Gymnastics News #21 - Tumbling on to Tokyo

[HeatherC]

Oh man, Sam was SO GOOD on PB and I think if he'd been later in the lineup, I bet he would have gotten a medal. He got screwed by the start order IMO. Great to see him do so well even though he ended up in that dreaded fourth place spot on this event. (SO glad he got that medal on the HB! )

 

[HeatherC]

Dalaloyan is a great gymnast but I actually think Sam was slightly better than him on PB today. Now I'm even more bummed out that he didn't get that medal because I think he really earned it there.

 

[Aaron MB Fan]

I didn't bother watching the Beam EF (and I can't find Liu Tingting and Ana Padurariu's performances) on YouTube because from all accounts it was a messy event overall. I wish Kara Eaker could have performed the way she did in TQ and TF, I don't care what medal she would have won, if any. That beam work is gorgeous even if the construction leaves her open for mistakes and E score deductions.

Not sure if this link is geo-blocked, but Gymnastics Canada shared a link to Padurariu’s BB on CBC. Hopefully that works:

https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/1360991811659/

 

[dramagrrl]

I know this may be an unpopular opinion, but for as much money that Simone probably has, it really is unacceptable that her floor music is that God-awful.

Agree on this, I wish she’d come up with something completely different and not the same dance moves and poses recycled to music of the same type each year.

I also completely agree. I think her FX choreo and music are both pretty bad and the whole routine would be godawful if anyone else was doing it.

 

[Aceon6]

In Simone’s defense, keeping the floor routine might have been a compromise. She’s only been back 12 months and has spent most of that time on the other events. She and her coach might have said “that’ll do for this year” and focused on bars and improving her start values overall.

 

[Erin]

In Simone’s defense, keeping the floor routine might have been a compromise. She’s only been back 12 months and has spent most of that time on the other events. She and her coach might have said “that’ll do for this year” and focused on bars and improving her start values overall.

She didn’t keep an old floor routine. It’s a new routine and they picked Middle Eastern music specifically for Doha. It does say a lot that you can’t tell it apart from her other routines though.

 

[Aceon6]

She didn’t keep an old floor routine. It’s a new routine and they picked Middle Eastern music specifically for Doha. It does say a lot that you can’t tell it apart from her other routines though.

New music maybe, but old choreo

 

[Erin]

New music maybe, but old choreo

Oh I think Dominic Zito still got paid for a new routine even if the choreography looks very similar to the old routine.

 

[ilovepaydays]

No one in the seats but remember, this is Doha. Can they even look at woman in leotards??

I thought there were strict dress codes for women in the mid east which is why I found this location so odd for this event. Does anyone even do gymnastics in Qatar?

That's what I thought. Wasn't there a smaller gym competition years ago in Iran and armed guards had to force women out of the arena who wanted to watch? I mean Qatar isn't Iran but it ain't exactly the most progressive place for women either.

I was really sad about the attendance in the seats at this Worlds. It makes me really nervous about what the crowds will be like when Track & Field has their worlds in Doha next year.

I haven’t been to Doha, but I’ve been to Bahrain and to Abu Dhabi, UAE. They were progressive places for the Middle East, but there’s a large ex-pat population there. I’ve thought Doha was the same - so I was surprised there weren’t tons of people from the British, American, French, etc. communities and schools attending this competition.

 

[Erin]

It’s especially sad when you consider that apparently tickets for Stuttgart are starting to sell out (which sucks for me, I was considering going but won’t know for about six months if it can happen). Anyway, when there are places that can sell out an arena and sell it out this far in advance, it’s sad to see Doha so empty.

 

[Braulio]

New music maybe, but old choreo

The 'Oh' hand to the mouth thing is old, though the blowing kisses in the end is new

 

[Jimena]

Simone's not a natural performer. And she's not graceful nor musical. In the Nastia/Shawn video of them watching men do women's gymnastics, there's one gymnast doing Simone's choreography. And he's way better than Simone at it.

This is not meant to bash Simone at all. She's an unbelievable gymnast.

 

[Vash01]

In Simone’s defense, keeping the floor routine might have been a compromise. She’s only been back 12 months and has spent most of that time on the other events. She and her coach might have said “that’ll do for this year” and focused on bars and improving her start values overall.

The commentator said she was in the ER with kidney stones just before this competition. It is amazing that she was able to get through the routines, although with some mistakes.

 

[bardtoob]

Simone's not a natural performer. And she's not graceful nor musical. In the Nastia/Shawn video of them watching men do women's gymnastics, there's one gymnast doing Simone's choreography. And he's way better than Simone at it.

This is not meant to bash Simone at all. She's an unbelievable gymnast.

In agreement, I say Simone is a power gymnast, and she presents herself that way.

 

[VGThuy]

Wasn’t the man who was recreating Simone’s choreography not nearly recreating her difficulty and all of the elements AND wasn’t it edited so he wasn’t performing it continuously? He may be a better dancer than her and Simone isn’t the most natural at that but doing her difficulty would make even the best dancers be less so.

 

[Rob]

She didn’t keep an old floor routine. It’s a new routine and they picked Middle Eastern music specifically for Doha. It does say a lot that you can’t tell it apart from her other routines though.

Right, they changed the music from Brazilian to Middle Eastern but the moves are all recycled.

 

[AYS]

Simone was quite good on Dancing with the Stars, although not at the level of Shawn Johnson or Laurie Hernandez. She could probably do more with her choreography if she wanted to. It's pretty clear she was focused on getting back to competition shape, increasing her difficulty, and improving on uneven bars since coming back. It's not like she came back and remained stagnant as a gymnast vs 2016, which she could have done and still won.

 

[bardtoob]

The bars improvement was a good investment. It saved her World AA title.

 

[FiveRinger]

New music maybe, but old choreo

It looks like the same choreography to different music....lol....hence, the problem!

 

[Rob]

Simone was quite good on Dancing with the Stars, although not at the level of Shawn Johnson or Laurie Hernandez. She could probably do more with her choreography if she wanted to. It's pretty clear she was focused on getting back to competition shape, increasing her difficulty, and improving on uneven bars since coming back. It's not like she came back and remained stagnant as a gymnast vs 2016, which she could have done and still won.

Aly didn't really take advantage of her DWTS experience either in her comeback. I think Simone should get Sasha Farber to choreograph for her next year.

 

[VGThuy]

Aly didn't really take advantage of her DWTS experience either in her comeback. I think Simone should get Sasha Farber to choreograph for her next year.

I think it's because of this damn code. Like unless you're only two two level 9-10 tumbling lines like the Dutch are doing, then it's hard to incorporate dance if your difficulty is coming from multiple F-I level tumbling runs and doing C-level and above dance/leap skills.

 

[Rob]

Reading some post worlds stuff, I noticed that Laurie Hernandez has started training with Jenny Zhang.
And that Jenny Zhang got a medal in 2014 when she was the head team coach so it wasn't a new thing in Doha.
https://usagym.org/pages/post.html?PostID=15063

 

[judiz]

https://www.azcentral.com/story/spo...dour-cleared-u-s-center-safesport/1283769002/

 

[ilovepaydays]

The first Olympic apparatus qualifier - Cottbus - will be airing on the Olympic Channel today and Wednesday night.

Andrade (Brazil) was apparently incredible. Jade Carey was 2nd in vault and 5th on floor.

Trevor Howard and Marvin Kimble didn’t make any finals. I’m not sure how generous USAGym will be with sending men to these.

 

[Rob]

If Carey gets an Olympic spot for vault/floor, but then we pick her for the team, did we just forfeit a spot? Trying to understand these complicated rules.

 

[rhapsody]

If Carey gets an Olympic spot for vault/floor, but then we pick her for the team, did we just forfeit a spot? Trying to understand these complicated rules.

Most likely. The nominative spot that Jade earned would automatically go to the following athlete in the Challenge Cup standings. It might be an American, it might not which is why I said 'most likely'. And it's also why I think going after nominative spots for the US is silly--getting the non-nominative spots through the AA World Cups and continental championships makes more sense because they aren't named spots--they can be chosen closer to the Games. Imagine if Jade gets a nominative Olympic spot and then gets injured... we can't sub anyone in so we would essentially lose that spot.

 

[Rob]

Most likely. The nominative spot that Jade earned would automatically go to the following athlete in the Challenge Cup standings. It might be an American, it might not which is why I said 'most likely'.

I read somewhere that Tom Forster was only going to allow one of the two specialist spots to be a nominative spot. So that could mean that he isn't letting anyone else go to the Challenge Cups? Suppose Mykayla Skinner wanted to come back for this -- he would tell her he isn't sending her to Challenge Cups because then both Mykayla and Jade could qualify nominative spots? But if Jade gets injured, then there is no US athlete who could qualify to be next in line through Challenge Cups? It is all so weird. Please just go back to 5-6 person teams.

 

[Aceon6]

Agree. There has to be an easier way. If I had my way, the Top 6 teams at the prior Worlds would automatically get in and not have to deal with the nominative process. Same for anyone placing in the Top 6 in AA or event finals. The Challengers should really be for the countries that don't qualify via Worlds or can't field a full team.

 

[VGThuy]

Why do they even bother having team competitions these days? I mean four member teams? I know the lack of depth is bad all around but this is ridiculous.

 

[ilovepaydays]

Why do they even bother having team competitions these days? I mean four member teams? I know the lack of depth is bad all around but this is ridiculous.

I think the idea was to make sure that the team winners were from teams that had the best all-around gymnasts. This is especially going to be true on the men’s side.