Utah 198.0 on Pride / Olympian Night

Season high.

The Utes celebrated both equal opportunity for all AND Olympians.

Opinion polling has shown an increase in support for LGBT rights in the state. A 2017 Public Religion Research Institute poll showed that 44% of Utah residents supported same-sex marriage, a significant increase from the early 2000s. …

Ski Jumping Judging Bias

Ski jumping competitions involve subjective evaluations by judges from different countries.

This may lead to nationalistic bias, according to which judges assign higher scores to their compatriots.

To test this claim empirically, we exploit within-performance variation of scores from all World Cup, World Championship, and Olympic Games competitions between the 2010/11 and 2016/17 seasons. (15,000 jumps)

Our findings confirm that judges assign significantly higher scores to their compatriots. The magnitude of this nationalistic bias is significantly higher in more corrupt countries.

We do not find that judges assign significantly different scores to jumpers whose compatriots are present on the judging panel. …

March 2021 – Scandinavian Journal of Economics – Nationalistic Bias among International Experts: Evidence from Professional Ski Jumping

Most biased were the Russian judges. Judges from Finland and Norway showed no bias.

Sari Thaler – Floor

The senior finally gets to show off her beautiful Floor routine.

Click PLAY or watch it on Twitter.

Canada’s Cory Paterson retired

Super competitor and dependable teammate for so many years on Team Canada and Iowa in the NCAA.

Quebec put together a career retrospective video. Cory will stay involved in the sport in leadership roles.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

Suni DID compete 1/2-on, Fwd Layout

As a competitive Vault, that’s crazy. SO difficult to land consistently.

I’d argue it’s even tougher than the Handspring Fwd Layouts we’ve seen a few times in NCAA.

When I saw it in training online I ASSuMEd she was using it as a “timer” — and would add twists later.

Click PLAY or watch it on Twitter. Spencer would have given  9.8 though she was scored 9.925.

50 Most Artistic Gymnasts

The edition of Inside Gymnastics I most look forward to each year.

NCAA Divison III teams scored lower

As we’ve always known, NCAA judges apply the rules more accurately when at Div III competitions. It’s one of the worst aspects of the silly College judging scheme.

Spencer crunched the numbers on the recent GymCastic podcast:

  • Using data from every meet for the DIII WIAC teams (the 8 teams in Wisconsin/Minnesota) for the last 10 years—679 team scores—the average score when they compete away at a DI or DII school is 186.104. 
  • Compared to when they compete at home or at other DIII schools or neutral venues, when the average score is 183.776. 
  • That’s a difference of 2.328 in the team score—or greater than four falls—maintained across an entire decade of meets for an entire division of teams.
  • Far from being an urban myth, DIII teams scoring far higher at DI and DII schools is a long-standing and verifiable reality.

Men’s NCAA week 7 Power Rankings

  1. STANFORD (-)
  2. OKLAHOMA (+1)
  3. MICHIGAN (-1)
  4. NEBRASKA (-)
  5. ILLINOIS (-)
  6. OHIO STATE (+1)

After winning arguably the biggest upset of the season against B1G rival Michigan, the Buckeyes jumped a spot in the rankings to number six.

With the help of their all-arounders including Jesse Tyndall and Justin Ah Chow, Ohio State was finally able to break the 400 mark with their 403.60. …

College Gymnastics Association