Rewriting Russian Gymnastics

Interview with RGF President Vasily Titov.  Confirms broad details of competitions to take place next year.  Efforts to clarify FIG/IOC requirements are underway, but there isn’t much communication.   President of the Artistic Gymnastics Federation of the Russian Federation Vasily Titov - about relations with the IOC and FIG, domestic competitions and motivation of athletes under the ban ❓ Are the gymnasts planning any competitions next year? 💬 A very busy schedule of domestic competitions, primarily the March Russian Championship in Sochi. In addition, artistic gymnastics is included in the program of the BRICS Games in Kazan, the Friendship Games in Moscow and Yekaterinburg. Plus a match meeting with the Chinese. The first one was already very successful at the youth level at the end of November in Kazan. There will still be meetings at the level of large national teams ahead. ❓ With the participation of stars like Nikita Nagorny and Angelina Melnikova? 💬 Yes, of cour...

Highlights from an interview with the 1981 and 1985 World Champion, from the RGF’s magazine ‘Gymnastika’.  Yuri died suddenly in April 2023. Are you a children's coach, or do you prefer elite (‘champion coach’). I like working with adults more. It’s easier with them.    After all, this is my level in gymnastics and it’s easier for me to convey it. You are a nanny with children, all the time you are fighting with yourself: it seems that you have already brought your best to the international platform, but you are busy with “cartwheels” and somersaults. Would you have won the AA at the 1984 Olympics? I'm 90 percent sure that I would have won it. It’s impossible to say one hundred percent in sports, but there is no doubt that I could have fought for first place. On his gymnastics home, the Nikolai Tolkachev School of Gymnastics in Vladimir They say that on any platform you can immediately recognize gymnasts from the Vladimir school... This is the technique, cleanliness, chor...

‘Vladimir Putin approved a list of instructions following a meeting of the Presidential Council for the Development of Physical Culture and Sports. These included the creation on Russky Island and in Vladivostok of centers for martial arts, artistic and rhythmic gymnastics, hockey, swimming, boxing, a tennis academy and an athletics arena as part of a federal sports and training center for training Russian national teams. 💬 For a country of the size of Russia, it is important that in different regions there are educational and training centers that correspond to the most modern level of development of sports, including the highest achievements. The Far East needs such a center. We have repeatedly discussed the prospect of its creation, including within the framework of the Presidential Sports Council. I think this is very correct and timely,” Titov told Match TV. 💬We raised the issue of creating a base there for a very long time. This is a part of Russia where there are few gymnastic...

Russia is to build new sports complexes in the far east of the country, says RGF President Vasily Titov following a meeting of the Presidential Council for the Development of Physical Culture & Sports.     The plans to create two new national training centres has been signed off by President Putin.     The locations, Vladivostok and Russky Island, both have a wider strategic importance for Russia in building relations with China. Via Match TV/Google ‘The President of the Russian Artistic Gymnastics Federation (FSGR) Vasily Titov told Match TV that he considers the decision to build sports training centers for Russian national teams in the Far East correct and timely. Earlier, Vladimir Putin approved a list of instructions following a meeting of the Presidential Council for the Development of Physical Culture and Sports. These included the creation on Russky Island and in Vladivostok of centers for martial arts, artistic and rhythmic gymnastics, hockey, swimming, ...

The coach of Chinese gymnasts believes that Paseka and Nabieva made the team stronger Russians worked as coaches in the Chinese women's artistic gymnastics team from October 2022 to August 2023 KAZAN, November 22. /TASS/. Russian artistic gymnastics world champions Maria Paseka and Tatyana Nabieva, who worked as coaches with the Chinese women's team, made the team even stronger. This opinion was expressed to TASS by the coach of the Chinese team, Zhou Shiping, during a match between the junior artistic gymnastics teams of Russia and China in Kazan. In October 2022, Paseka and Nabieva left for China to work with the country’s women’s national team. In August, after the expiration of the contract with the Chinese Gymnastics Association, they returned to Russia. “Paseka and Nabieva worked very friendly together with our Chinese coaches. They helped our athletes a lot. The gymnast who worked with Nabieva became first at the World Youth Championships in the balance beam exercise. Sh...

Aliya Mustafina is now national coach with responsibility for the junior WAG team.  She runs a happy ship; her gymnasts are confident and there is a good team spirit evident. The leader of the team, Zlata Osokina, couldn’t compete in Kazan against China this week as she was resting an injury.  Her absence was precautionary.  Now read on as Aliya Mustafina sums up how the competition went. Source : TASS.  Google translate. ‘Two-time Olympic champion in artistic gymnastics Aliya Mustafina admitted that it was more difficult for her to perform as an athlete than to participate in competitions as a coach. She told TASS about this during a match between the junior artistic gymnastics teams of Russia and China in Kazan. 💬 “Now, probably, everyone will be surprised, but it was more difficult for me to perform,” said Mustafina. “I don’t know why this is so, they usually say, on the contrary, it would be better if I went out and did it myself. It was more difficult for me to...

As usual, Valentina Rodionenko has an opinion on the current Canadian Gymnastics suspension of Elena Davydova, and has a verdict to deliver on Elvira Saadi, too.  Davydova has been invited to return to coach in Russia - she still has her apartment in St Petersburg, apparently. Remember that Andrei Rodionenko headed up Canadian Gymnastics’ training for eight years until moving back to Russia in 2006.  Valentina’s opinion of the relative merits of Elvira and Elena’s coaching styles may have some basis in fact. Read the whole story in English (Google translate from the original Russian language source - TASS) below. ‘Valentina Rodionenko: “Davydova needs to return to Russia, we will be happy to take her” Valentina Rodionenko believes that Elena Davydova needs to return to Russia. Two-time Olympic champion in artistic gymnastics Elena Davydova was temporarily suspended from coaching in Canada “Elena Davydova needs to return, we will be happy to take her. Lena left Leningrad for Ca...

 Tatyana Nabieva and Maria Paseka spent a year in China, working as coaches for the country's women's national team. We spoke with Tatyana about her experience working with Chinese gymnasts and memories of the trip. ❓ How did the idea to go to China even come about? Was this a long-planned invitation from the Chinese side? 💬 This was a complete surprise for me. I was in Dagestan, I had my plans lined up, but Masha called and asked if I wanted to go to China to work. I enjoy risk, so I answered: “Why not, let’s go!” ❓ You went to training camps in Russia for many years as a gymnast and even as a personal trainer. What was your job in China? 💬 Let me correct you, in Russia I only went to a training camp once as a personal trainer, replacing my coach. And we were invited to China as specialists to work on individual apparatus. We worked with the Chinese women's team in Beijing. ❓ What kind of equipment did you work with and did you have any specific task formulated before st...

May I recommend this book to you.   Anya is a young girl living in the dark, cold climate of Norilsk, Siberia.    The pollution makes it difficult for people to live healthy, happy lives and her family is riven by illlness and hardship and in particular the disappearance of her mother. Anya is a talented gymnast and she is ‘adopted’ by the state system.    Her coach, Anatoly, is brusque and unforgiving.    He recognises the same ambition in Anya as he has for himself, and propels her through years of relentless training to the very top of the sport, a gold medal at the 1980 Olympics.   There is more to the book than that, though; the cultural and political environment of the Soviet Union is clearly portrayed from the point of view of an ordinary citizen.    The harsh conditions for workers in Norilsk, the queues and the poverty, are well known but the book sensitively reveals the lack of options and freedoms that made life so t...

 Google translate :  “In China they say: if you are Russian, you are our friend.” Gymnast Paseka trained the top team for a year, but returned Maria Paseka is the face of our gymnastics of the last decade. In 2012 and 2016, she won a total of 4 Olympic medals (two each in the team and in the vault). She performed the most difficult jumps and was an important element of the team medal. Paseka’s last start at the World Championships was in 2019, when she was already 24. She could have continued to compete, but the pandemic hit. But it was no longer possible to return after a long break. Last year, Paseka surprised me: she left to work as a coach for the Chinese national team. In the talk show they called her a traitor, but a year later Maria returned. “The Chinese didn’t accept us at first.” How did Paseka make Chinese coaches believe in her methodology? “A year ago, an acquaintance called me,” Paseka said. “I was at a time in my life when I really needed money. He said that the...