Rewriting Russian Gymnastics

Years ago the Soviet team would take extended summer breaks in resorts such as Sukumi, Georgia. These holidays were known as 'active recreation', the chance to relax but also to keep up with important training targets and build teams. Times have changed, but old principles remain and at present the Russian team is holidaying in Palma, Mallorca, using the facilities of a local gym to keep up with their training. Back home in Russia, however, work continues on both the political and sporting front, building relationships with press in advance of the coming Olympics and building reputations for the young gymnasts of the future. The Russian Federation's website includes a photo report of a recent press tour of Lake Krugloye.   It's clearly a busy day, with journalists interviewing key members of the coaching staff as well as some of the gymnasts.  It is interesting to see Konstantin Pluzhnikov taking a leading role in orienting the visiting journalists - while he su...

Alexandrov comments on the Russian Federation website on the results of the all around competition : 'Aleksandr Aleksandrov said: "These results cannot be called surprising. Anna Dementyeva competed well and earned her spot. Aliya Mustafina will compete in the World Cup qualifier in Jacksonville in the USA in a few days. It would have been physically difficult for her to compete in two meets essentially one right after the other and so the Federation made the decision to allow her to not compete in Russian Championships. Tatyana Nabiyeva only competed on two events and Viktoria Komova is recovering from an injury, and we hope that she will be in good shape in a month for European Championships. Anna Pavlova is an experienced gymnast, but she is competing after a long break. In light of the situation, she had a good chance to win a medal and she made excellent use of that. Alyona Polyan showed an excellent result, and we are now considering her for the University Games in Ch...

A selection of lovely pictures appears on the Russian Federation's website , recording an awards ceremony during which head coaches of the women's and men's teams, Alexander Alexandrov and Valeryi Alfosov, handed out medals to their gymnasts and coaches, including juniors.  A commentary notes that coaches are often better at evaluating the success of their gymnasts than judges.  The medals were given out in recognition of the success of the Russian teams in the last year.  Apparently missing from the gymnasts honoured were Ekaterina Kurbatova and Anna Myzdrikova - although this may just be an unintended slip of the camera. Or perhaps the girls were staying warm, tucked up in bed somewhere.  This must be a welcome distraction for the teams during what is a very cold snap indeed, even by Moscow standards - it must be hard to keep your spirits up when it's below -20 outside.  Tanya Nabieva looks taller than ever in these pictures, and Mustafina, bundled up in a b...