Rewriting Russian Gymnastics

It's worth watching these timeless videos.  Check out the routines of Alla Shishova, especially on beam.  She was ahead of her time.  Also observe the magnificent artistry of Olga Mostepanova and Natalia Yurchenko.  Neither gymnast had intricate choreography, but they were both captivating.  Their work conveyed emotional as well as technical impact.  Yurchenko moves slowly, floating through the air.  Who would think that such a light, slender gymnast as Mostepanova could find all that air time in her tumbles?  Technique, not muscle, gave these gymnasts their power.  Their artistry came from the consummate grasp of technique, something that cannot be expressed as execution or entertainment.  Ilienko, Bicherova, Frolova are other classical members of this team.  They will all be remembered for a very long time. The Soviet team managed to fall off beam even in those days, but their superior difficulty and technique lifted them above ...

For those of you coming to the story about pregnancy doping late, and wondering what on earth those translations I published this morning are all about, some context -  The Observer published a history of cheating in sport on the 15th November that featured allegations of pregnancy doping in the USSR gymnastics team at the 1968 Olympics. The allegations were pivotal to their story, although they could have chosen a different example to make their point. I have now published three articles on RRG about this - the first an opinion piece with reference to sources refuting the allegation, and this morning translations of two Russian language reports from 1998 and 2001, including a Vladimir Golubev interview with Karasyova in which she describes the whole story as a 'monstrous' lie.  The chronology has become clearer, and a few confusions been cleared up. I wanted these pieces to go on the record in the English language.  I have written to the Observer readers' editor twice ab...