Rewriting Russian Gymnastics

This video was made by VTB, Russian bank and sponsors of Russian gymnastics.  Aliya sings part of a happy song to wish all their friends a good new year :-). http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=t-S4cpaPR4Y&desktop_uri=%2Fwatch%3Fv%3Dt-S4cpaPR4Y

Alan Owen has confirmed via Tatiana herself, as per the Facebook page of Tatiana Nabieva Online, that Tatiana is retiring from competitive gymnastics. As one door closes, another opens and I feel sure that Tatiana will continue her involvement in the sport as a coach, first of all at home in her home city of St Petersburg where she is studying at he Lesgaft Institute, but then, who knows where. Tatiana has competed internationally at all levels from friendship to World Championships, from a very early age.  She has made friends everywhere she has travelled in the world, and is well known for her spontaneous and emotional character, a very likeable gymnast who seems to love people as much as she loves her sport.  Her feisty competitive spirit and fierce support for her friends and team mates were a missing ingredient on the Russian Olympic team in 2012, but she made a believable comeback in 2013, contributing to the Russian team's domination of the Universiade in Kazan.   As a

Tatiana Nabiyeva has fuelled rumours this weekend of her retirement with a number of indirect postings on social media sites.   But nothing she has said at present is clearcut or official, and for me to say more would be mere speculation. Wait and see is the best policy.  Russia might still need Tanya - I hope so. If and when I hear anything more certain, I will post the information here.  In the meantime, Happy Christmas to one of Russia's best competitors of the last four years, a stalwart team mate, great friend and entertaining gymnast.

Olympic legend Larissa Latynina has been reflecting on Russian gymnastics in an interview with Pravda, and I am summarising below a paraphrased version of what she has said. Interesting that Russia is now beginning to reflect on the brain drain and loss of investment dating back to the 1990s and early 2000s and that is now affecting their competitive results.  There is also a fascinating article  on the mass exodus of coaches, including interviews with Valery Belenkyi, Vladimir Vatkin, Andrei Popov and Alexander Alexandrov.   I am hoping to have it translated for you in the coming weeks.   In the meantime, Larissa's words reflect so much of what has been covered in this blog over the last year.  Someone of her profile and significance speaking openly on this subject in the Russian press must show that her country is beginning to consider the loss, and perhaps the measures necessary for a recovery - if desired. "You know, I want to tell you that we lost a lot duri

2013 European and Universiade All Around Champion, World beam champion Aliya Mustafina has been awarded a Silver Doe Award in a poll of the best Russian athletes of the year conducted by the Federation of a Russian Sports Journalists. Pole vaulter Elena Isinbayeva won the overall title of athlete of the year. Congratulations, Aliya!!! http://www.itar-tass.com/sport/842376

I think Nikita Ignatyev has some hidden talents ... He's much more than just a gymnast, you know ... http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mIIslqn5KSU&feature=youtu.be&desktop_uri=%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DmIIslqn5KSU%26feature%3Dyoutu.be From Nikita's personal VK site, via YouTube :-)

Anna with her team mate Maria Nekrasova today.   Maria competed in this spring's Russia Cup and will join Anna on the Azerbaijan national gymnastics team.  Picture courtesy of the Azerbaijan Gymnastics Federation on Facebook. As Anna prepares to compete at this week's Voronin Cup, representing Azerbaijan for the first time, RRG, in collaboration with Anna's authorised website Anna Pavlova Online, would like to invite readers to submit their questions for an interview with Anna.  What have you always wanted to ask one of Russia's best gymnasts of the last decade? Each reader may submit up to three questions.  We will collate and if necessary edit the questions and Anna will answer the ones she finds most interesting.  Please add your questions as comments to this blog, or you may email them to me at rewriterussiagym@btinternet.com.  We hope to publish the final interview on both websites by Christmas. Many of you must dream of having a conversation with Anna - this is th

Anna Pavlova, who last competed for her home country of Russia at the 2008 Beijing Olympics, and has maintained a solid presence on the domestic circuit since, today announced that she will prepare to compete for the Azerbaijan national team at the 2015 European championships, which will take place in the Azerbaijan capital city of Baku.  Her mother, who is Anna's personal coach, will take up a position as Azerbaijan's national coach.  Working alongside Anna will be 2011 World Championships team member, 2012 Olympic reserve Yulia Inshina from Voronezh.  On the men's side, rings specialist Konstantin Pluzhnikov will also make the move to the Azerbaijan team.  All the gymnasts will be working at home in Russia, as there is no equipment available in Azerbaijan.  Pluzhnikov is considered a world medal contender on his specialist piece, the rings, and Pavlova has regularly beaten national team members on vault, beam and floor in Russian domestic competitions. Pavlova says

Sheer charm.

Moscow Dynamo are developing a video project where sportsmen across different disciplines are sharing their sports. Here , Emin Garibov shares gymnastics with Dynamo footballer Yuri Kotov. You can also find pictures at Moscow Dynamo's Facebook page.

Evgenia Shelgunova.  Picture: Olga Terentyeva Valentina Rodionenko has outlined the Russian team's plans for the coming months in a recent press statement , highlighting the next major competition for March 2014,the Russian Championships in Penza.  This will be the qualifying event for the European Championships, to take place in Sofia, Bulgaria, next spring. All the team's major players are back in training now, but not at the most intense level, says Rodionenko. The gymnasts are now working with their coaches to develop new difficulty for their exercises, or to change the composition of their existing routines. 'It is very important that all of them begin the new season in optimal condition', said the head coach.  'On the 22nd, the teams will go home after their current training camp at Round Lake. They return on December 4th, and this year they will go home again on the 20th December.' Olympic all around silver medallist Viktoria Komova

The RGF has now published links to the full video of  'Countdown', a programme in which the Seoul Olympics gymnastics competition of 1988 was discussed, with some comparison to today.  It is in total an hour long programme.  I wonder if anyone is feeling strong enough to provide some summary translation of the second part, or of fragments they feel are interesting?  I am copying Captain Hook's translations of the first part below, from his comments to my original post about this discussion. My post turned out to be somewhat out of context with the overall programme so I am glad for an opportunity to present the video in its entirety, in the hope that a fuller translation will set the record straight.   Many thanks again to the Captain! Part 1 Part 2 Part 1 Part 2 Host: This Olympics ( I guess he means 1988 Olympics- beginning of this video is cut off ) was very successful for both soviet teams, men and women. They won a lot of gold medals. In other wor

I hadn't seen this fascinating documentary before last week.  It provides some great history on the heritage of the sport.  In German, with English subtitles. Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4

Mustafina's beam at the Antwerp World Championships may well have expressed the Code to its fullest artistic potential in that event final, on that day. But what has the additive Code, and other progressive changes to the sport, done to beam? One of the most beautiful beam routines ever can be found here .

I have yet to source a full translation of this 2nd November television discussion between National Coaches Rodionenko, Olympic Champion Aliya Mustafina and 1988 Olympic Champion and FIG judge Elena Shevchenko.  Some fragmentary details provided by Rachael Liv on Gymfever (:-)) suggest that it addresses the results of the 2013 World Championships again, with Andrei Rodionenko providing reasons that his team did not perform as well as, perhaps, the Russian public had expected.  Pretty much a re-run of his earlier press interview that appeared on VTB.  Shevchenko apparently mentions that the biggest worry during her competitive years was making the Soviet team, so evidently some comparisons are being made between today's gymnastics and the Golden Era. If anyone has time to add any translations to the comments on this post, we would all be very grateful ... I know that translating such a discussion in its entirety is painstaking and arduous ... NOTE : PLEASE SCROLL DOWN TO THE COMME

I like to think that I inspired this film ... I probably didn't though. Just a bit of mid week silliness.

Adrian McArdle pointed me to this cute - but impressive - video of Elena Zamolodchikova, aged 13 or 14, competing in South Africa in 1996. Four years later, she would be a double Olympic champion, on vault and floor. What an incredible, if occasionally somewhat erratic, competitor she was.  My first view of Super Zamo was in a junior team competition in 1995 in Guildford, in the south east of England.  Her team mates included the peerless Elena Produnova, and the great Russian promise of that time, Evgenia Kuznetsova. Elena Zamolodchikova was then a tiny scrap of a thing,  every cubic millimetre packed with dynamic energy.  She competed only vault but charged the gymnastics hall with electricity.  I'll never forget that fierce, reckless sprint towards to the vault.  She possessed energy, motivation and skill at a time when Russia's gymnasts were powerful, innovative and fearless, a thunderbolt of sheer grace.  She impressed me in a way I will never forget.  This video remin

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,

Video 1 Video 2 National beam coach Marina Bulashenko leads a master class of young gymnasts with the assistance of Aliya Mustafina.  Anna Rodionova demonstrates a spin.

Rodionenko with European Champion David Belyavski  Courtesy RGF/Elena Mikhailova This is the interview that many people on the internet have already commented on, regarding Andrei Rodionenko's alleged racism.  The original, Russian language version, appears on VTB Bank's website (VTB are sponsors of Russian gymnastics).  It takes cleverer people than me to decide what is racism, what is deliberately perjorative, and what is inferred in an interviewer's question.  For now, I will not comment on this, therefore, but I would ask you to read Lupita's translation carefully before you form your own opinion.   I am providing some links below which might help you to decide where you stand. Definition of racism Definition of sexism BBC Sport article by Matthew Syed : Is it wrong to note that 100m winners are always black?            Updated 24/10 CSKA Moscow: UEFA opens racist chants case             http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/24654499 Andrei

We remember Yuri Ryazanov, 2008 Olympian and 2009 World All Around bronze medallist, who so tragically lost his life on 20 October 2009, just a few days after the World Championships which many of us had seen as his 'statement of intent' for the coming years.  Yuri was only 22 years old. Yuri came from the historic city of Vladimir, where he trained at the same School as Nikolai Andrianov, Yuri Korolev, Vladimir Artemov and, today, Nikolai Kuksenkov. RIP, Yuri. See Yuri's parallel bars routine, part of his bronze medal winning performance in the all around at 2009 Worlds, here . 

Some pictures and a short video of Viktoria, Aliya and Katya Kramarenko are available here. The girls are benefitting from a last few rays of sun before returning to chilly Moscow for winter training. The location, Sochi, will of course be the home of next year's Winter Olympics.  Russia's oligarchs and government have invested in significant changes to the infrastructure there, including the building of training facilities.  Andrei Rodionenko has suggested some of these be adapted post-Games to provide the Russian gymnasts with a  mild weather winter training retreat, so no doubt this publicity is part of that lobby, as well as providing motivation to the team.

The Russian men suffered some unlucky performances - and untimely injuries - at this month's World Championships.  Here, Nico writes about their competition, and reflects on the future for Russian men's gymnastics. Team captain Emin Garibov on high bar.  RGF I’ve been a great admirer of the Russian men’s programme since getting my start in gymnastics in 1994.  I got into the sport during the era of Aleksei Nemov, who was and still is a fantastic role model for me. He embodied everything I enjoyed about the sport: power, form, style, poise, humility, and even a bit of sex appeal. Since Nemov, I found it a little difficult to remain inspired by the Russian team because his absence left a great void in the programme. That is, until recently. Around mid-2011, I found a renewed interest in the men’s team when I noticed the talents of David Belyavskiy, Emin Garibov, and Denis Ablyazin. I saw in them some of the qualities Nemov had when he began his senior career