Kharenkova takes gold on final day of Euros

15 year old Maria Kharenkova saved the day for Russia with a well deserved gold medal on the beam this afternoon in Sofia.  To the visible delight of team mate and captain Aliya Mustafina, who has supported Kharenkova right through this competition, Kharenkova went through her difficulty packed routine with very little error, converting her junior gold from two years ago into her first major senior title.

Kharenkova is the latest generation of a long tradition of great gymnasts from the town of Rostov on Don in the south of Russia.  Her coach, Olga Sagina, formerly counted Anastasia Sidorova and Elena Produnova amongst her gymnasts.  Sagina's philosophy is pretty simple - champions must have discipline, and work hard. 'Head and intellect are very important', she said during a coaching clinic in Glasgow in 2008.  Kharenkova's earnest attitude and fighting performances speak much of this approach.  In team finals her positive attitude and determination kept her on the beam after a landing that was clearly offline.  Today she came out ready to do her best; her efforts reaped gold, and a big smile from a very serious girl. Maria will no doubt now return to Lake Krugloye determined to train even better for Worlds.  I wish her the best of luck.

Her team mate Mustafina didn't manage to win a gold medal this time, but looked thoroughly comfortable in her role as team captain.  Silver on bars and bronze on beam were a credit to her raw talent and the careful training of personal coach and beam specialist Raisa Ganina.  Limping heavily after the beam performance, Mustafina was not doing her full difficulty anywhere, but what she did do was to perform as close to perfection as her body would allow.  If anything, this was Mustafina's greatest performance, drawing on all her physical, mental and emotional energies to pull the Russian girls back from the brink of an empty handed Europeans.  I trust that the trip to Germany will resolve Aliya's ankle pain thoroughly, without any pressure to come back to full training and competition too quickly. She has shown here what a fantastic motivator she can be and her presence on the Olympic team in Rio will be vital to the team's morale. 

Dasha Spiridonova performed her bars routine beautifully for a bronze medal behind Britain's Beckie Downie (congratulations to an extremely emotional champion!) and team mate Mustafina.  Alla Sosnitskaya did her best in both her finals, floor and vault, but unfortunately these are Russia's weakest apparatus and she was unable to make much of an impression despite a strong effort.  The power and energy of Larissa Iordache and Vanessa Ferrari held sway this year.

As gymnastics moves on, it is evident that Russia needs to re-evaluate its training regimes to promote better performance on floor and vault.  I don't believe Valentina Rodionenko's idea that the Russians lack power (compared to the Americans, Germans and British) because they are relatively small; like boxing, power to weight ratio is what counts and the Russians have always been able to produce small but strong gymnasts in the past, eg Zamolodchikova, Lobazniuk, and not forgetting Komova and Grishina.  

Poor attention to detail is also slipping gradually into Russia's floor and vault work; eg compare Pavlova's leg form to Sosnitskaya's.  Both trained under the same system, yet the older gymnast has better basics there.  The only conclusion to draw is that something is slipping away from Russia's training and discipline that was once there so could presumably be restored fairly easily.  The only dependency here is that the coaches are supported in doing their jobs well.  But how much authority and control do they really have?  I am remembering now yet another part of Alexandrov's story; that his training plans were regularly altered by Valentina Rodionenko, who has never coached a single day in her life. That she deleted lines relating to specific conditioning and replaced them with a walk in the park.  I certainly hope that she is not misusing her influence all over again with coach Grebyonkin, who looked rather worried this week.

It is all too easy to seek to lay blame on one or two people and I don't want to malign Valentina - but so many of the things she says are silly and betray a lack of understanding, while the remaining coaching staff and gymnasts are thoroughly professional.  Besides the dipping competition performances, the evidence base is growing; for example, I am surprised that there hasn't been more fuss surrounding Afanasyeva's very measured, but somewhat damning interview.  A top gymnast who Valentina transparently propelled and promoted as an all around prospect, was persuaded to increase her difficulty on vault and bars, her weak pieces, despite a serious injury that sounds to be career threatening.

While Alexandrov's account pulled no punches, Afanasyeva's was quiet and factual.  Afanasyeva may need to return to a national team led by the Rodionenkos so was treading carefully.  Alexandrov had nothing left to lose.  They both ask similar questions about how Russia's WAG team is training.

Find all the scores from Sofia here http://www.longinestiming.com/Competition?id=00000D0000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF&sport=GA&year=2014.

Link to Afanasyeva interview http://rewritingrussiangymnastics.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/ksenia-afanasyeva-sports-express.html?showComment=1400428961531