Gymnastic news #22 - Tokyo or bust

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I periodically follow International Gymnast for news and found this link which shows such a creative idea to come out of pandemic training. I would love to see competitive beam routines that incorporated a little more of this approach. Sanne Wevers in particular and the Dutch gymnasts in general are excellent examples, and I hope future revisions of the Code of Points will encourage choreography on beam (as well as floor, but perhaps that ship has sailed).
 
AxelAnnie said:
Who the heck knows? Maybe she didn't have a mirror?
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One would think a coach would give better advice so let's discuss why the advice might be skimpier is better. Even some figure skaters are getting a bit skimpy - especially the young girls, makes me question why. Male judges are influenced? Makes the skater look more "mature" ?
 
Go watch vids of Ohashi while at UCLA and see if her Leo looked that while she was moving around. I'm guessing some of those pics are edited. It is not uncommon for pervs to circulate edited photos that are close enough to reality yet skeevy.

That said, everyone's aware of the issue of ill-fitting leotards. I don't really think you want to spend your time searching for pictures of them on the Internet.
 
Can somebody explain how many women Team USA are able to send to Tokyo. I think we send a 4 member team and one specialist, but I am seeing confusing information.
 
Jayar said:
Can somebody explain how many women Team USA are able to send to Tokyo. I think we send a 4 member team and one specialist, but I am seeing confusing information.
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It’s very confusing and I direct you to The Balance Beam situation for a complete rundown. It’s a mess particularly with event cancellations due to COVID.

In short, 4 members for a US Team (selected after Olympic qualifications) another gymnast has already qualified as a named individual specialist - but maybe wants to be on the team instead (to get another medal with the team) and probably one more will qualify as a named continental qualifier. I think.
 
Looking at the trials pictures, as to be expected Becky and Ellie didn't compete but neither did Claudia Fragapane, who must have pulled out of the process.
A complicated selection must just have been made much harder. I imagine the Downie sisters will be offered the opportunity of a deferred trial if they want one. I have to say based on the published scores to date I don't know what I'd do as a selector. The gymnasts who've been performing best at trials are not the ones with medal potential so they're going to face criticism whatever decision is made. The only certainty at this point appears to be Jessica Gadirova - she posted a very upbeat instagram message and dominated the first trials so I imagine she did well again. She's the only gymnast who is both a potential medallist and did well at trials, making her an almost lock.
 
@Jayar

I second @skatfan Balance Beam Situation is the best.

The US has qualified a 4 person team, plus an individual spot (gymnast #5) that can be awarded to any US gymnast. This was was a spot that should have been determined by the results of the World Cup AA series which was cancelled. There were 3 spots up for grabs there that, after the cancellation, went to USA, RUS and CHN.

Jade Carey, of the US, earned what is currently the Americans' 6th spot, but it is for her alone. If she elects not to use it because she wants to try to be on the team and earn a team medal, no other American can use this spot.

At this time, no one knows when Jade has to confirm that she is taking that 6th spot. Will it be before US Gymnastics Trials or after?

Gymnast #5 and Jade Carey, should she elect to use the 6th spot, can both compete all four events in prelims at the Games, but can't compete in team finals.

However, if a gymnast on the four person team gets injured between athletes arriving in Tokyo and the start of the preliminary round, either Gymnast #5 or Jade Carey, if she is using the 6th spot, can serve as alternates and replace the injured team member.
 
This whole thing is so needlessly complicated and ridiculous. Two spots up for grabs, but one is only for the federation and one is for the gymnast herself and if she doesn't use it, then the federation can't reassign the second spot to another gymnast. They are not on the team, and will not be considered as a member of the team, but if someone on the actual team gets injured, then either one of the individual competitors can be placed on the team before preliminaries begin and are now a member of the team.
 
VGThuy said:
This whole thing is so needlessly complicated and ridiculous. Two spots up for grabs, but one is only for the federation and one is for the gymnast herself and if she doesn't use it, then the federation can't reassign the second spot to another gymnast. They are not on the team, and will not be considered as a member of the team, but if someone on the actual team gets injured, then either one of the individual competitors can be placed on the team before preliminaries begin and are now a member of the team.
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Again it doesn't make sense from the perspective of the big teams who think they should have 6 gymnasts anyway, but a lot of thought went into it to avoid all the pitfalls of other systems and allow specialists to qualify even if they compete for top nations with a lot of depth AA-wise... and avoid specialist gymnasts from mid-level nations getting pushed out just because a big-gymnastics nation gymnast got injured and her spot was reassigned to a compatriot rather than the second-best specialist on that event. If the second gymnast in the specialist ranking was also American, she'd be in line to get Jade's spot if she pulls out.
I do think that for all the criticism, if the lurgy hadn't come into play we'd be having a very good line-up at the games.
 
One thing I don't get is why Worlds has a totally different format than the Olympics when it comes to the team competition. It happened last cycle too when the 2015 Worlds had 6 member teams but Rio had 5-member teams, which was a continuation of what happened in London where the 2011 Worlds in Tokyo had 6-member teams but London had 5-member teams, and Worlds continued to have 6-member teams until AFTER Rio.

For all the talk about how this new system helps specialists, specialists were very important to the team make up in the 6-3-3 and the 5-3-3 format. Now you have specialists who have helped qualify teams to the Olympics who will now be left out for the Olympics because they don't serve as much of a purpose with the smaller team format that focuses much more on AA now. So they have to jump through these new hoops to qualify extra spots for the Olympics. Reading all the pratfalls of this system throughout the years, there seems to be a lot of negatives to this system and complications despite having a positive goal in helping specialists qualify for the Olympics through multiple avenues and with some avenues being apart from a federation's selection criteria.

The truth is, with all the positives, the FIG is forever and always majorly tweaking and changing this sport to the point where it always feels like it's almost different sport every four years. Their new rules every post-Olympic period always create some sort of havoc and they tweak it some more for the next four years that has its own issues, and the repeat it over and over. From the scoring system, to qualification rules, to competition formats, etc. I've never seen a sport that has to change so much every Olympics as I've seen in gymnastics. People in figure skating actually have it pretty easy as even the most major changes to IJS pale in comparison to the reboots in gymnastics. It gives a sense that people in charge of the sport really don't know what they're doing or what they want this sport to be.

The funniest thing is a lot of what we see and the field that we see competing at the Olympics would be there despite what qualification system is used just because of the way the world gymnastics fields looks now and the way things naturally moved towards specialists with how difficult it has become to be a true AAer with the COP and heightened difficulty on all four events. So some procedures being more complicated and difficult may not have shown themselves to be necessary.
 
The current selection process makes more sense for Men's Artistic Gymnastics (MAG) than it does for Women's Artistic Gymnastics (WAG), as MAG has more competitive specialists from outside the top 3-5 teams than WAG does.

So in that sense, this was a good idea.

But in order to pull it off, they had to shrink the size of the teams down to 4. Honestly, I wonder if they considered allowing the #5 and #6 gymnasts to be eligible for team finals. Countries would still have to select 4, but they could, for example, go with the hot hands as it were and drop 1-2 gymnasts who were brought to the Games for the team event. If they had allowed this, it would have eliminated the stupid Jade Carey dilemma (team spot or individual spot) and made prelims even more interesting.

It all goes back to how many spots Artistic Gymnastics has at the Games. This sport needs more...in theory.

But putting aside that issue, the qualification process is unsatisfying because it takes place over such a long period of time and entry to the qualifying events is determined by the Federations, not the athletes.

I think part of the problem is that Gymnastics doesn't have a clear cut season. To the extent that it does, the Olympics is ~3-4 months earlier than Worlds. So whatever season the sport does have, it's cut very short in the Olympic year.
 
Based on the scores posted from team gb trials (5 total competitions for women), I'd go with these teams:

women- Jessica Gadirova. Kinsella, Fenton, Morgan.
Alt: 1Becky, 2Ondine, 3jennifer gadirova

Men- James Hall, Joe Fraser, Giarnni, Whitlock, I guess
Alt: Nathan, Jarman, Tulloch, unsure of the order Id do here
 

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And in a more normal version of gymnastics, Memmel earns a Cadbury candy bar.

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I assumed the 4-person team with extra non-team AA slot was designed to give more countries with less depth a shot at a medal and to give countries that did not qualify a team an extra chance to qualify an athlete to the games while also giving the gymnastics powers the chance to get that 5th spot back. Then all this crap happens, events canceled, and who gets an extra spot each? - USA, Russia, China. Big surprise. Glad they are going back to 5, but I wish they'd go back to 6.
 
Certainly this 4 + specialists system disadvantages any specialists from countries vying for medals. Think about athletes like McKayla Maroney or Madison Kocian. They are team gold medalists because specialists had the chance to contribute to their team. With the 4 member team format, both would likely only have earned their individual silvers. Same thing with Maria Paseka and her team medal for Russia in 2016. A one or two event gymnast is a liability on a four member team.

You might also say that it makes more room for specialists from other countries, but it doesn't seem like that is what is happening. I'm not sure who it really gives the advantage too.
 
No emoji covers my reaction to that.

From the published scores, Ellie appears to have been a long shot so perhaps that impacted her decisions. I feel so bad for the family and I hope both sisters get whatever support they need.
 
danafan said:
The WAG olympic selection process for GBR has been extended to allow Becky Downie an additional opportunity to participate. Ellie will not be participating. "Ellie is taking some time away from the sport to be with her family and would appreciate if everyone could respect her privacy during this time" says the article.

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That is sad but not unexpected. Ellie has been open about training struggles this year, and now this tragedy will have been one hurdle too many.
@Coco in terms of being a long shot, the GB selection process only partially relies on the trials. One of the top selection criteria is having the SVs to potentially medal - something that Ellie had over the gymnasts doing well at trials. Previous good results at internationals are also taken into account.
That's why Becky * might * still be on the team even if she bombs trials. With Ellie out, she's the most realistic medal chance.

But Ellie's absence changes the cards for the selectors quite a lot in terms of the balance of strengths needed by apparatus and paradoxically might lower Becky's chances.
I guess Jessica and Jennifer are locks now. Neither Amelie, Alice or GMF are strong floor workers but I guess GMF could start to make sense on the team as she has a great DTY now and the highest combined SVs on the other pieces I think.

There are so many criteria, it's just hard to know what the selection committee will do. They could go "safe" and judge by trials, in which case the likely team would be Jessica, Alice, Jennifer and GMF or Amelie. Or on the other end of the spectrum they could think Becky is the only gymnast with a medal-worthy SV on any piece and build the team around her.
 
I’m hearing that Peacock (free) will have the first session coverage of US Classic. So it’s stream at 1:00 and broadcast on NBCSN at 7:00.

Unfortunately, both junior sessions on Friday are on Flo. I’m not giving USAG or Flo a penny of my money, no matter how interested I might be in the content.
 
Aceon6 said:
I’m hearing that Peacock (free) will have the first session coverage of US Classic. So it’s stream at 1:00 and broadcast on NBCSN at 7:00.

Unfortunately, both junior sessions on Friday are on Flo. I’m not giving USAG or Flo a penny of my money, no matter how interested I might be in the content.
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Is the Peacock showing and the NBCSn the same thing?
 
muffinbiscuit said:
Is the Peacock showing and the NBCSn the same thing?
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No. Peacock has Session 1 and NBCSN has session 2. Since it’s random draw, there will be lots of talent in Session 1. I highly doubt that Simone’s name will be drawn for Session 1, though.
 
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I'm sure someone already posted, but do we have the dates and times of the Classic? I definitely don't want to miss it.
 
www.usagymclassic.com

Ticket & Event Info | U.S. Classic

Ticket and event information for the U.S. Classic.
www.usagymclassic.com www.usagymclassic.com

SCHEDULE: (all times ET) (subject to change)
May 21, 2021 – GK Hopes Championships – 1:40 PM
May 21, 2021 – GK U.S. Classic (Junior Competition) – 6:40 PM
May 22, 2021 – GK U.S. Classic (Senior Competition- Session 1) – 1:00 PM
May 22, 2021 – GK U.S. Classic (Senior Competition- Session 2) – 6:50 PM

TV & Webcast Info
Senior session 1 will stream on the free part of NBC’s Peacock on May 22 starting at 1 p.m. ET
NBCSN will broadcast the senior session 2 on Saturday, May 22 at 7:00 p.m. ET, with a livestream on NBCSports.com.
All senior routines will be available on the USA Gymnastics YouTube Channel following the sessions.
The GK Hopes Championships and junior session of the GK U.S. Classic will be livestreamed on FloGymnastics.com
GK Hopes Championships – May 21 – 1:40 p.m. ET
GK U.S. Classic (Juniors) – May 21 – 6:40 p.m. ET
 
Thanks @Sylvia for posting the schedule. I took a quick look at NBCSports.com and they have a brief article up about Chelsie. Here is the link in case anyone is interested. https://olympics.nbcsports.com/2021/05/14/chellsie-memmel-gymnastics-comeback-classic/ Not sure any of this is really news, but I was previously unaware that she plans to compete two events at the Classic (BB and Vault) in hopes of just qualifying to Nationals.

I love seeing "older" women staying active in the sport. So much of the verbal and sexual abuse happens (starts) with the very young in the sport. I have to think there are many benefits and advantages to the health of the sport to have more mature women staying in the sport longer. Or maybe that's just wishful thinking on my part.....
 
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