Skip to main content

Russian gymnastics teams for London 2012 are announced

By
Komova, Nabieva, Mustafina, Inshina, Afanasyeva - all included in the team selection for the London Olympics


Head National Coach Andrei Rodionenko on Sunday announced the names of those gymnasts who will be preparing for the forthcoming Olympic Games in London (reports Eurosport).  The gymnasts were selected according to three criteria :

  1. Results at the Russian Championship, European Championship and Russia Cup. 
  2. How the gymnasts had implemented their routines, and their compliance with 'model characteristics', complexity and quality of execution.  
  3. Moral, strong-willed and feisty qualities at the highest levels of competition

WAG : Ksenia Afanasyeva, Victoria Komova, Aliya Mustafina, Anastasia Grishina, Tatiana Nabieva, Maria Paseka, Anastasia Sidorova and Yulia Inshina

MAG : Denis Ablyazin, Alexander Balandin, David Belyavsky, Emin Garibov, Konstantin Pluzhnikov, Nikita Ignatyev, Sergey Khorokhordin, Igor Pakhomenko 

Of the eight gymnasts selected for each discipline, only five will appear at the Olympic Games, with four competing on each apparatus in the qualifications stage.  

The WAG selection controversially omits 2011 European Champion Anna Dementieva, a strong beam worker and all around competitor, who has suffered a rocky competitive programme since last spring.  Dementieva has suffered injury and illness since, and it seems likely that her consistently poor performance in criteria 1 and 3 has, sadly, led her to lose out on this occasion.  

The MAG selection is noteable for the exclusion of vault and floor specialist Anton Golotsutskov, who unfortunately is suffering from a back injury and in hospital, and was unable to compete at the Russia Cup.  It is expected that Golotsutkov will retire imminently.  Former Russian Olympian and European Champion Maxim Devyatovski has also retired following a year of training independently at his home gym in Siberia.  This was presaged by his non-appearance at the Russia Cup.  

Thus Russia goes forward to London with only three experienced Olympians on their training squads - for the women, Ksenia Afanasyeva, for the men, Konstantin Pluzhnikov and Sergei Khorokhodin.   This is not unusual for gymnastics, a sport where youth appears to have a distinct advantage.


Good luck to all the gymnasts - I wish them the very best on their way to the Olympic podium!


Picture courtesy of the RGF.
Labels:

Comments

  1. M20 June 2012 at 20:36

    Yeah disappointed for Dementyeva but if she suffers from injury and illness, then makes no sense to take her. Still would have preferred her to be on the training squad at least.

    As for criteria number 3, the only one who fits all of that is Mustafina and Ksenia. The others crumble at times.

    However, I have faith that all will be well at Olympics.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

‘We all love her very much’ - Roschina speaks of Mustafina and the need to perfect an Amanar vault

By
From sport.ru via vk.com.  Google translate  A big interview with Anastasia Loginova from Sport24 with Lyudmila Roshchina following the Strongest Cup, where the gymnast won four out of five gold medals. We quote several fragments, the full version is available on the publication's website, link at the end. ❓ The Strongest Athletes Cup has recently ended. Did you have time to analyze your performances? 💬 I just rewatched the broadcast, looked at my shortcomings. ❓ Did you set a medal plan for this start? 💬 I didn't think about it. Only that I needed to do my program - and then what will happen. ❓ Did you have time to discuss the competition with your coach? 💬 She praised me, said that I was great. She didn't scold me for mistakes on the beam - on the contrary, she supported me. ❓ Can we say that the beam is your weak spot? This is the only final you didn't get to. 💬 Probably yes. I have this apparatus that is a bit unpolished, so to speak. Treacherous. I need to work...
Post a Comment
Read more

Tatyana Nabiyeva on work and love in China

By
Some highlights from a long interview with 2010 World champion Tatyana Nabiyeva.  Source: Russian team page on VK.com.  Translation - Google translate A big interview with Tatyana Nabieva about the peculiarities of work and life in China, the bright years of her sports career, a little about modern gymnastics and about love. On the Nabiyeva flight — At the same championship, you presented a new element on the bars, which was later added to the rules with your last name (flying over the top bar with a straight body, difficulty group F. — Sport24). How did you come up with the idea to try something new? — Actually, it happened spontaneously, I think. We worked with Vera Iosifovna [Kiryashova] on the purity of the elements on the bars, sometimes I didn’t fly all the way to the Shaposhnikova element. Once I didn’t fly all the way to the bars either and stood on my feet between the bars, bending my legs in flight for safety. Then Vera Iosifovna said that this was a different eleme...
Post a Comment
Read more

Angelina Melnikova photo session

By
Daria Isaeva has done a photo session with Angelina Melnikova at Dynamo Moscow.  Here are Angelina’s words about it.   "  The first time I was on a balance beam I was six years old. I was scared because of the height, so at first I walked hand in hand with my trainer." "The hardest thing on this apparatus is to keep your balance. Usually, when I'm on the beam, I imagine that I'm in a corridor 10 centimeters wide." "You can't be afraid of the beam! Coaches say that if you have fear, you will perform poorly." "The first difficult element I did at the age of eight was a backflip. In adult gymnastics, this element is considered one of the easiest." “I still can’t do a cartwheel on a log; I can easily fall off it, although children can do this element at the age of six.” "It's better to perform on the balance beam barefoot - you feel the apparatus better that way. But to avoid injuries, we sometimes tape our ankles." "It...
Post a Comment
Read more

RRG Archive - scroll by date, from 2024 to 2010

Show more