Rewriting Russian Gymnastics

Once upon a time, there were six little girls ... The little girls became gymnasts, and the gymnasts became Champions - but never Olympic Champions. Politics got in the way. 'Their' Olympics, the 1984 Los Angeles Games, disappeared as their country boycotted the Games for political reasons. History vanished. They became a lost Olympic generation. Irina Baraksanova Tatiana Frolova Natalia Ilienko Olga Mostepanova Natalia Yurchenko There was one exception. Elena Shushunova went on to compete at a second Olympics, becoming All Around champion at the Seoul Games in 1988 The 'little gymnasts' (in fact they were extraordinary athletes) competed at the Oloumoc Friendship Games instead of the Olympics. At these Friendship Games, Olga Mostepanova became Champion in the AA, Floor, Vault and Beam, scoring an unequalled total of 40 in the All Around; a level of perfection never seen before or since. There is very little video of this competition...

Natalia Yurchenko in 1984, on the cover of magazine Smena ('camera') When I was a girl, I used to watch gymnastics.  Avidly, concentratedly, passionately.  There was no Youtube or internet so every second of the three or four hours I had pored over on our little black and white TV set had to fuel my interest for a full twelve months, maybe even more.  I had to imagine the rest. The language of gymnastics was exotic and alien to me : Voronin, Tkachev, Tourischeva, Korbut, Tsukuhara.  As the years passed, I became familiar with the meanings and took great pride in being able to pronounce the names.   I grew up in Lincoln, a small town in the East Midlands of England.  Nobody I knew spoke Russian or knew any Russians, and there was, besides, no way of accessing Russian language publications or broadcasts.  Tabloid stories of Cold War, culture and sport, tinged with a strong flavour of suspicion, fear and mystery, developed my taste and fasc...

Natalia wins gold at the World Championships in Budapest, 1983 1983 World Champion Natalia Yurchenko speaks directly to readers of RRG in this exclusive interview.    Early years: In the summer of 1976, at the age of 11, I was accepted to a sports boarding school in Rostov-on-Don. I remember it was a 4-level building with the cafeteria on the first floor, academic classrooms on the second floor, rooms for girls on the third floor and rooms for boys on the fourth floor. There was one TV on the ground floor and the kids who stayed at school over the summer (about 20-30 kids), were able to watch the Olympics. Nadia Comaneci’s outstanding performance made us feel jealous because usually the Soviets were the unbeatable favorites. We did feel some relief with amazing performances from Nellie Kim and Ludmilla Tourischeva. Besides Ludmilla, there was a gymnast from Rostov-on-Don, Svetlana Grozdova! And, we were really thrilled to see the very little and cute Maria Fi...

Aerial view of Christ the Redeemer, Rio de Janeiro. It's 2016, a year of many hopes and promises for us all, Olympians or not.  We are all looking forward at this time of the year and I hope everyone achieves at least a little of what they plan.  Begin your work now, and enjoy the journey.  Most of all I wish everyone much happiness and peace. In Russia, the gymnasts are back at Lake Krugloye and beginning their preparations for the summer, 'step by step' as Aliya Mustafina put it this morning on her Instagram.  Sergei Starkin has been keen to stress the importance of the men's team and in particular Denis Ablyazin to Russia's Olympic effort.   Valentina Rodionenko has made some announcements of team membership for the summer Olympics, but these are too early to make any difference - everyone is training for the Games and the key decisions will be taken much later in the year.  The announcements were initially made via the Russian Olympic C...

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 ...