTY after balking her first attempt.
Bars: Sophie Scheder, GER. A woman as tall as Khorkina at 14 or 15, she nevertheless dominated her routine — and the event — in the qualifying round.
Beam: Eythora Thorsdottir, NED. What a wonderful routine for this young lady and her country!
Floor: Enus Mariani, ITA. A wonderful dancer with the capacity to do any style.
Longines Prize for Confidence: Gabrielle Jupp, GBR.
details on Examiner – B & B’s Junior European team finals summary
Someone, who has montaged my photos again, posted their choices for the Canadian WAG team. The GCG logo doesn’t mean this is official in any way. There’s still Regina and Gatineau …
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
I’m putting my money on Savona. She’ll end up competing in London.
#Brussels2012
Junior European WAG Team Champions:
1) RUS 167.330
2) ITA 164.031
3) ROU 161.037
Blythe:
… The Couch Gymnast’s Bea Gheorghisor and I (roomies for this week) sat down together post-senior women’s podium training to put together some superlatives about what we saw.
Biggest surprise of the day — team: Great Britain. Two DTYs, out of the blue!
Biggest surprise of the day — individuals: Ruby Harrold …
Mariya Livchikova … looks better than ever
Biggest surprise of the day — skill: Vanessa Ferrari’s full in tuck to immediate back tuck second pass. Um, wow. Honorable mention: Anne Kuhm’s triple full off beam.
Top three teams and why: Russia, Romania and Britain or Italy. Italy looked stronger on beam, Britain better on vault …
Top three individuals: Anastasia Grishina, Larisa Iordache and Mariya Lichikova. Not necessarily in that order …
read more on Examiner – B & B’s Senior Europeans podium training summary
Women’s European Championships are underway. The Men go later in the month in Montpellier, France.
The last big international before the Olympic Games in London …
Germany. GBR. France. Russia. Ukraine. …
Philippe BOY is the defending AA champ.
Seems Visa has issued take-down orders for others who posted this clip on YouTube. Here’s their official version.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
Interview with Team Visa athlete Lauren Mitchell about her training and dedication getting to the London 2012 Olympic Games.
The world’s most “difficult” Horizontal Bar routine.
Click PLAY or watch Epke Zonderland on YouTube.
Nice edit.
Behind the scenes with Utah at the 2012 NCAA Championships.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
It seems a long time ago already.
Couch Gymnast:
… Bea Gheorghisor gives a comprehensive look at the Romanian training during the morning’s podium training session as well as video of the girls training. It seems that Romanian are competing as expected, strong on their pet events; beam and floor, while bars is still lacking …
Bars
When the Romanian gymnasts arrived for podium training yesterday, it was Diana Bulimar, Raluca Haidu, Larisa Iordache and Sandra Izbasa who stepped up and trained uneven bars. The most consistent in this rotation was Larisa Iordache. She managed three or four full sets with only minor form breaks. Diana Bulimar was pretty steady as well. Her form though, was not as consistent: she sometimes hits every handstand, has great straight elbows but other times she pikes her body a little bit and loses the rhythm. You can see that she is struggling to overcome this. Raluca Haidu, on the other hand has much better form but looked the most inconsistent of the three. She had issues especially on her Giant 1/2 to Jaeger. Sandra Izbasa did train bars as well – in her usual style, a bit slow with some form breaks but nothing big. She dismounts with a double twist. …
Diana Chelaru is there, perhaps just observing the competition.
TAA linked to an interesting interview with Head Coach Octavian Bellu.
It may be a close Team competition. Romanian consistency vs Russian brilliance.
(via Pushy Queen)
