Skip to main content

Flashback to 2010 - Viktoria Komova

By

Four years ago, we were eagerly awaiting the upcoming Youth Olympic Games, and the name on everyone's lips was Viktoria Komova, who was confidently expected to win the gold medal at these Games in the all-around competition.  Komova had contributed significantly to her team's victory at the Junior European Championships that spring, and was reigning Junior European Champion. 

The 15-year-old was under a great deal of pressure.  Expectations ran high as Russia's Prime Minister Vladimir Putin publicly expressed his expectation that Russia's young athletes would win ample gold at this first Youth Olympic Games.  Viktoria, well known in the gymnastics world as the daughter of former gymnastics world champion Vera Kolesnikova, headlined many media appearances and was highly touted as a likely gold medallist.

She delivered in style, scoring a total of 61.25 ahead of China's Tan Sixin (58.5) and Carlotta Ferlito from Italy (55.35), and went on to win a further three medals - gold on vault and bars, and bronze on floor.  Only an error on beam denied her a clean sweep.

Young Viktoria, alongside President Dmitri Medvedev with Russia's medallists at the last Youth Olympic Games.

Rarely has such a young gymnast faced such high profile expectation at such a tender age.  Komova's technical ability was inborn and trained from her very earliest days.  She has produced some of the best gymnastics of the past four years, including this superb beam routine from the all around competition in 2010 : http://youtu.be/j4hZ4_b72eA

Surely, injury free, our still young Champion can reconnect with her most brilliant abilities to stamp her authority once more on the world of gymnastics?  I doubt there is a gymnast in the world who has better innate technical capabilities.




Labels:

Comments

  1. Anonymous8 August 2014 at 14:19

    I still can't get over her programme at the Olympic Games - if she hadn't wandered off the side of the vault, she would have run away with the all around title. Even with that mistake - she should have won. It was the most outstanding display or difficulty, twinned with unmatched technical ability on the day.

    Shame on the judges.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Queen Elizabeth8 August 2014 at 14:22

    I agree. The error in vault had a disproportionate impact on the overall result. And in 2011 she was best too.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Gláucia Sousa8 August 2014 at 14:23

    That is all that fans want to see is artistic gymnastics Vika Komova competing again in hes best performance. Just the fact of seeing her competing to her full potential and artistic talent would be enough.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Anonymous8 August 2014 at 16:00

    I mean, when is a gymnast going to include an Amanar Vault, Pike Tkatchev, Komova and Double twisting double somersault dismount on Bars, standing arabian with Patterson dismout on Beam and an absolutely perfect floor routine including a triple twist, and 1&1/2 step out through to double arabian... not to mention wonderful choreography and music that suited Komova.

    The programme was mind boggling.

    Executed brilliantly...

    And left unrewarded.

    Turns the sport into a joke!!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous8 August 2014 at 19:45

      Don't forget the gorgeous pike stalder pirouettes and sheep jump! I absolutely agree with you.

      Delete
    2. Anonymous14 August 2014 at 13:33

      I'm going to disagree about the music for Vika. I thought it was terrible and it didn't suit her or her choreographer at all.

      Delete
  5. Sasha9 August 2014 at 07:16

    I thought this article was gonna segue into Seda's YOG chances.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Queen Elizabeth9 August 2014 at 09:39

    :-). There will be a post shortly. But I wanted to give some positive airtime to Viktoria.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Head MAG Coach Alfosov on Russian gymnastics prospects in 2026

By
"A Really Good International Level": Alfosov on the Return of Russian Gymnasts, Belyavsky's Videos, and the Games Qualification Alfosov: Belyavsky's presence on the team was a big plus Interview by Elena Vaitsekhovskaya  Google translate Russian gymnasts competing under neutral status will be able to take their first step toward qualifying for the Los Angeles Olympics as early as October, Valery Alfosov, head coach of the Russian men's team, told RT. He believes that qualifying for not only the individual but also the team competition at the World Championships is one of the season's greatest achievements. He also explained the criteria he uses to compare his players with their competitors and described David Belyavsky's decision last year as hard-won. The current season began with good news for the gymnasts: almost all of the leading Russian team members are participating in international competitions. Does this mean the suspension situation is a thing of...
Post a Comment
Read more

Artistry versus acrobatics???

By
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...
39 comments
Read more

Angelina Melnikova and Arseny Dukhno - Results from Serie A competitions in Italy

By
  Russia's neutral gymnasts have been performing very well in competition recently, not least at the Cottbus Cup last week where a fairly inexperienced group of young women took medals on every piece - and their men did well, too. The team is still in the position where its veterans, or at least its established performers, are the leaders.  For the women, this means that Melnikova is assumed to be the top, while for the men, Marinov is the one whose name is most likely to be spoken.  But he is still recovering from multiple injuries and not expecting to be ready for competition until later in the year.  In fact the leadership of the men's team has skipped a couple of generations: first year senior, Arseny Dukhno, is taking the lead for the team. So while the youngsters head off to the World Cup competitions to make a name for themselves there, the leaders are competing in the Serie A league in Italy - and they aren't doing too shabbily there.  Both Melnikova and...
Post a Comment
Read more

RRG Archive - scroll by date, from 2024 to 2010

Show more