Russia Cup will be a qualifying competition for the Russian MAG and WAG teams for the Antwerp World Championships, due to take place late in September. Gymnasts pre-selected for the team due to their participation in Europeans and the Universiade will not be required to compete, so we will not be seeing Aliya Mustafina, Ksenia Afanasyeva, Denis Ablyazin, Nikolai Kuksenkov, Emin Garibov and David Belyavski. This seems a good strategy designed to protect these gymnasts from over exposure.
There are strong rumours on the internet that Viktoria Komova will not appear here. This would have been Vika's first major competitive appearance in over a year, and her only real opportunity to test herself before Worlds, so is disappointing and a little worrying. There is no official news from the RGF about it so, for now at least, we can only speculate and hope that things turn out for the best by the World Championships. In Komova's absence, Anastasia Grishina must be front runner for the WAG all around title. The men's competition will be enriched by the participation of local Penza favourites Pavel Russinyak and Pavel Pavlov.
It is not easy to access information about these Russian domestic competitions. RRG will try to find the best sources and provide links and updates as they become available. Individual and qualification competitions take place tomorrow for both MAG and WAG; WAG team competition on Sunday, MAG team competition Monday, with event finals taking place on Tuesday and Wednesday. There will be live online streaming of Event Finals only, accessible on the RGF website.
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