Gymnastics Coaching.com

Irina Karavaeva misses the medals. Another GOLD in Gymnastics sports for China.

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Karen Cockburn, He Wenna, Ekaterina Khilko – photo Grace Chui from Facebook

Congratulations to Karen Cockburn, my favourite, who has had medals in the past 3 Olympics!

Thanks Stu.

UPDATE: Though I competed Trampoline long ago, I’m no expert. But having now seen the Finals on NBC TV, I felt Karavaeva was badly underscored. What did she miss?

Slate has a slideshow of unusual gymnastics photos.

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Nastia … won the silver medal in the uneven bars during Day 2 of the individual event finals Monday evening at the National Indoor Stadium. The gold medal went to He Kexin of China, who was first in the rotation and posted a score of 16.725. Liukin followed and her score was also 16.725, but tiebreaking procedures placed her second. Beth Tweddle had the highest start value at 7.8.

Bars:

(L-R) Nastia Liukin, He Kexin and Yang Yilin. (Photo credit: Getty Images) – source

Too bad. I was cheeing for Jordan Jovtchev (in his 5th Olympics) but he finished 8th in the Final. Pinheiro Robrigues Danny attempted the impossible “Victorian Cross”.

Rings:

Dragalescu from Romania finished 4th on Vault nailing his awesome “Dragalescu” vault, but falling on the second vault — exactly the same thing he did in Athens. This means he will come away from Beijing with no medals at all. Perhaps the last “comeback” we will see from the dominant Floor / Vault man of this decade.

Men’s Vault:

Congratulations to Leszek who was not even allowed to compete in 2004 though he was then, as he is today, the #1 vaulter in the world. (Form is not great, however.)

more results – Gymnast.com

Steve McCain’s live blogging notes.

My predictions on who would win the Gold medals.

WOMEN’S FLOOR:

Sadly, Alicia finished just out of the medals on Vault. But it’s wonderful to see Oksana Chusovitina win a medal in her 5th Olympics!

WOMEN’S VAULT:

In a shocker, both Dragalescu and Hypolito MISSED. These guys took advantage:

MEN’S FLOOR:

You cannot be too surprised that Sasha Artemev fell, placing seventh on pommels. He has been very inconsistent on that awesome routine. I was cheering that young Louis Smith of Great Britain took Bronze. Congrats to him and coach Paul Hall.

MEN’S POMMEL HORSE:

more results – Gymnast.com

Or read Steve McCain’s live blogging of Finals.

Looks like they’ve signed most of the big names in USA Gymnastics.

… Okay, so after the Olympics are over the greatest gymnasts in the country are gonna be on the road and coming to an arena near you! What could be cooler than the best gymnastics in the world? …

2008 World Tour of Gymnastics Superstars

Yup. Only in the USA do they have the gall to call an American Tour … a “World Tour”.

Some of the dates will conflict with the “World Series of Baseball”, I suppose.

related post: Gymnastics SPECTACULARS give me a headache

UPDATE: Ha. The “World” has now been removed from the official poster. (Click through to see the revised poster.) And the TV advertising in the USA does not use the “World” either.

… Now. If only they would adopt the “North American Series of Baseball”.

My friend, former gymnast, Cristina Knihnitski is opening a new CHEERLEADING facility.

The club has been running several years. Now they are opening a new gym.

Website looks great. Good luck!

Prairie Fire Cheerleading – Saskatoon, Saskatchwan,

Good article:

… FIG raised the minimum age from 14 to 15 in 1981. In 1997, it went to 16. Boosting the minimum age was supposed to encourage coaches to go easier on younger athletes.

U.S. Olympic gold-medalist Bart Conner has his doubts.

“In many ways it was a knee-jerk reaction from the gymnastics federation to remind coaches to not push so hard,” Conner said. “But I’m not sure that’s really worked. I’m not sure if, in the gym, that causes a coach to back off a little. Maybe it does. …

I think the age rule has had some overall influence. Some coaches do more long-term career planning. But the “cheating” problem, outweighs the benefits in my opinion.

Read the whole article:

Tom Daley’s age hasn’t been an issue. The British Olympic diver is 14 and his youth—his braces were only recently removed—makes his story compelling.

Nor has anyone made a fuss about Antoinette Joyce Guedia Mouafo. At 12, the swimmer from Cameroon is the youngest athlete in the Beijing Olympics and had never swum in a 50-meter pool.

…

Age rules at the Olympics are set by the federations that run the sports, and many don’t have any limits. …

Arne Ljungqvist, head of the IOC medical commission, said age-manipulation is a problem that’s tough to detect. Ljungqvist runs the IOC’s effort against doping and concedes age manipulation is another form of cheating.

“This is a problem when you have an age limit that there is a temptation for manipulation,” Ljungqvist said. “How to prove that is very difficult. There are ways and means of establishing the age, or the supposed age of a person, but it isn’t absolutely scientifically accurate—nor a legally accurate way of doing it.”

Minimum age rules vary widely at Olympics – AP

Antoinette Joyce Guedia Mouafo – Reuters

Top 8 move on to Finals.

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I carry an expensive video camera on my hip in the gym. It provides instant feedback for the athlete, time allowing. And the video can be analyzed later on the computer.

A simple camcorder that costs less than $200 that might be ideal for coaches is getting great reviews. A tiny unit.

Flip Video Mino Series Camcorder, 60 Minutes (Black)

Leave a comment if you have an opinion on this product.

As Crossfit advances as a sport, I’m seeing more and more similarities between their conditioning and gymnastics. In fact, many of the best Crossfit coaches do a lot of gymnastics conditioning.

From one article:

One of the questions I get asked most often is: What exercises do gymnasts do to train their abdominals? People are always in awe of the strength gymnasts possess. Gymnasts are small athletes, but pound for pound some of the world’s strongest.

Gymnastics is an extremely demanding sport which asks its athletes to do things the body physiologically just shouldn’t do and core strength is a major part of any gymnasts conditioning routine. Without a rock solid core there is no way these athletes could perform the skills and routines they are required to do.

Below are 5 common exercises gymnasts use to train their abdominals. Please note that these exercises are fairly advanced. Make sure you have the necessary basic abdominal strength before attempting them. …

read more – 6 Pack Abs – Gymnast Style Abdominal Exercises – Shapefit.com

photo – Nicole – CrossFit.com