Gymnastics Coaching.com

Morgan Hamm out of Olympics with ankle injury – AP

Sasha calling Dad with the news:

… “Both Alex and David Durante (the USA’s alternates) have done an incredible job of maintaining their readiness and being prepared to step in on a moment’s notice if called upon,” said Dennis McIntyre, director for men’s program at USA Gymnastics. “The role of the alternate athlete is very difficult and both of these athletes have demonstrated their commitment to our Olympic team by staying well prepared. In this situation, we believe Alex is best suited to help the U.S. men’s team pursue a team medal. We appreciate the dedication of both men and the fact they have maintained their competitive readiness.”

“It’s an honor to be on this team, but it’s a shame that it had to happen this way with Morgan getting hurt,” Artemev said. “He’s a tremendous loss to this team. I’m ready to step in because that was my job as an alternate. …

read more on Gymnast.com

If you follow this blog regularly you know I’ve wanted Sasha on the Team all along. He’s by far the most artistic member on the Team. And — if he stays on — has one of the best medal shots for the U.S.A. – Pommel Horse.

Click PLAY or watch him on YouTube.

(via Stick It Media)

After seeing Morgan live in Houston at VISA Championships, I’ve not been enthusiastic about his contributions to the team.

Having both Hamm twins withdraw from the Olympics is a sad end to one of the great stories of the Beijing Games.

Good luck to both in future.

Many people only think about Olympic Gymnastics sports every 4yrs.

For once we are seeing articles like this:

… Olympic gymnastics provides the ultimate theater, displays intriguing rivalries, is purely amateur competition, and displays such consummate skill that it’s difficult to believe that some of these moves are humanly possible.

You want toughness boys? These girls participate in the most injury-plagued sport on the planet. It dwarfs things like wrestling and football when it comes to career-ending injuries, and is ahead of extreme sports like skate-boarding and motocross when it comes to fractures.

These girls are tough. And the margin of error is so small. Gymnastics is also one of the most grueling mental competitions, demanding nothing other than absolute focus. All this from mid-teen-year-old girls, on the world’s most intimidating stage.

You want athleticism? These girls can actually do the things that movie folks need wires, and mirrors, and special effects to produce. They can balance on a four inch beam, while twisting, and flipping, and tumbling. The can swing like spider man on a couple of flexible bars, and can land double twisting double flips on the floor. White girls CAN jump. …

Do you appreciate dedication? These girls have basically given up their childhoods to pursue the mastery of a sport that will never make them any money. Sure, maybe one athlete every couple of Olympics captures the imagination enough to get some good endorsements, but that fame is most often fleeting, and is quickly forgotten. Most of these athletes simply hope for a College scholarship, though unfortunately, their sport is not funded by the majority of NCAA schools.

We like these girls because they are more like us. They are not multi-millionaires talking about “feeding their families,” while pocketing tens of millions of dollars, and they aren’t unrepentant liars, claiming their innocence in the wake of lock-tight doping allegations. …

A Shout out to the Shorties. Gymnastics Is The Best Olympic Game. – Daniel Muth – Bleacher Report

Only every 4yrs is Women’s Artistic Gymnastics one of the highest profile sports in North America.

All coaches want to take advantage of the Olympic “boom”.

USA Gymnastics is doing something interesting. On Aug. 15th they will put an ad insert in USA Today that communicates the essence of gymnastics and makes it easy for parents to find a USA Gymnastics member club in their area.

The new website is up already:

screenshot from Begin Here, Go Anywhere

It seems to work well. Here’s a screenshot from a search in Idaho:

details – USA Gymnastics launches National Marketing Initiative for grassroots growth – USAG

(via Shergymrag)

How much of a membership “bump” will your club get from the Olympics?

… David Holcomb, owner of Buckeye Gymnastics in Westerville, Ohio, says … attendance at his gym shot up by double digits after U.S. gymnasts won medals in 1996 and 2004. In contrast, lackluster performance of the team in 2000 — the men and women’s team failed to win a single medal — didn’t move the needle at all for his gym that year. “The gymnastic community, those young girls and boys, weren’t excited,” he remembers. “So we saw nothing.” …

Gymnastics Campaign Vaults Over Stars – Wall Street Journal

Good news.

Canadian gymnast Brandon O’Neill was back training during official podium training. He injured his ankle Monday. And spent most of his waking hours since doing rehab / recovery to get ready for Saturday.

He has very high pain tolerance. Sounds like Brandon will be in the line-up for Team prelims.

Rumour is that France had two big injuries the week before they left for Beijing, one cruciate ligament and one broken thumb. That almost every Men’s Olympic team lost a key athlete leading up to the Olympics. (i.e. Paul Hamm)

With Brandon, Canada still has their original lineup.

2000 Olympian, Steve McCain is blogging LIVE from the Olympics:

…Today was the podium training for Men’s Gymnastics. Podium training is the first and only time the gymnasts get to touch the equipment before the competitions begin. The podium training also serves as a dry run for the event staff. Overall the U.S. Men look really solid on Rings, Vault, Parallel Bars, and High Bar. However, they showed real signs of weakness on Floor and Pommel Horse.

The biggest problem the U.S. men face is competing in the first round of 3 competitions. Historically, scores escalate after each round of competition. So, the same performance will score higher in the 3rd round of competition compared to the 2nd round. And, the 2nd round performance will score higher than the 1st round. There is nothing the U.S. men can do about it. It’s the luck of the draw.

NBC Olympics showed the Podium Training LIVE on their website. Here are my notes from the training if you did not catch the LIVE version.

read more including interviews with each of the guys on Gymnast.com

Steve is fairly upbeat in the post. But, to me, things do not sound good. Many of the other teams are doing FULL routines. Working fine details. Practicing sticking landings on the competition mats.

This team REALLY needed Paul.

I’ll be keeping my fingers crossed Saturday.

Katrina posted more details on the U.S. podium training
.

The favourite on Horizontal Bar will be one of the most exciting gymnasts to watch in Beijing. He’s yet another international star coached by a parent.

coach Wolfgang Hambuechen

more Hambuechen photos on the NBC Olympics site

Click through for details: The Perfect 10 blog:

the return of the aerial cartwheel on Beam

Mattie Larson

Cheng Fei

NCAA gymnastics

Russia’s recent resurgence.

Big and more diverse tumbling on the Woman’s side

Raj Bhavsar

Fabian Hambuechen

Beth Tweddle’s rocking bar set

Oksana Chusovitina & Jordan Jotchev

Ten Things I Like Right Now… – Perfect 10

Mattie Larson Online – fan site

Highlights of the Beijing Olympics will be streamed daily on YouTube to 77 territories where the digital rights have not been sold or acquired on a non-exclusive basis.

The package will include highlights, news, daily clips directed mostly for the people of Africa, Asia and the Middle East.

“For the first time in Olympic history we will have complete global online coverage, and the IOC will have its own broadcast channel and content production facilities,” said Timo Lumme, the IOC’s director of television and marketing services.

Countries outside of the 77 territories will be “geo-blocked”. The channel is www.youtube.com/beijing2008. …

Beijing Olympic Games blog

Excellent news. Congratulations to the IOC for extending coverage to parts of the world “blacked out” by the old media. Starts August 6th.

I only wish I could see those clips myself in North America.

A full list of the nations eligible is posted on the official press release. (My friends in Cambodia can get it!)

All those young, healthy people in one place. What do you expect?

Chinese condom manufacturer Elasun released cheeky and clever ads with an Olympic theme. They depict athletic stickmen with condoms in place of various sports apparatuses such as basketball nets, bicycle wheels, archery targets and gymnastic rings. A ribbed condom was even used to symbolise the water surface in swimming.

In the Sydney 2000 Games each athlete was given 51 condoms on arrival at the Olympic Village, but another 20,000 had to be shipped in when supplies began to run low.

Seems this ad campaign is going viral on the internet. Smart marketing.

(via the Beijing Olympic Fan blog)

I’ve made all the “easy” predictions for Beijing.

In the last few days, I’ll try to scramble to fill in as many blanks as possible.

Most will pick Diego Hypolito from Brazil to win Floor Exercise. He’s the defending World Champion. He’s very consistent. He’s young and, I think, healthy.

Personally I’ve never been a fan of Diego’s style.

Romania’s Marian Dragulescu is back out of retirement. He actually tied Shewfelt in Athens … but lost the Gold on Floor in the tie break.

However — being a Canadian — I think I’ll double my chances by calling for either Kyle Shewfelt to repeat as champion. Or his teammate Brandon O’Neill to take the Gold on Floor.

photo Sam Sanford Blades

If all the top guys HIT, I feel Brandon is the man to beat. But over the past 15yrs I’ve learned never to count out Shewfelt. If he can get into the Final, Kyle’s super tough under pressure.

Recall that Canada was the top team on Floor in prelims in Athens. I expect they will be in the top 3 on Floor in Beijing as a team.

UPDATE:

… O’Neill’s status for the BrandonOlympic gymnastics competition is up in the air after he injured an ankle in training earlier this week.

The Edmonton native was doing a tumbling pass at the National Indoor Stadium on Monday when he suffered the injury. “He landed quite short and when he hit the ground he felt something move in his ankle,” said Canadian coach Tony Smith said Tuesday. …

Canuck gymnast suffers ankle injury – CP

What a shame.

Kyle Shewfelt says the Canadian men were “hitting routines like they were going out of style”. And Canuck Elyse Hopfner-Hibbs is ‘good and ready’.

Dasha Joura says the Aussie girls “exude confidence and consistency”.

Podium training for the Chinese teams was called “normal” by the coaches. (no injury)

… OK, OK. This is the calm before the storm. LET THE GAMES BEGIN, already.

Here are the Sports Illustrated MEDAL PICKS:

GYMNASTICS

Men
Team
G: China
S: Japan
B: Russia
Also favored in 2004, China tumbled to fifth in Athens.

Individual all-around
G: Yang Wei, China
S: Fabian Hambüchen, Germany
B: Hiroyuki Tomita, Japan
Yang led all-around in ’04 before crashing from high bar.

Floor exercise
G: Diego Hypólito, Brazil
S: Zou Kai, China
B: Marian Dragulescu, Romania
Hypólito’s sister survived bus wreck, won worlds medal.

Pommel horse
G: Xiao Qin, China
S: Hiroyuki Tomita, Japan
B: Yang Wei, China
Yang proposed to fiancée at a fake press conference.

Rings
G: Chen Yibing, China
S: Jordan Jovtchev, Bulgaria
B: Yang Wei, China
Bad (early-group) U.S. draw may cost Kevin Tan a bronze.

Vault
G: Marian Dragulescu, Romania
S: Leszek Blanik, Poland
B: Daniel Popescu, Romania
Dragulescu was on Romanian Dancing with the Stars.

Parallel bars
G: Mitja Petkovsek, Slovenia
S: Li Xiaopeng, China
B: Kim Dae Eun, South Korea
Former world champ Li is finally healthy after foot ailments.

Horizontal bar
G: Fabian Hambüchen, Germany
S: Vlasios Maras, Greece
B: Justin Spring, U.S.
Hambüchen was Germany’s ’07 sportsman of the year.

Women
Team
G: China
S: U.S.
B: Romania
U.S. beat China by a point at worlds last year.

Individual all-around
G: Shawn Johnson, U.S.
S: Steliana Nistor, Romania
B: Yang Yilin, China
Rain flooded Johnson out of her Des Moines gym in June.

Vault
G: Cheng Fei, China
S: Hong Su Jong, North Korea
B: Alicia Sacramone, U.S.
Germany’s Oksana Chusovitina, 33, could win a medal.

Uneven bars
G: Nastia Liukin, U.S.
S: He Kexin, China
B: Ksenia Semenova, Russia
Liukin’s dad, Valeri, was first man to do a triple back on floor.

Balance beam
G: Li Shanshan, China
S: Steliana Nistor, Romania
B: Shawn Johnson, U.S.
Li’s routine is so good she fell at ’07 worlds and still won silver.

Floor exercise
G: Cheng Fei, China
S: Shawn Johnson, U.S.
B: Alicia Sacramone, U.S.
Brown junior Sacramone has won two world floor medals.

Rhythmic
Individual all-around
G: Anna Bessonova, Ukraine
S: Vera Sessina, Russia
B: Olga Kapranova, Russia
Anna’s dad was Ukrainian soccer player of year in 1989.

Group
G: Russia
S: Italy
B: Bulgaria
U.S. didn’t qualify anyone in rhythmic gymnastics.

Trampoline
Men
G: Ye Shuai, China
S: Dong Dong, China
B: Yasuhiro Ueyama, Japan
Ye is a former diver and artistic gymnast.

Women
G: Irina Karavaeva, Russia
S: Huang Shanshan, China
B: Karen Cockburn, Canada
Cockburn’s husband is Sydney medalist Mathieu Turgeon.

Brian Cazeneuve – SI