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!