Rewriting Russian Gymnastics

Simone Alexander drew my attention to this video.    http://youtu.be/DIE0tfdYgos This is the best video of this outstanding floor routine that exists to my knowledge. Groshkova has never competed at World Championships; her light shone all too briefly when she won a silver medal at 1990 Europeans. Has anyone else ever performed that unique double full in in the straight/piked position? Tatiana trained at Moscow Dynamo where her personal coach was Elvira Saadi, who now coaches top internationals in Canada.  Her bars and beam exercises were also packed with innovation and difficulty.  But reliability curtailed her career prospects in the frighteningly competitive field of early 1990s Soviet gymnastics.   She was the focus of a 1987 Soviet TV documentary 'Will You Come To The Ball'. The tumbling in this floor routine - by a very light, spritely gymnast - belies the idea that you have to be muscled to be powerful.  And my, how does she manage to perform with su...

Albert at the All Around Forum posted a link to these two videos, produced by Soviet sports committee Goskomsport in 1990. This was at the very cusp of the breakdown of the Soviet Union and represents perhaps a final record of their sporting educational legacy. Top gymnasts demonstrate basic skills, and we are reminded why the Soviet Union is considered to be a leader in technical excellence twenty years after its last appearance at major competition. The videos are punctuated by character shots of major national championships, and some performances of the then current (1989) USSR All Around Champion Natalia Laschenova, whose complex skills such as the full twisting double somersault dismount from beam appear both powerful and faultless (the take up and twist in the first somersault is almost in the straight position - I think this is the best I have seen the skill performed). The Youtube videos are annotated with the names of the gymnasts appearing, but for the sake of keeping the...