Alabama, Florida, STANFORD advance to Super 6

Alabama 196.85
Florida 196.775
Stanford 196.300
Michigan 195.700
Arkansas 195.600
Missouri 194.600

Roll Tide. ‘Bama has the momentum.

On the other hand … anyone can win who gets to Super 6.

UCLA will win, me thinks.

… I’m off to the coaches party.

Event finalists from session 1

Ingrid720 posted this unofficial list on College Gymnastics Board.

Vault EF:

1 Susan Jackson LSU 9.950
2 Mandi Rodriguez Oregon State 9.925
3 Ashley Lee LSU 9.900
3 Anna Li UCLA 9.900
3 Elyse Hopfner-Hibbs UCLA 9.900
3 Vanessa Zamarripa UCLA 9.900
3 Brittany Skinner Nebraska 9.900
3 Lora Evenstad Nebraska 9.900
3 Sharaya Musser Penn State 9.900
3 Mary Atkinson Arizona State 9.900
3 Allison Buckley Illinois-Champaign 9.900

UB EF:

1 Susan Jackson LSU 9.925
2 Daria Bijak Utah 9.900
2 Summer Hubbard LSU 9.900
2 Anna Li UCLA 9.900
2 Hollie Vise Oklahoma 9.900

BB EF:

1 Jamie Deetscreek Utah 9.900
1 Kyndal Robarts Utah 9.900
1 Susan Jackson LSU 9.900
1 Courtney McCool Georgia 9.900

FX EF:

1 Brittani McCullough UCLA 9.925
2 Annie DiLuzio Utah 9.900
2 Makayla Stambaugh Oregon State 9.900
2 Vanessa Zamarripa UCLA 9.900
2 Hollie Vise Oklahoma 9.900

It’s great to see former World Champion Hollie Vise make Bars.

The rest of the Event finalists will be selected from Session 2. My 4 predicted apparatus champions are already through.

Leave a comment if you KNOW who’s going to win event Finals.

Gymnastics – UCLA, OU, and Utah advance

The most important story on the Thursday of Championships is … what 3 teams move on to the Super 6 Team Finals. And what 3 teams are finished for the season.

From Session 1 of two today:

LSU, Nebraska and Oregon State did not make the cut.

UCLA 196.875
Utah 196.625
Oklahoma 196.550
Nebraska 196.175
Oregon State 196.050
LSU 196.025

official results page

LSU was the team that most impressed me today … until Beam. Last rotation. Two girls fell. They counted a routine with a fall for Team.

The best live blog coverage is Anne on Gymnastike. If you prefer, it goes out to Twitter, as well: follow gymnastike. (Still no twitter hashtag for this meet. Who’s in charge of social media for the NCAA? It’s 2010.)

UCLA was very shaky compared to the dominating meet they had at Regionals. Bars could certainly be better. Anchor Mizuki Sato fell on Beam, but they still pulled off a 49.125

The loudest fans were from Utah. Perhaps it helped. No team was more over-scored than Utah on Bars. I was embarrassed for that judging panel.

Actually the Bars scores were awful throughout the meet. Nobody was “ranked” except the very best few routines. It’s time NCAA fixes the Bar regulations.

… more on this later.

are you the next Michael Jackson?

From Cirque Casting:

Thank you for your questions about the casting for the Cirque du Soleil and The Estate of Michael Jackson shows!

We are currently in the early creation stages; therefore we don’t have specific information to communicate at this point. More details will be available in the coming months; in the meantime, we invite you to apply online and your profile might be presented to our creative teams if it meets their needs!

Sounds like there was a mad rush of interest in working for that particular show. I’m not at all surprised.

Click through to the link at the top of the page if you deserve to work with the King of Pop.

Jr Men – European Championships

Looks like hosts Great Britain will win the Team competition. Russia, the pre-meet favourites, sadly could not travel to the competition. It would have been close, I think.


5 in a team, 5 to compete each apparatus and 3 scores to count. FIG Junior Code, prohibited skills, short routines and C dismounts. A new game to be played. …

Great Britain holding an unprecedented 9.7 point lead after the second sub division. For GBR now a long wait until ten o clock this evening. France and Switzerland will have to have something special to shift the British boys sitting team 1st and ranks 1,2,3 5 and 8. This is an amazing team.

Sam Oldham (GBR) “I think we’ve done really well. It was nerve-wracking at first but its great to have friends and family cheering you on and once the first piece is out of the way the nerves go.It’s going to be a long wait to see if we’ve won but things look good at the moment.” …

There’s so much good news out of the UK these days. Kudos and congratulations.

British Gymnastics – GBR boys take strong lead after 2nd subdivision!

Photo from From the album: Junior Men’s Qualifications by British Gymnastics on Facebook.

Bars video – Oakville Gymnastics

Robbie Popkin posted a short clip of Oakville Gymnastics Bars training.

Hey, why the “cut” in that regrasp, Robbie? … Creative editing? … UPDATE – coaches confirm she did catch several that day.

The coach on screen is former Olympic gymnast Lorne Bobkin.

related – Bars training in England: Aasha Kimpton el-grip giants and layout Geinger

Is she only 10yrs-old when this video was taken? … Amazing.

Thursday – NCAA quick links

• NCAA’s live streaming Semifinal 2 – CBS College Sports All-Access. Fast internet connection recommended. 7PM EST time start.

• official competition website

• live scoring available linked via www.GatorZone.com

• excellent live blog by Anne Phillips on Gymnastike.

Leave a comment if you have any problems. Or find other good links.

If you couldn’t care less about this meet, Longines will be posting results from European Championships all weekend.

more jots from podium training

There’s no open wifi at the NCAA Championships.

Aunt Joyce phoned text messages to Catty Comments, who posted them on Aunt Joyce’s Ice Cream Stand.

Click through if you’d like to see his typical catty, funny and insightful opinions.

Texting out is one workaround. A laptop tethered to a phone … Or a laptop and MiFi would be another.

What’s a twitter hashtag for this meet?

That might be the best way of all to follow several live bloggers at once.

vault landing drill

Here’s UCLA coach P.J. Irvin in podium training at the end of vault training. The beatboard on top of the horse.

Click PLAY or watch it on Gymnastike.

http://www.gymnastike.org/assets/portal/add_ons/mediaplayer-4.2/player.swf

Not great here. But he had 3 of 6 girls “stick” at their last meet. 50% is a good stat in competition.

Marta … call Brandi Personett

You’ve likely heard the buzz about Anna Li and Vanessa Zamarripa considering a return to Elite Gymnastics.

It’s a long shot, at best, for any College gymnast to qualify for the American National Team.

Vanessa should be training only for the NCAA, I feel. But a Senior like Anna is certainly free to do as she likes.

From the USA National Team point of view, why not look at College girls?

If I was Marta Karoli, I’d be phoning Brandi Personett right after her final competition this weekend.

If there’s one competitor the other girls at Championships would point to and say: “She’s a stud”, it’s Brandi.

Her last 1/1 twisting double layout on Floor in podium training today was as good as any I’ve ever seen, anywhere. Here’s some video of that skill captured by Anne of Gymnastike.

Here’s my thinking:

• Russia is the team to beat at Olympics 2012
• the USA has almost no chance to have a higher start score (Bars will be far lower)
• China and (likely) Russia will have higher execution scores

The best chance for the USA to win in 2012 is consistency. In a 3-up, 3-count Team Final, the States might make up the difference if their opposition falls twice, perhaps even only once.

And who’s more consistent than a College gymnast?

How many Beam routines has Anna Li done in series without a fall, for example?

Again, it’s a long shot. But worth a phone call. Bringing some very experienced College gymnasts to camp might help the up-and-coming younger kids.

Update: Here’s one vault from podium training. (I didn’t think Brandi did any great vaults this day. … Saving it for the competition, we assume.)

Click PLAY or watch it on Gymnastike.

http://www.gymnastike.org/assets/portal/add_ons/mediaplayer-4.2/player.swf

Brandi’s been training a double twisting Yurchenko. She’ll take your call, Marta.