Skip to main content

Mustafina collects another gold, silver at Toyota Cup; dominates world scene in 2010

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 badly either, collecting 4 medals overall. 

Given the roster at this competition which was a little like a mini World Championships I think it's fairly plain that Mustafina is currently dominating the world scene.  In Japan she again demonstrated her competitive grit and consummate technical and artistic ability.  Had she not slipped up on bars she would have medalled on all four pieces, and the margins on beam indiciate it's arguable she could have taken gold there, too. Competition organisers seem to like to spread the gold around a little if they can.



The Russian team performers did a fairly good job, Kurbatova surprising no one as usual and achieving a solid result.  Anna Dementieva is Miss Potential Waiting For It All To Turn Out Right.  Had she performed to her full ability, she could fairly easily have achieved another gold in addition to her silver on bars.  This girl makes too many mistakes at present, but she has grit and ambition, and I would love to see her do her talents justice and shine on the world stage alongside the other Russian girls over the coming year.  She looks like a girl for the big occasion, to me.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Svetlana Boginskaya: I was always a bitch* in gymnastics

Svetlana Boginskaya, 15 years old, with her medals from the Seoul Olympics Nico translates the latest interview with gymnastics legend Svetlana Boginskaya, during a recent visit to her home country of Belarus. Svetlana Boginskaya: I was always a bitch* in gymnastics, so now I ask for forgiveness from everyone who came in contact with me. The National Olympic Committee of Belarus held a press conference with three-time Olympic Champion in artistic gymnastics, Svetlana Boginskaya. The meeting was devoted to the 25th anniversary of the Olympic Games in Seoul. In South Korea the Belarussian won two gold medals in the team competition and vault. As a gift to the Olympic Hall of fame, the famous gymnast, now living in the United States, donated one of her trophies that she won at the 1990 European Championships and a pennant for Best Female Athlete of the USSR in 1989. How happy we were when we could share with such stars as Boginskaya, Scherbo, and Ivankov,...

Mustafina Interview 2 of 2 : 'I will only perform under the Russian flag'

Argumentyi i Fakti interview with Aliya Mustafina Translated by Marina Vulis ‘I have no fear’, says Aliya Mustafina.   ‘My father [Farhat Mustafin, the bronze medallist in Greco-Roman wrestling at the 1976 Olympics] took me to my first gymnastics class.   In his opinion children need to do sports, and he saw gymnastics as useful for my general development.   He had no goals – just to let us practice.’ It did not end with ‘just practice’ – she became the World Champion at 16, but then had an ACL injury the next year (2011) at the Europeans.   Even just returning to gymnastics is a feat; then she came back to win four medals at the 2012 Olympics. Aliya Mustafina – That injury.   I do not know why I was ashamed – so many people were watching me and I could not even walk.   My parents!   They saw everything on TV (the coach had to carry her from the podium).   Of course I was aware that anything could happen in gymnastics, but I di...

Fact or fiction? The press, gymnastics and pregnancy doping

It was a Sunday morning.  I was drinking my coffee and contemplating the day ahead - a workout at the gym, shopping for groceries, an evening reading a book, or catching up on last night's episodes of crime thriller The Bridge .  How nice it was not to have to think about work for a day. Then I saw it - a story about the history of doping in The Observer .  Interesting reading. Of course, cheating is as old as the hills.  It is, unfortunately, human nature for some people to try to gain easy advantage in any kind of competition.  That is why we have laws, rules, ethical guidelines.  People who cheat should face justice and shouldn't complain when they are found out. But the story about pregnancy doping bothered me.  Hadn't that been found to be fictional?  The author began with Olga Kovalenko's allegations made in 1994 - but the rumours had started way back in 1991 with the documentary series More Than A Game .  The practice...

RRG Archive - scroll by date, from 2024 to 2010

Show more