Rewriting Russian Gymnastics

Aliya Mustafina highlights the support of relatives and fans as 'worth its weight in gold' in this brief end of year note in Sovietski Sport today. 'Without this support, winning the gold would have been much more difficult', she says. Let's look forward to a golden year in 2011 for Aliya and the girls.

The Russian Federation's magazine 'Gymnastika', issue number 3, dating back to May 2010, is available here . As I mentioned earlier, the Federation have updated their website quite extensively, and have now ironed out some of the earlier teething problems. I don't think I have seen this before, and I really wish there were an English language version available, as it is fascinating! The magazine is richly illustrated with full colour photographs and includes features on Olga Mostepanova, Ekaterina Lobazniuk, Elena Mukhina, coach Marina Ulyankina, and the legacy of coach Yuri Shtukman. There is a piece on this spring's 'Olympic Hopefuls' competition in Penza, and an extensive interview with Valentina Rodienenko. There is also a full colour pull out centrefold of Anton Golutsotskov, holding a snooker cue.

The Russian Federation's website carries a notice of this girl's competition which opened today. Results will be updated after the winter break.

The All Around news site carries some more context and background to the re-election of Andrei Kostin. Kostin is the man Andrei Rodienenko credits as of critical importance to the resurgence of Russian gymnastics (see a brief media directory ). I hadn't taken on board that he is also very senior at the VTB Bank, thus cementing the crucial sponsorship arrangement between the Bank and the Federation. Let's hope this means continuing support for all the success the gymnasts are experiencing currently. A link to pictures of the Conference can be found at the Russian Federation's website .

There is an interview with Svetlana Khorkina here . The article includes some lovely pictures of Khorkina in her current life as a Russian State Deputy, including one shot with Alina Kabaeva. If I understand the translation correctly, Khorkina's political responsibilities include a specialist interest in the Committee of Youth. She comments with pride on the achievements of the Russian team this year and identifies closely with Mustafina. She echoes Rodienenko's concerns for the future of Russian gymnastics, however, highlighting the shortage of coaches, and the corresponding poor rate of pay. Today's gymnastics is 'all bent legs', and lacks complexity. She suggests that Code changes after 2012 should be brought about, to encourage greater complexity in exercises, as well as better quality of performance. On a broader front, she suggests that the Russians need specialist legal sports representation to confront problems of unfairness she perceives, such ...

The success of the Soviet Union women was not founded on reliability. Most of their World and European Champions suffered errors en route to their notable victories. Yurchenko was notorious for her unpredictability pre-1982; Shushunova fell twice on bars in qualifications during the 1985 World Championships; Davydova’s gold at the Moscow Olympics was a surprise, given her error rate at previous competitions. Often, it was the most beautiful Soviets who were the least competitive: Ilienko and Shaposhnikova were stunningly erratic. Behind them stood a whole army of astonishing but competitively inept aspiring World Champions, many of them well known but who never made World Champion teams: Groshkova, Priakhina, Shkoda, Mysnik. The entire history of Soviet gymnastics is littered with brilliant, but unpredictable startlets. Their teams were no less likely to win because of it. We were no less in their awe because of it. A certain degree of unreliability – risk - was expected if...

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Galina at the Russian Federation's message board has now posted results of yesterday's event finals, kindly in English.  Aliya Mustafina gained two golds in the finals she competed, vault and floor.  Nabieva took bars, and Anna Pavlova took beam. In the junior competition Anastasia Sidorova won first in vault, beam and floor, leaving bars to Ukrainian Alina Vasilievna.  Sidorova did not qualify to bars final following a major break during a transition from high to low bar, but this was an otherwise dominant performance by this emerging young gymnast. Top three finishers are provided below.  All gymnasts were competing for Russia, unless otherwise stated. Senior competition Vault 1 Nabieva T         14.8 2 Chusovitina O    14.375 3 Pavlova A           14.25 A Bars 1         Mustafina A         ...

Einselka at the all around forum provides this link to details of the all around and team results at the Voronin Cup. In the meantime, the Russian Federation has found time to revamp its website which is now far more colourful than before.  I am particularly excited to see a page of pictures of a recent conference at which the Federation President, Andrei Kostin was re-elected.  Everyone looks very worried in these pictures, and I am tempted to invite a caption competition for pictures number 4 and 8. Have they cut Rodienenko's head off?  There are second and third pages of these pictures, including some which are temptingly labelled with officials' names.  However, for some reason the site refuses to play with my computer tonight and I have been unable to refer to them a second time to enable any form of comment.  I blame the weather, but then surely Russian websites should be able to cope with a little snow? It is clear that Russian sports are very male-...

There is a long and interesting interview with the Rodienenkos in Sovietski Sport today.  The Google translation is rather difficult to make complete sense of but the interview addresses the prospects for the Russian team at the 2012 Olympics (they are targetting six medals: two golds, two silvers, two bronzes); discusses the reasons for the Russian team's improved performance and the different rates of recovery between the men's and women's teams; and relations with Leonid Arkayev, who apparently is much more relaxed and happy now.  When discussing the performance of Aliya Mustafina, Rodienenko emphasises that her immediate future revolves around training and competing, not celebrity performances and modelling! They were keen to emphasise that they returned to Russia as they were, fundamentally, homesick.  Alexandrov's family has remained in the United States and he now has an American passport.  The coaches do not work in Russia for the money, but because they ...

Albert of the All Around Forum reports that Viktoria Komova has been named Voronezh region athlete of the year.  A local news site gives the details, and explains that thanks to Vika's achievements the Government has agreed to build a new school gym in the region. The page also shows links to other news stories and interviews with Vika. Congratulations Viktoria!  Well deserved!

The All Around Gymnastics News site reports the final results of the second day of competition in Japan. Beam : 1 Mitchell, 15.2   2  Mustafina 15.15   3 Sui Lu 14.975  Dementieva came 7th with 12.775 following two falls and two large balance checks.   Such a pity - competing to full potential, Dementieva should have been able to beat this field on beam. Floor: Equal first = Sui Lu and Aliya Mustafina, 14.625  3 - Jiang Yuyuan, 14.175.  Dementieva came 5th with 14 points.  Albert reports that she had problems landing her final triple twist. This was a fairly good competition for the Russians that underlines their growing strength in depth.  Thanks to Mustafina's efforts, they took half the gold on offer, in addition to two silvers and a bronze medal.  All three Russian girls medalled, and Russians collected medals on every piece of apparatus.  Out of 12 possible medals, they took five. The Chinese didn't do ba...

A running commentary on the Toyota Cup can be found at the Japan Gymnastics official blog .  A whole new experience for me, reading Google translates of Japanese gymnastics reports! Edited 12 December - The All Around Gymnastics news site as ever has an excelent comprehensive report on this competition, men and women.  So far, the women's competition has resulted in three medals for the Russian ladies present, with beam and floor to come tomorrow. Vault - 1 Mustafina, 14.287; 2 Rie Tanaka, 14.05, 3 Ekaterina Kurbatova, 14.037 Bars - 1  Jiang Yuyuan 15.475 2 Anna Dementieva 14.375 3 Minobe Yu, 14.325 Mustafina competed bars but took 2 falls - hope she is OK. Men's results can also be found at the above link

The Russian Gymnastics Federation reports that the 18th Voronin Cup competition, run by Dynamo Moscow, will take place on the 17th and 18th December, including gymnasts from around 20 countries.  This is a competition for men and women.  It is expected that Viktoria Komova will compete.  Watch this space for updates as they become available.

The Gymnastics Examiner provides some context and background to this interesting competition. Full results have been provided by International Gymnastics magazine. Vintage Tanya video here of Nabieva's competition at the Tournoi in 2007.

The Siberian Open Cup has been taking place in Leninsk-Kuznetzk.  In its 10th year, previous winners have included Anna Pavlova, Evgeny Podgorny and Maxim Devyatovski.  Competitors from Russia, Mongolia and Kazakstan this year participated. Anastasia Ovipova from Novosibirsk took first place in the girls' competition (Candidate Master of Sport level), ahead of home gymnast Ekaterina Ilyankova, who won the competition last year.  The senior competition (Master of Sport level) was won by Valeria Sviridova.   Full results of this competition can be found here .  Sviridova also won bars in the individual apparatus finals, which were otherwise dominated by Irina Andreeva who had come third in the all around final. The men's competition was headed by Igor Pakhomenko, followed closely by fellow Leninsk-Kuznetsk native Nikita Ignatiev.  In third position was Andrei Cherkasov.  The men's field also included Youth Olympic Daniil Kazachkov, so there was ...

I felt I had to start a new post to offer reverence to this wonderful gymnast whose website I found by chance when trying to identify a gymnast in an old Soviet newsreel.  Viewing the website has been a little like dusting off an old book you read years ago and loved, but had almost forgotten existed.  It is a fan site and the design is unsophisticated, but there are photographs and a short biography, including a press cutting of Tamara's obituary from a publication entitled Physikulturnik Belarusy (24 November 1992).  A daughter of Tamara has also provided a picture for the site. There are even videos of Tamara's floor and beam routines.  When you watch them you really get a feeling for the time that has elapsed since she was competing.  The videos, in black and white, don't have sound on my computer and are even a little blurred round the edges, like old family photographs. A further link for those interested in this era is here .  To think that th...

Tanya Nabieva won two more golds today at the international tournament in Arques, taking the top step of the podium in both the asymmetric bars and floor finals.  She also won bronze in the beam final, behind China's Zhang Zelinzi and Zhang Qing.

Tanya also led the Russian team to victory in this competition which featured gymnasts from 13 countries.  There was a live stream yesterday which was rather difficult to follow as no scores were given out and full routines were not always covered - the apparatus finals will also be free to view this afternoon from 2.30 pm Central European Time (ie in Britain this means 1.30pm).  Tanya was accompanied by her personal coach, Alexander Kiryashov of St Petersburg. I do not have the full statistics to hand as yet, but WenShuli at the All Around Forum confirms the rankings, via the French gymnastics board : Team competition : 1. Russia (Nabieva /Cheong) 2. Belgium 3. Great Britain 4. Switzerland 5. Russia Juniors : 1. Terri Grand'ry BEL 2. Chiara Gandolfi ITA 3. Johanna Dejardin BEL 4. GBR (I think this was Billy McKenzie) 5. GBR Seniors: 1. Tatiana Nabieva RUS 2. Zhang Yelinzi CHN 3. Ekaterina Krilova RUS 4. Olga Zemskova RUS 5. AUT

Find results of this competition on the International Gymnast website. Promise I will be back soon with some commentary!

Today's Sovietski Sport has an interview with former Russian and twice European champion, 32 year old Alexei Bondarenko. Bondarenko visited the recent World Championships and reports here that he is working on his gymnastics again, despite an injured hand.  He speaks of his devastation at his two disastrous falls on vault in Athens, and of the increased level of difficulty performed today by such champions as Japan's Uchimura.  He also comments on the motivations of the current generation of Russian male gymnasts (he seems to think they are more concerned with winning money than medals), and the lack of financial support he received following his injury which saw him spending four weeks under the care of a Moscow specialist hospital. He shares his Moscow lodgings with a cat, Bond, which makes him a good person as far as I am concerned ;-) Good luck Alexei!

A great discussion going on at the Gymnastics Coaching blog on artistry raises some important questions, especially since Nelli Kim mentioned there may be a future need for harmonisation between the men's and women's Codes.  I have a few thoughts to elaborate on this subject, but office politics (groan) and student assessment must take first place at present. In the meantime, I'll provide you with a link to this excellent discussion.

Russian Sports Classifications explained/Russian bonus system, I guess?! It has always intrigued me - the system of nominating the different levels of competitors in Russian sports, that is.  Thanks to the wonders of Google translate, and the world wide web, we now have that information available from an official source, the Russian Gymnastics Federation website, where this link reveals almost all, for those of us intrigued enough to want to navigate the language You will also find here ' Additions and Changes to the Mandatory Programme ' which I am guessing - please correct me if I am wrong - is the special bonus system of marking operated at some of the competitions. Enjoy!

Charlotte at the All Around Forum reports that Anastasia Grishina and Anastasia Sidorova are planning to compete at the Belgian Top Gym tournament weekend of 27/28 November.  It will be great to hear reports of their progress and performance at this competition which is running for its 14th year. Edited 23/11 - please see comments below - sadly, Anastasia Grishina has withdrawn from the competition because of an injury - she will be replaced by Kristina Sidorova.  Good luck, Kristina - and may I wish a happy, healthy recovery to the beautiful Anastasia Grishina . 

This weekend in Blanc Mesmil, France, the Daniel D’Amato International Tournament took place.  This is a team and individual competition for boys and girls from Spain, Ukraine, the Czech Republic, Russia, and local teams from France.  A list of participants can be found here .  Full results have yet to be posted on the website but, via the GymNet Forum Albert reports the following results of the girls’ competition: 1         Ukraine 2         Russia 3         Antibes In the individual competition, Russia’s Yulia Belokobylskaya took first place, ahead of Ukraine's Anastasia Koval and Yevgenya Chernyi.  Well done all! I will update this post with a link to the full results and any observations, if and when they become available. 23rd November - full results of the all around competition are available here . Team competition - we may have to wait a little long...

Cor.  When I began this blog, only a couple of months ago, I never realised quite how much goes on in the constantly evolving world of Russian gymnastics.  I started out by wanting to look back to try to make some sense of what might be happening now and in the future.  As it turns out, current events are enough to keep me occupied, although I expect - jolly well hope - there will be some fallow weeks and months when I will get the chance to be more reflective again. The internet has opened up gymnastics amazingly.  I can remember when every speck of information I could gain about the Soviet gymnasts was precious.  We had to wait months for the results of even the largest competitions.  I remember, for example, tuning into the BBC World Service at midnight to hear the results of the women's all around at the 1985 World Championships, only to disbelieve the report I had heard (Shushunova tied Omelianchik) and to have to wait another few days for highlights...

Results of the Glasgow Grand Prix can be accessed here . Australia's Lauren Mitchell dominated this competition, taking golds on beam and floor. Russia's Ekaterina Kurbatova, the only gymnast to qualify to all four event finals, took gold on vault but finished outside the medals elsewhere. Well done, Katya! Anna Myzdrikova unfortunately finished outside the medals on her specialist piece, floor. In the men's competition, Alexander Balandin took gold on the rings.

While the world focusses on international competitions such as this weekend's Grand Prix, Russian junior and local competition continues. Perhaps a name emerging from one of these competitions will in future make it onto the Russian national team at European, World or Olympic level. They perhaps help to guage the progress of development of the 'mass base' of Russian gymnastics which is so important to its future development. The Russian Gymnastics Federation website provides information about these competitions. First, a regional competition taking place in the Far Eastern Federal District of Russia (capital: Khabarovsk), the largest, but least populated of Russia's 8 Federal districts (the other seven are Central Federal District (capital: Moscow); Southern Federal District (Rostov-on-Don); Northwestern Federal District (St Petersburg); Siberian Federal District (Novosibirsk); Urals Federal District (Ekaterinburg); Volga Federal District (Nizhny Novgorod); and the...

Albert and Nora at the All Around Forum have kindly provided a link to the roster for the above competition. For Russia, Anna Dementieva, Aliya Mustafina and Ekaterina Kurbatova are so far posted to compete. This weekend, Ekaterina Kurbatova and Rotterdam reserve Anna Myzdrikova compete in Glasgow at the Grand Prix (World Cup competition). I will provide links to results for all these competitions once they are complete.

A TV report here records Medvedev's meeting with successful Russian athletes including their gymnastics team from the 2010 world championships. I have added this link to the media directory below.

http://www.net-film.ru/ru/films-finded-page-1/?sp=ru&s=%d0%93%d0%b8%d0%bc%d0%bd%d0%b0%d1%81%d1%82%d0%b8%d0%ba%d0%b0

Russian Gymnasts Prepare for Mexico (1967). This delightful short news video, property of the British Pathe archive, features Zinaida Druzhinina (Voronina) in training for the Mexico Olympics.

The FIG have now published a list of new elements credited at the World Championships 2010 (Rotterdam). You will also find a list of new elements credited at the Youth Olympic Games. Nabieva, Mustafina and (Youth Olympics) Komova have all had uneven bars elements named after them.

My friend Ian from the University of Greenwich sent me this link to the Chinese State Circus's version of Swan Lake. He headed the email - 'Ballet, or gymnastics?'. I found that quite intriguing, and even though I don't have time to write more now, I wanted to share it with you. Please do comment! I'd love to know what you think of this.

If revolutions can only be acknowledged and recognised with hindsight, we are still too early to celebrate the Russian women’s team and all around victory at the Rotterdam World Championships 2010 as such. In many ways, Russian gymnastics is only beginning to turn a corner and to build the foundations for future more solid and consistent victories. The women’s team looks strong; over this weekend we have seen an impressive number of medal winning performances all across Europe. The Russians appear to be building strong reserves as well as celebrating the achievements of their medal winners. But we are still some distance away from witnessing a force to compare with the relentless, invincible gymnastics machine that was the Soviet Union. The technical, political, funding, human resources and artistic changes that Russian gymnastics needs to undergo to reach such a position are still very much underway. Media coverage of the world championships, and in particular during and po...

Lenta (online) ‘Andrei Rodienenko : What are the chances of the Russian gymnasts at the 2012 Olympics?’ Press Conference 12 th November 2012 available at : http://lenta.ru/conf/rodionenko/ accessed 14 th November 2012 Keywords : Rodienenko, Olympics, Soviet Union, system of training, importance of media, international system of physical education, Russian system of physical education, Valeri Liukin, exodus of Russian coaches, ambiguity of judging decisions, FIG, future of Russian men’s gymnastics programme

Andrei Rodienenko has been busy recently answering questions! Here , he considers the theme 'What are the chances of the Russian gymnasts at the Olympics 2012'. Incidentally, I am growing to love the eccentricities of Google translate which perhaps deserves a blog all of its own. Do please enjoy this piece and its literary associations as best you can :=)

The Russian girls have been busy - and very successful - this weekend! All seven gymnasts from the national team (including reserve Anna Myzdrikova) are scheduled to compete by the end of this month. Massilia Cup The wonderful TATIANA NABIEVA competed alongside her team mates KSENIA SEMENOVA and KSENIA AFANASYEVA in Marseille this weekend at the Massilia Cup, and achieved gold medals in the team, all around, bars and vault events. Tanya also took the bronze on balance beam. KSENIA AFANASYEVA took gold medal on floor and silver on beam behind France's Aurelie Malaussena. A fuller report can be found at The Gymnastics Examiner . The Italian Grand Prix World Champion ALIYA MUSTAFINA competed here alongside Youth Olympic Champion VIKTORIA KOMOVA. Aliya won beam and came fourth on bars, while Viktoria took the gold on bars and silver on beam. Full results, and a video of Aliya's performance on beam can be found at Aliya's official website . DTB Cup Promising young ANNA DEME...

A fascinating interview is available to view here : http://www.sovsport.ru/gazeta/article-item/418471 Includes some relatively detailed discussions surrounding the apparently sudden departure of Dina Kamalova (Aliya's coach during her years as a junior competitor) to America, the role of CSKA head Galina Stepanova in helping link Aliya to her new coach, Alexander Alexandrov. Fargat Mustafin also discusses Aliya and her sister Nailya.

A press conference was held at which Rodienenko, Mustafina and Komova discussed the recent world championships and their plans for the forthcoming year. Rodienenko also makes reference to the state of men's gymnastics and to the state of University gymnastics in Russia. Video conference (one hour long) is available here : http://www.tatar-inform.ru/video/1369/ Gennady Elfimov, Komova's personal coach, was also present. Andrei Rodienenko : http://summer.sport-express.ru/gymnastics/reviews/9195/ Aliya Mustafina and Viktoria Komova : http://summer.sport-express.ru/gymnastics/reviews/9194/ With thanks to Nora and Albert at the All Around Forum for posting these links. I intend to post a round up of the best coverage of worlds by the middle of next week, identifying key themes and questions for the future. I will include video links.

Albert at the All Around Forum alerts us to some results from the Moscow Regional Championships, held 26-29 October 2010 and posted at http://www.sport-gymnastics.ru/viewtopic.php?f=22&t=2425&sid=31ec44c5dfd1f31ba0f4e286fd04f553 . Some of the scores noted, in particular those for Maria Paseka, Anastasia Grishina and Viktoria Malikova, appear to be those they achieved for the Russian Nationals earlier this year. I understand that these key results can be re-used for team competition purposes, in order to avoid over-competing key gymnasts who are preparing for higher profile competitions. This compromise allows the ‘home’ club to gain appropriate recognition for the achievements of their gymnasts. I will transcribe here some of the key competition results with a view to registering some new names. Of particular interest are the achievements of Naila Mustafina, Aliya Mustafina’s younger sister ;-) Candidate Master of Sports (girls born 1996-1997) 1. M...

A flurry of activity at Lake Krugloye: first, on the 1st November, Russian minister of Sports, Tourism and Youth Policy Vitalyi Mutko visited the training base to congratulate the women's team on their victory in Rotterdam, and also to present awards to various gymnasts and coaches: Merited Master of Sport medals were given to Ksenia Afanasyeva, Tatiana Nabieva and Anna Dementieva (Aliya Mustafina, Ksenia Semenova and Ekaterina Kurbatova have already received this honour). Merited Coach of Russia medals were awarded to National Team Coach Alexander Alexandrov; acrobatics coach Vasily Ivanov; choreographer Olga Borova; technical trainer Evgenyi Grebenkin (he has special responsibility for uneven bars); and Anna Dementieva's personal coach, Elena Zhiganova. Congratulations to all!! Secondly, the Russian women's team and coaches held a press conference on the 2nd November at which the results of the recent world championships, and prospects for future development were discusse...

Nora at the All Around Forum kindly alerts us to the following article and short video tribute to the irreplaceable Boris Pilkin. http://belnovosti.ru/news/society/2010/10/22/belgorod-prostilsya-s-borisom-pilkinym And see here one of his masterpiece works of gymnastic art. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IzSMcTtYkik Rest in peace, Boris.

I’ve added a list of links to video documentaries on this page which will gradually be expanded. The first link is to the documentary ‘What makes Milo fly’ (1996). Lavinia Milosovici, the famous Romanian who won floor at the Olympics in 1992, might not be the most artistic gymnast. But I do remember her with affection. Her fierce competitive attitude and simple acrobatics brought their own form of aesthetic to the sport. And the documentary really underlines how amazing the most mundane gymnast is. Not that Milo was ever mundane, but hopefully you get my meaning! Please do add links to any videos you think should be included in the list by means of comments, and I will transfer them to the list.

Happy Russian Gymnastics Day! http://www.sportgymrus.ru/press/news/4755/default.aspx

Can judging ever be objective? Part 2 Now that the flurry of World Championships is well and truly over, I have been cogitating on the different perspectives on gymnastics discussed earlier in this blog and attempting to analyse what we can learn from the latest developments. The thing that repeatedly strikes me right in the eye is the prescriptive approach of the Code which seems to try to apply a painting-by-numbers type formula for good gymnastics. I believe that this alienates judgement of the aesthetic dimension of the sport and imposes a set of assumptions which not all of us share. In turn, this disadvantages those gymnasts who attempt to express artistry and discourages the development of an artistic approach to the sport. It facilitates an approach to gymnastics marking that favours verbal reasoning over aesthetic judgement, thus opening the door to all forms of behind-the-scenes nit-picking and making the sport increasingly political. Finally, it reinforces a k...

I'm laid up with a virus at the moment and will update this blog with some 'proper' writing as soon as looking at the computer screen doesn't send shooting pains through my eyes. Oh joy. In the meantime, however, please find below a list of some lovely media coverage about the Russian girls and Mustafina. Sigh. I have a less lovely question re the code, or rather Rebecca Bross's beam score in the all around. Could any of you clarify you views on this and perhaps enumerate the E score deductions and how the D score would have been affected? How would artistry/posture/line have been taken into account? It just seems to me that 14.1 was rather out of synch with other scores on the apparatus given what seemed to me to be a huge hiatus mid routine that then led to a fall. (Please note: I am a code dissident: I think it tries to formulate the sport out of existence - how can you calculate something that is at least as much art as sport? However, I would be int...