Plans for the Olympics, the family cat, how Aliya managed her nerves in 2012 and much more - translation on Liubov's blog
A brief interview with the World and Olympic Champion from All Sport is summarised below. Russian national gymnastics continues to prepare for the World Championships, which will be held October 3-12 in Nanning (China). Olympic champion Aliya Mustafina told Mary Staroverova about her health and about preparations for the competition. - In June, I went to Germany to solve the problem with my ankle. I had a small operation to clean the joints of a build-up of bone particles. Nothing serious was evident, and the operation went well. Now I have to tumble. But there is still some discomfort, a slight pain at full load, and I can not tumble at full force. For the time being, I try to go easy on my legs. After the Russia Cup I will have to fully prepare for Worlds. That is just one month. Even if I'm not tumbling, I will keep myself in good shape, and that should suffice (smiles). - I can't say if it is a different pain to before Europeans, because at...
Aliya handles it graciously, but I wish Russian sport journalists would stop going on about Simone and the ADHD medication all the time. It's mean-spirited and unsportsmanlike, like when American sport journalists used to constantly prod about Chinese gymnasts possibly being underage.
ReplyDeleteI feel like the the mental state that helps Aliya compete so well comes across in interviews. She talks about gymnastics in a similar way to Kohei Uchimura, interestingly.