Rewriting Russian Gymnastics

Hello everyone It has recently come to my attention that someone has been copying my blog - yes, in its entirety. In fact there are a number of blogs out there purporting to be me. This is not only very annoying - the blog represents six years of very hard work - it is also plagiarism, and a legal breach of my copyright in my writing and presentation of the work. I am happy if people refer to my blog and give credit, but not to be plagiarised lock, stock and barrel, and I will be pursuing this matter to try to set things straight. In the meantime, please note that the only real Rewriting Russian Gymnastics blog is here. Any other blog is a mere imitation!  Please only visit this URL or the associated Facebook and Twitter pages, if you want to read my work. Down with pirates!

Elena Shushunova, European, World and Olympic Champion 1984-1988, has died of pneumonia, reports TASS.  'Shusha', perhaps the greatest artistic gymnast, was only 49. She will be greatly missed and we will remember her with awe and love.RIP.   http://rewritingrussiangymnastics.blogspot.com/2015/08/elena-shushunova-grace-power-complexity.html Shusha BB -  https://youtu.be/EQPUDGoLucc Shusha FX -  https://youtu.be/EQPUDGoLucc Shusha UB -  https://youtu.be/yLSwcPgBNw0 Shusha V -  https://youtu.be/aUC7DjWfZuQ

Dutch news site nu.n l has reported the sudden death of coach Boris Orlov.  Boris coached 1981 World Champion Olga Bicherova.  In 1986 he moved from Moscow to Holland and made his home there, holding a number of club and national coaching jobs, including as Head coach of the Dutch national team from 1994 to 1999 .  His gymnasts included Renske Endel and Susanna Harmes, medallists at the 2001 and 2005 World Championships. Boris was 73.  Our thoughts are with his family and friends.

I am on my way home after attending the annual World Congress of the International Society of Sport, which this year was held over three days in Switzerland.  More than 300 participants gathered at the University of Lausanne, on the edge of Lake Geneva, to discuss issues relating to the place of sport in society.  Themes covered included sports policy, anti-doping, social exclusion and participation, ethics, disability, gender issues, sports development, globalisation, Olympism and mega-events and health. I attended the second gathering of the group ISCWAG (International Socio-Cultural Research into women's artistic gymnastics), which is a relatively newly assembled group of academics from all over the world.  You can find profiles of the founder members here .  This year the papers focussed on such subjects as the coach-gymnast relationship and grooming; gender-based violence and gymnastics coaching, and the pattern of older gymnasts continuing to compete in the sport.  There

Russia WAG are travelling to Mallorca today for their annual two week active holiday - mainly two weeks of rest, relaxation and bonding, but with some daily training to keep in shape.  I'm glad to say that Elena Eremina is going there with the team!  It is now still only three months since her op, so still too soon to train fully, but this photo, taken yesterday, shows she has lost neither her beautiful line, nor her desire and enjoyment in gymnastics.   Aliya is staying in Moscow to continue working there as part of her planned training regime.  I suppose this will also enable her to be close to her family and especially Alisa, her 10 month old daughter.

At the next Olympics, the teams will include four all arounders.  This rule change is one of the more positive things that the FIG has done for the sport recently.  Specialists like Denis Ablyazin will still get a chance to qualify for a limited number of specialist spots, but the emphasis on all around achievement is just what gymnastics needs.  The all arounder has always been the most intriguing gymnast, and it is is the all around competition that brings with it the greatest sense of show, endurance and self challenge.  This change will eventually, hopefully, encourage the pursuit of excellent and consistent execution as a route to self actualisation, if not competition medals.  Apparatus specialists can be very exciting, but they are also rather hit and miss.  If the sport's raging epidemic of injuries can also be quelled, and gymnasts can enjoy competing longer, it will be a step forward. I always love the RGF's photo galleries, especially the way they quietly convey stor

Knysh and Korbut in training, 1973 Olga Korbut has repeated her allegations of mistreatment and rape by her coach, Reynald Knysh, in a Russian Jerry Springer style panel show.  She first made these allegations public in the early 1990s. Supported by her sisters, and her first husband Leonid Bortkevich, Korbut confronted Knysh, who has repeatedly protested his innocence, revealing that he had been suspended from the national team after an investigation into complaints made in the 1970s.  Korbut says her abuse went on for over one year. An occasionally hostile audience, and a sceptical panel who included 1968 Olympian Olga Karaseva, could not drown out Korbut's strong and assertive performance.  After Olga was accused of lying, former husband Bortkevich spoke out:  'I was married to Olga for 25 years and she never lies'.   It is now too late for any legal redress against Knysh.   . A Sports Express report  of  the documentary includes a video of the show. Update : a better, f

No good news to report at present from beautiful, brave St Petersburg, as the gymnastics club where national team members Elena Eremina, Valeria Saifulina and Lilia Akhaimova all train faces ruin.  Club Pushkin, built up from scratch by coaches Alexander Kiryashov and Vera Kiryashova, is one of Russia's leading gymnastics clubs for women.  St Petersburg gymnasts are technically clean, well disciplined and happy competitors who generally stay in their sport and work with their club for years.  Tatiana Nabiyeva, Ekaterina Kramarenko and Evgeniya Kuznetsova have all trained at Pushkin and earned medals for their country at world level, including gold.  Current senior national Elena Eremina is vice world champion in the all around and uneven bars events. St Petersburg is a historic city where Imperial Russia left its mark.  The beautiful palaces and waterways mark it out as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, one of the wonders of the world.  Its spirit is fierce and proud as the survivor of

I saw the poster on the wall of the gym and it surprised my teacher when I asked if I could go.  She had noticed that I didn't exactly love PE ... But I loved gymnastics and I wanted to see my favourite, Olga Korbut.  My friends Elaine Richardson, Janet Brooks and Mary Andronowski wanted to come too. We set out in the school coach, all of us excited.  I wore my best purple dress and purple eye shadow and had my little Kodak camera in my bag.  I remember the excitement when we arrived and parked up at Wembley, only a few steps away from the Trident studio where rock band Queen had recorded some of their first album!  I half expected to see them there :-). We found our seats, up in the higher echelons of the Grand Tier.  There was a strong smell of popcorn.  Scampering school children made the boards beneath our feet echo, seats around us snapped up and down, lending the impression of an ever moving sea rather than an attentive audience.  But I was transfixed.  It was my first

I just watched the most discouraging competition of my life in WAG, the AA.  Maybe the team competition yesterday was better - I didn't watch - but the AA left me dead cold.  The highlight was an energetic floor routine from Jordan Chiles.  The rest was complete and utter baloney.  The standard of vault has improved, but elsewhere there were falls aplenty (in fact the only gymnast to go four for four was Ellie Seitz, who finished second).  Beam routines lacked any fluidity and were almost all staccato, stuttering shambles.  The standard of tumbling on floor was fairly good, but choreographically the routines were empty.  Where did split leaps go?  When did bouncing on the spot take their place?  When did shuffling while pathetically waving wrists about or wiggling hips and shoulders semi-suggestively qualify as connections?  When did it become OK to fudge half hearted leaps into the corner of the floor mat, as if no one would notice? In the end, no one will notice, because they wil

There is so much talk of sport in the media recently, in a negative way, that I wanted to express my thoughts. The three themes that regularly emerge are corruption, cheating and cruelty, or a combination of all three.  Sports politics, at various levels local, regional, national and international, are an overarching consideration, as are gender and racial issues.  Most sports are funded by national and local governments on one level or another.  Corporate organisations sponsor sports.  Sporting federations wrangle for power.  Coaches fight for prominence.  Sports relationship to medicine, injury and recovery is currently emphasised as never before.  The battle has become as much one of the doctors as of the athletes.  Perhaps the purest part of sport is the action that goes on in the competitive arena. The sociological context of sport differs from person to person, country to country and sport to sport.  The framework of political influences begins at a personal level for the a

World and European champion gymnast Elena Eremina, 16. Elena, and her team mates Lilia Akhaimova, Valeria Saifuluna and Tatiana Nabiyeva, all hail from St Petersburg where they train together under the same roof with world class coaches such as Alexander and Vera Kiryashov. Their predecessors include Olympic champions such as Elena Shushunova, Elena Davydova and Alexander Detyatin Now, it seems, the club is experiencing some problems - their facilities at a 'new' gym are very poor - no pit, they are landing on concrete floors, the apparatus are old, and there isn't enough space for a busy gym with lots of children.   The big problem is that the local St Petersburg admin refuses to help with the refurbishment of the gym.  So Elena, via her Instagram account, is asking us to post and repost her message explaining the situation.   This is a recurring theme in Russia at the moment as we take on board the surprising decision to close the gym in Leninsk-Kuznetsk.  I hope that Ele

Moscow's Sambo club, a multi sports complex with a strong gymnastics history, is currently being demolished and rebuilt with new, improved facilities.  This is not the only example of ongoing sports development in Moscow as the new Dynamo complex, sponsored by VTB, approaches readiness.   Sambo has produced many world and Olympic champions, i ncluding Maria Paseka, Seda Tutkhalyan Alla Sosnitskaya and Elena Zamolodchikova. I  remember a time when Zamolidchikova could only practice her vault with full run up by beginning it in the corridor beyond the main gym, so this development has to be positive!   The club is also home to Greco-Roman wrestlers, with Seda's father, Gurgen Tutkhalyan, as a coach. Renat Layshev, who is an MP in the local Moscow Duma , and Director General of  the sports club, posted these pictures on his Instagram account. Ooo - I almost forgot to mention - figure skaters Evgeniya Medvedeva and Alina Zagitova also compete for the Sambo club!  See them fight for

Valery Liukin has resigned and the vultures are after his entrails.  But is blame the answer?    We have all been mesmerized by medals.  We are all involved in the unhealthy culture of sacrificing young women in the pursuit of extraordinary achievement. Nassar and Karolyi could not have existed without our interest.  We have long known of the inhumanity inherent in elite sport.  Is it really our place to condemn those who fed our fascination for so long?   Liukin has done the honest thing and resigned.  In the past he has apologized for any wrongdoing and seemed prepared to make changes.   He is right when he says we are all looking for someone to blame.  Emotions are running high.  I do not for one moment believe that Liukin is guilty of anything worse than unwise, misplaced, thoughtless words.  He is guilty of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.  But no crime has been committed and there are many who have far more difficult questions to answer. Well now a new head coach can b

In my gymnastics collection that is still gathering dust in my spare room, I have a few copies of a publication called 'Flying Squirrels', produced by a freelance journalist called Keith McCaffety.   This photocopied 'All American Gymnastics Newsletter' was kindly sent to me by friends in America; I never subscribed to the publication directly. The February 1992 edition included a story about international gymnast Erika Stokes and her experiences in elite gymnastics, including a short section on her life at the Karolyi Ranch.  I seem to remember many more similar stories with details of how the gymnasts were treated there.  Remember, the Karolyis defected to the USA from Romania in 1981.  By 1984 they had made an Olympic Champion of Mary Lou Retton, and by the end of 1991 they had their first World All Around Champion, Kim Zmeskal.  The article about Erika was published in February 1992. The same edition records a threat of legal action from the USA Gymnastics Feder

The major centre of gymnastics in Kemerovo Oblast, Siberia - the Mametyev School of Gymnastics in Leninsk - is to close in July 2018, reports the RGF. No announcement has been made in the Club's own website and the reasons for the closure are unclear.  National team members, Anastasia Ilyankova and Nikita Ignatyev, train at the Club and have their families and homes in the district. Leninsk's greatest hero, Maria Filatova, had recently returned home to Leninsk after a long struggle to secure her Russian passport.  Filatova, who owns and runs a Gymnastics club in Rochester, New York, is much loved wherever she goes and was a trailblazer of difficult and artistic gymnastics during her competitive years.  She has always been loyal to her hometown, creating distinctive choreography for 1992 CIS and Russia team member Tatiana Ignatova.  There is a 2016 documentary about her emotional return to Russia on  Youtube . Other gymnasts who have trained at the Club include Valentin Mogilnyi

I cannot find the words to express my thoughts and feelings about the Nassar tragedy.  We are an international community of people motivated by a love for gymnastics.  In the main, young people are the only ones with the energy, skill and daring to be able to compete.  These young people are completely reliant on elders to train safely, to progress healthily and to be happy.  The betrayal when this all goes wrong is total and inexcusable.  To think that there is even one person exists who sees this reliance as an opportunity to hurt and repress individuals for the sake of their own pleasure - it is evil.  J K Rowling's Death Eaters, the Dementors of Harry Potter, have nothing on Nassar and his depraved, selfish pursuit of power.  The horror is complete.  I have awoken to the scale of this horror terribly slowly, as if incapable of distinguishing life from nightmare.  I am removed from the everyday reality of these awful experiences, yet they keep me awake at night.  For the s