Skip to main content

Vika is back! Russian team in training in Sochi

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.

Comments

  1. Dear Queen Elizabeth

    You think Aliya and Vika will be in the Russian team for the 2016 Olympics? They have some new girls like Maria Bondareva, Maria Kahrenkova, Vitoria Kuzmina, Anna Rodionova, Eugenia Shugunova, and others....

    I really really love Alyia and Vika, and I would like to watch them competing the Olimpics again. :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It depends on whether they can remain healthy, their commitment to training and whether the coaching is appropriate. At present I am not particularly hopeful about

      Delete
    2. the new generation - there are too few strong gymnasts coming through and they are all event specialists. Teams need a strong reserve. There is a lot of work to do.

      Delete
    3. Dear Queen Elizabeth,

      Now that was quieter (because I am passionate about this sport, and the beautiful Russian gymnasts, and despite being quite mature, I still lose my mind with the injustices done by the judges).

      Therefore, I would like to make some remarks on the statements about the interview Nelli Kim.

      First of all, I would like to clarify that I have great admiration for some American gymnasts, and especially the Romanian gymnasts.

      Nelli Kim says the gym has become a sport for girls who have power and like to smile, just as are the American gymnasts. This is absolutely unfair because it varies according to the character of the person. Personally, I am a melancholic appearance, but quite aggressive when need be. So if this or that gymnast does not smile all the time, or gets upset at his own performance, she can not demonstrate their dissatisfaction? How Vika Komova and McKayla Maroney?

      With that statement, now was implicit but clear, the reason being the American Overscore, while Belarusian, Ukrainian and Russian are underscores. FIG gymnasts want of strength and power. And almost melancholy seriousness of Russians, Belarusians and Ukrainians do not pleasants FIG.

      As to the method of Rodienkos, I think Nelli Kim is absolutely right. The Rodienkos have to do your homework. The resignation of Aleksandrov (and Oleg Stapenko in my view), was shot in their own foot.

      Nelli Kim has a good point about the fact that federations of Ukraine, Belarus and Russia should unite to fight against the low scores of its gymnasts or criticism to FIG. This way they will be heard.

      She is also terribly right in saying the reason why the Russians coaches left Russia and went to the USA. And for them to come back, everyone knows that Russia needs to offer: A decent salary and good working conditions (which also means stop interfering VR)

      In the end, I think Nelli Kim was absolutely frank in saying that prefer the American gymnasts, however absurdly unethical to openly criticize Komova and Mustafina.

      Personally, I felt Komova fight to the end (the FX in the Olympics AA) for the gold medal. Maybe because I also do not be a person smiling all the time with everyone. However, this criticism never fit the Aliya Mustafina. She has nerves of steel, heart of a lion, and always smiles when he finishes his routines....











































































      Google Tradutor para empresas:Google Toolkit de tradução para appsTradutor de sitesGlobal Market Finder




















      Delete
  2. Good to hear that Vika is back and training, hopefully we'll see her at next year's Worlds.
    Meanwhile, can anyone provide a translation for this interview with Aliya from before Worlds?
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X1qVX5yEf7A

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Updates on Russia, and Russian gymnastics

  Kartsev: FX, PB, HB; Suedin: PH, PB, HB; Roschina : V, UB Kalmykova: V, FX; Vassilieva: BB, FX; Kaiumova: UB, BB At times, I have been at a loss as to what to say; I still am.  I don’t think that politics and sport make good bedfellows, but we live in a time of global confusion and sadness.  It has been more than twelve years since Russia has competed under its own flag at the Olympics, and for all I know it could be another twelve or more before things revert entirely to ‘normal’.  I don’t know how seriously to take any of the announcements being made recently, about junior athletes being allowed to compete as Russian, about athletes in the Winter Paralympics being allowed to compete under the Russian flag.  I’d like to see the athletes back and able to live their lives, for them to be able to show off a bit and feel pride in their accomplishments.  But I can’t ignore the bigger picture of death and destruction.  People are lucky if they can live in...

Viktoria Komova - back pain has forced me to step down

I awoke this morning to a very simple statement from Viktoria Komova, on her vk.com site, which Papa Liukin has translated (via the IG forum): 'Dear friends, fans, and gymnastics lovers. Unfortunately back pain isn't allowing me to train to my full potential and get ready for competitions. I've made the very difficult decision to stop training and take care of my health. I want to thank everyone for their support! Without your love and warmth it would've been more difficult to go all the way. Thanks everyone and see you soon! Love and kisses.' Well, first of all, good wishes and best of luck to Viktoria, who has struggled since 2012 to re-establish herself fully as a competitive gymnast, whose talent was so great that she secured gold on bars at two different World Championships, four years apart, whose career was littered with controversy, who must be allowed to live her life as she wishes.   I know that the 'gymternet' will now be overflowing...

Artistry versus acrobatics???

Watching videos of this weekend's competitions - the qualification and all around rounds of the Russian championships, medal winners from the American Cup - I am struck, more and more, by the huge difference between the American and Russian schools of gymnastics. It led me to ask the question : do artistry and acrobatics have to be mutually exclusive? (I am afraid that I think naming 'American' gymnastics a 'school' is perhaps lending an undeserved dignity to work which has become excessively obsessed with the difficult and the consistent, but I am using the word here so as not to label unfairly those individual gymnasts who are blameless in the direction of their training.) The FIG's vision for gymnastics is said to embrace more artistry; at least the publicity it has put about on the subject of its new Code makes that fairly plain.  So perhaps the Russians, with their inconsistent brilliance and superior body carriage (Mustafina, Komova, Grishina, Afanasy...

RRG Archive - scroll by date, from 2024 to 2010

Show more