Rio 2016 Olympic MAG/WAG Event Finals & Final Thoughts PART 1

Artistic Gymnastics at the Olympic games has come to an end. It felt like it went by quickly. There were lots of happiness and disappointments. But for the most part I am satisfy with how everything went.

Team China came out with no individual medals but two team bronze medals for MAG/WAG is something to be proud of. Their program is still one of the top level powerhouses. China would have liked to win individual medals but most of them did not performed to their best abilities, especially the men. I do believe the Chinese WAG scores have been low balled through out the competition but I also believe that everyone deserved their placings. Also disappointed with Team Japan individually but they got the coveted MAG Team Gold and AA. 

I am liking that team Great Britain and Russia won many individual medals. I was not having much expectations for MAG Russia but they really proved themselves. I think this was one of the interesting and exciting things to see at the Olympics.

At the Olympic level it is the best competition to win but also as gymnastics fans we know more beyond what we see at the Olympics. We know the true beauty and work of these gymnasts. Olympic games does not necessarily define a gymnast. The Olympic games doesn't always showcase all the best gymnasts in the world. All these gymnasts are winners for competing in such a tough sport. Sometimes we don't agree about placings because we are so passionate and knowledgeable. But when the results are sealed and done there is not much we can do.

Somewhere there is a new gymnastics fan because they watched the Olympic games. In time, hopefully they realize it's not always about winning and placings. In my opinion it's also about marveling about the beautiful strong powerful skills and performances that they do. Watching your favourite win is an added bonus. Everyone is bias for whatever reasons. But we also need to find a way to feel stress free. We should try to see the beauty in everything.

MAG FX Results 
1. Max Whitlock 15.633
2. Diego Hypolito 15.533
3. Arthur Nory 15.433

The only surprise about this podium was Arthur Nory. I'm a bit confused about his name as I've always been calling him Nory. In this sport you just got to do the best and things can work out. I am happy for Nory. I am more happy for Hypolito. He had so many disappointments in past Olympics that this silver probably feels like a gold to him. His routine is full of multiple saltos which makes his routine exciting to watch. Then there's Max Whitlock. He is also a twisting machine like Kenzo. There is no surprise he won. He has scored very good on this event in the past. I am disappointed that Kenzo did not do the best he could but that's how this sport is. You just never know what is going to happen.

PH Results
1. Max Whitlock 15.966
2. Louis Smith 15.833
3. Alex Naddour 15.700

It was going to be a battle with teammates Whitlock and Smith. I thought Smith was actually going to win but Whitlock's difficulty outdid Smith's routine. I really like French man Tommasone but he had a few small errors and America's Alex Naddour was able to do his best routine to go over him. Gah I just like Tommasone elegance.

WAG VT Results     
1.Simone Biles AVG 15.966
2. Maria Paseka AVG 15.253
3. Giulia Steingruber 15.216

Well this final was intense because these women attempted some very difficult vaults. Chusovitina and Dipa Karmakar both did Produnova vaults. It's nice to see Karmakar place 4th for India. And lets talk about HONG UN JONG! She attempted the triple twisting yurchenko vault! She has guts and is badass. She fell and was not awarded TTY but it was still exciting to watch. I know safety is important but all these women were walking off being bosses. Maria Paseka does not have beautiful vaults but I am happy that she successfully medal because that was her only event she competed in Rio. When it came to Simone Biles I was rooting for her so hard because her vaults are so beautiful to watch. I'm happy she won. And Steingruber medal in 3rd is great for her and Switzerland. Her vaults are always powerful. This was a nice medal for her since later on she had a disappointing floor finals.

Still Rings Results  
1. Eleftherios Petrounias 16.000
2. Arthur Zanetti 15.766
3. Denis Abliazin 15.700

The strengths of these men are incredible. It really makes me motivated to work out. I was disappointed with the Chinese men. It really makes me miss great Chen Yibing who I still believe was robbed in 2012. Denis did a commendable job on rings he always has been a good rings worker. Zanetti was last up so he knew what he had to do for the win but his routine was not as crisp and precise as Petrounias. The lord of the Rings was rightfully Petrounias.

Maria Paseka UB Glasgow 2015 Podium Training

Nice routine and I'm hoping lots of success for her. I hope she medals on vault or even win :)

Maria Paseka 2015 Russian Cup TF/QF VT & UB

In 2012 I was unsure of Paseka. I was kind of a hater but she has really grown on me. She is really improving. Her vault and bars has been getting better each year. Like Afanasyeva said to her, "Masha, don't give up!" Don't give up Paseka.

Nice Amanar and her Cheng improved a lot. Her bar connections are on point! I'm a new fan.

Paseka VT Gold & Kramarenko UB Gold (D-score) @ Universiade 2015

A lot of unflattering leg separations but still very good first vault. I hope she keeps staying consistent for Russia.

And here is Kramarenko's bar routine. I like her composition. I like that she has two shap 1/2 variations in her routine. Sooo pretty. The only thing that takes away from this routine is the pak salto. It has always been like that. It's good to see Kramarenko still sticking around.

Stalder 1/1 +  Stalder Shap 1/2 (D+E) 0.1CV
Toe 1/2 + Jaeger (C,D)
Pak salto (D)
VLW (E)
Toe 1/1 + Tsuk (D+D) 0.1CV

3.3 + 0.2CV = 3.5 + 2.5CR = 6.0 D-score

Maria Paseka VT QF @ 2015 Universiade

Good vaulting except for that huge pre-flight leg separation. She has been doing very good lately. Russia needs these vaults.

 

Team Russia - Montpellier 2015 Montage

By: RUSGymnastics

Maria Paseka VT Gold @ 2015 European Championships

There is now proof that she can do the Cheng vault. A bit messy but she did it. Paseka is improving a lot. Well deserved gold medal.

 

2014 WAG Russian Championships April 2-6

Usually this meet is used to determine the European team. According to most of the Russian media all of the 2012 Olympian members should be competing.

Recently on tumblr I did a post about when was the last time we saw the 5 Olympians. So I thought I would share it here on this blog. It's hard to let go of the 2012 team and move forward with the new seniors but this is just to show how I'm excited to see the return of some of the Olympians. Hopefully they will all show up.

Russia still has new hope in Kharenkova, Rodionova, Shelgunova, Sosnitskaya, Fedorova etc. Russia will still be one of the top contenders for Europeans.

I won't have high expectations for the gymnasts at this meet. They shouldn't be so perfect early in the season. I'm wishing everyone good health and for them to do the best that they can do.

I'm most intrigue in seeing how Komova has been progressing. I won't have high expectations but it would be nice to just see her back in competition. It's been too long. I'm not sure if I can follow this competition as I might be busy but I'm sure there will be lots of Russian fans posting up to date information. The official website for results is sportgymrus.ru.

If all of the 2012 Olympian shows up it will be the first time since we saw (compete):

Komova in 1 year and 8 months at the 2012 Olympic Games! Favourite routine was 2012 AA FX.

Grishina in 10 months at the 2013 Anadia Cup where she won uneven bars gold.

Afanasyeva in 9 months at 2013 Universiade Games. Favourite routine was AA FX.

Paseka in 8 months at 2013 Russian Cup where her best result was on uneven bars 2nd.

Mustafina in 4 months at the 2013 Stuttgart World Cup on beam in team finals.

Tatiana Nabieva's 2013 Russian Cup BB & Some other Random Rant

Here is part 2 of 2013 Russian Cup EF. This channel has the other part. The Russian stream is getting better but still needs a lot of work. Anyway I'm still grateful for coverage.

Latest news on the Russian front is that the WAG team has been announced. Only three names have been confirmed Mustafina, Afanasyeva and Nabieva. The last spot will be decided between Komova and Paseka. I'm still skeptical of what is going on in Russia but at this point it doesn't matter because it's an individual worlds. I think Nabieva is a good gymnast and I don't want to say anything negative so I hope she proves me wrong. Too bad she doesn't transfer her personality to her gymnastics. She seems very bored. She needs more oomph to her gymnastics. Even some of her boring teammates seem to have more vibrant gymnastics than her. I think Nabieva is coming along good but she is still only competitive on bars IMO. I guess it's good she is on the team because the unpredictable Grishina supposedly axed herself off the team by not wanting to compete at nationals due to back pains. I don't know who to believe, Grishina or Rodionenko. Rodionenko basically said Grishina is no longer in contention because Grishina walked out, hmm. Also I hear Dementyeva is not sure if she'll continue gymnastics, it's a shame honestly. I hope no one was bully to get off the team. I know I'm starting drama but somethings don't seem right IMHO.

To end this post on a somewhat positive note. Nabieva had a rather nice beam routine. I like it because she has potential and I could talk about her bars but we already know she is good there. She has the beam skills she just needs to be less cautious. She's lacking spark and aggressiveness for what could be a very good beam. I hope her AA quest works out for her. I put the whole part 2 up since I can't find a single clip of Nabieva's beam routine. Skip to around 1:06:13

Front Tuck 1/2 (F)
Switch Leap + L-turn (C+C) 0.1
RO + Layout (E) 0.1
Y-turn (C)
Aerial Cartwheel (D)
2/1 Spin (D)
Dbl Tuck (D)

3.2 + 0.2CV= 3.4 + 2.5CR= 5.9 D-scores if she gets everything credit. Not shabby and she won this event.

Some 2013 Russian Cup National Routines

Maria Paseka's and Tatiana Nabieva's new floor routines. Maria debuts new DLO! She got lost a bit but this was a very new routine for her. More videos here Leksy566.

Thoughts on WAG Russian TF Universiade 2013

I've only watched the Russian team because only subdivision 4 had live feed and there wasn't really much to comment about the other teams. The Russian gymnasts won with a comfortable lead of 175.5. Japan 2nd and Germany 3rd. The live feed wasn't great but at least I got to see some gymnastics. The audio for the commentators was hard to hear as the background crowd noise drowned the commentary. I did my best to hear what they said.

Please note these are unofficial results and I will post the official results soon. I also didn't edit this post so some things might not make sense.

The floor rotation started out good enough. There were some mistakes but some beautiful stuff.

-Tatiana Nabieva started on floor. It's been a while since she has competed and it's nice to see her. She had lovely new floor rouitne and I like her music choice. She opened up with 3/1 twists, second pass 5/2 twists + 1/2 twist. All her spins were single L-turn and Y-turn. The only major error was her huge out of bounds on the double pike dismount. Good start for her.

-Aliya Mustafina did the the same tumblings as usual but no stag on the double arabian and only a layout front on the 5/2 twists. She changed her third pass to 3/1 twists and her dismount to double tuck. I like it that way. She did a new spin combo single L-turn + Memmel, very nice. I saw on the screen she got a score of 13.75.

-Ksenia Afanasyeva debuted her new floor rouitne. I'll be honest maybe she wasn't fully committed to the routine and the music was soft which I didn't really like the new routine but the bias in me will wait to see it more to see if I like it. I have to say that her composition steps on the floor is always the same. What I mean is she always uses the same areas of the floor to move from place to place (I hope that made sense). I didn't really see any great moment of choreography. I think it is true that artistry is being sacrifice for difficulty, sad. But she still has an elegant way of moving around and  I do like the dramatic low floor choreography after her stuck double pike. In terms of the skills and tumbles she did the same things, nothing new and she had some errors a hop on DLO and a very nerve wreaking front layout, she almost fell. I saw she got 14.750 at first it seems high but she has high difficulty and I will have to see the routine again to understand the 14.750.

The broadcast did not show Anna Dementyeva

On vault there was limited showing of the Russians. Mustafina had a stuck DTY for 14.950. They only showed Nabieva's 2nd vault RO 1/2 on front pike 1/2. Afanasyeva did 2 vaults but they only showed her 15.000 DTY with a step back. The broadcast completely skipped Maria Paseka's vaults.

UB:

-They skipped Dementyeva's routine

- Nabieva did a lovely routine. She is considered a bars specialists. I love her work and she seems so happy to be competing again. She did toe 1/1 + shap + pak, stalder 1/1 + VLW, toe 1/2 + jaeger, and Tsuk dismount. Good score for 14.400.

-Mustafina did her same 6.3 routine. She looked good enough. She does seems a little tired on this event now and I hope she can upgrade her routine but I think she will because 6.3 might not be good enough for world championships. She scores 15.000 so that's means she got 8.7 execution.

- No Afanasyeva broadcast view but heard the commentators saying she fell, ouch. I heard she got a low score of 12.55 eek.

Then when it came to beam they completely missed everyone but Dementyeva and half of Tatiana's routine. Tatiana did okay for a low difficult beam routine. She waited a bit long going into her dismount but she landed it to her feet.

Aliya got a nice score of 15.200 but no live coverage of her routine :( boo.

The highlight for me was Dementyeva's beam. She looked fierce up there. She debuted a nice double pike worth E and even though it's lower in difficulty to her 3/1 twists dismount the pike works better. She got a score of 15.300. Her beam set was, roll on mount, switch ring, onodi + front aerial + sheep jump (very beautiful connection), Aerial cartwheel + leap series, RO + layout, full turn, split ring, dbl pike dismount. Nice work from Dementyeva.

- Afanasyeva's routine was not showed but I heard she had a solid routine for a 14.200.

Overall I think the Russians did good and it was nice to see Nabieva back with her expressive attitude :D. It wasn't tough competition for the Russians but I'm happy they won on home soil.

Team Russia's 2013 Universiade Teams Announced

The team members will be Aliya Mustafina, Ksenia Afanasyeva, Tatiana Nabieva, Anna Dementyeva and Maria Paseka. Source 

I read somewhere that the eligible age is 17 so technically some of the competitors don't have to be in University/College. I'm not 100% sure about this though.

It's nice to see Tatiana Nabieva and Anna Dementyeva on the team. Here is another article where Valentina Rodionenko talks about the MAG & WAG team.

This is just my fun speculation of how the team will be used. The format will be like the Olympics 5-4-3 but if I'm not mistaken the qualifying round will also be the team finals. So 4 gymnasts up and 3 scores count for team finals. The first gymnast I name will be the score that they will most likely want to discard.

Here's my line up, just for fun speculation :)

VT: Tatiana Nabieva, Ksenia Afanasyeva, Aliya Mustafina, Maria Paseka
UB: Ksenia Afanasyeva, Maria Paseka, Tatiana Nabieva, Aliya Mustafina
BB: Ksenia Afanasyeva, Anna Dementyeva, Aliya Mustafina (this one was tricky because Paseka and Nabieva are pretty useless on beam and floor so all these three gymnasts scores must count)
FX: Anna Dementyeva, Aliya Mustafina, Ksenia Afanasyeva

It is interesting to note that Valentina did say Nabieva restored AA but doesn't have a second vault so she could contribute on beam and floor in qualification.

Maria Paseka Unexpectedly wins 3rd on Bars

Well I didn't expect her to even qualify. Seeing how sad she was in vault finals I must admit that I'm happy she came back to win 3rd on bars. I've been a long time Paseka hater but she has grown on me. I actually wasn't able to watch bars finals but I heard it was a splat fest so perhaps that helped Paseka to medal.

Some Favourites For WAG European 2013

Okay this will be a post for some of my favourites to win or medal. I just quickly wrote this so it's not a well thought out post. First I'm just going to start talking about Ksenia Afanasyeva, after all my blog is named after her Olympic number. She has made this competition exciting. Let's all admit it we all thought it was crazy when we heard reports of Afanasyeva training the Amanar vault. At her age and knowing her vaulting ability it was just crazy to hear that she could do an Amanar. She does says that she can only do it to pit surface and doesn't know if she will compete it. Later reports on the gymternet reports that during podium training she in fact did do the Amanar, even if some of the attempts weren't successful, it is 100% true that she is training this vault. Reports also says she warmed up 7/2 twists, that's 3-1/2 twists in case you're wondering. Apparently she will do AA. I think she can have a shot at AA but her best shot is floor gold. I'm not sure why she is even trying to do AA or an Amanar but good for her! She is my favourite gymnast so it's exciting to hear all these news.

I love love her spin combination. 

 (Source: starkofwinterfell)

She is taking risks on spins while other gymnasts are taking risks on leaps. Her main competition will be the Romanian gymnasts. I don't particularly like their style but they are very very good on floor. Here is Afanasyeva's winning 2013 French Cup floor. She has posted the highest FIG world Cup score on floor for this year, 14.633.

(Source: starkofwinterfell)

2013 European Nominative List

Ksenia Afanasyeva 2013 Russian Championships

The 5th individual MAG & WAG Europeans will take place in Moscow, Russia. Aliya Mustafina, Anastasia Grishina, Ksenia Afanasyeva and Maria Paseka will represent Russia. Here is the rest of the Nominative Registration 

It's been 3 years since Afanasyeva has been to a European Championships. So happy she made it.

The competition will start April  17-21.

Thoughts on 2013 Russian Championships

These are just my opinions and impressions of this meet. I'm basing it on the live feed videos and interviews that I have read. This event was to determine which 4 WAG gymnasts would make it to the European Championships. The full WAG results AA EF.

Grishina, Mustafina, Shelgunova

My impressions of this meet is that it was basically a practice meet for the top gymnasts. They weren't all at their best shape and peak. My theory is that Mustafina worked really hard on her new beam routine and wasn't too worried about getting her other events. With time she will work to get her other events up to par. She was pulled out of day 2 event finals to rest her knee. This is good that Mustafina is gaining more confidence on beam. Her DTY vault is still great as always. Her bar set is still great. Even if it's a watered down routine, in my opinion she doesn't have to worry about upping her difficulty for this year. If she wants to make it to Rio I think she still has time to figure out a new bar routine mid quad. I think it's a smart idea that she is focusing on beam. For floor she might surprise us with some upgrades but for this competition she looked tired and rusty on this event. I don't think she was ready to compete floor at this event and she'll be ready by Europeans. Mustafina is the new Russian all around champion with 59.850.  Russia really needs to keep this girl healthy and safe.

Anastasia Grishina did well enough winning AA 2nd and gold on UB. She does need to get her DTY consistent though. She crashed it in team finals. It seems she is a bit weak in terms of endurance. It's really hard for her to finish up a floor routine without crashing or staying in the corner for a long time. It seems she just needs a lot of repetition and practice to get consistent. Apparently she was feeling fatigue for day 2 event finals so she scratched that finals. I think it's a shame because it seems she is not a strong enough gymnast. Most likely her coaches just wanted to keep her safe and free from injuries as she is most likely to be the 2nd AA for Europeans Championships.

Maria Paseka

Perhaps another reason for letting Grishina off the hook was to give competitive competition for Dementyeva, Afanasyeva and especially for new senior Evgeniya Shelgunova. This was particularly a weak day 2 event finals, well actually day 1 was pretty weak as well. With no Mustafina and Grishina it was a competition to see who would be the other gymnasts to compete with them at Europeans. In day 1 EF, Maria Paseka won vault with a decent enough Amanar. She is in the mix for contending for a European spot. Valentina Rodionenko stated that the team will be Mustafina, Grishina and Paseka. The others must prove themselves worthy, mainly Dementyeva, Afanasyeva and Shelgunova. I still think the team is undecided between Paseka, Afanasyeva and Shelgunova.

On day 2 EF Dementyeva pretty much lost her spot. She fell on her 3/1 dismount off beam and had problems on floor, she botched her Memmel badly and fell. Afanasyeva still proved that she is relevant to team Russia. Like Mustafina, Afanasyeva is doing some interesting new beam combinations. She stayed on beam and looked good enough. Her beam was obviously a work in progress routine. She still did 6 acro skills in her routine so that tells me that this is her chance to just practice and not take this event so seriously. Her routine consisted of Kochetkova + split leap 1/1, truly impressive! Also Onodi + side somi + 1 1/4 spin! The 1 1/4 spin was unexpected for me. This routine is a risky routine but hopefully she'll get it down and figure out which skills she'll use and leave out. I'm guessing she most likely did not get credit for all her connections as her beam score was low 13.775, no D-scores posted. It's encouraging that Afanasyeva is working up the courage to do these combinations.

Goryunova, Afanasyeva, Polyan

Her floor was alright. Could have been much better. She is still the top Russian to have the highest floor difficulty. I think it's a bit sad for Russia but it does give Afanasyeva a better chance at making European and world teams. Her double layout is still sky high and powerful. She had some issues with her difficult whip + whip + 3/1 twists. Her spins are beautiful but at the end of her routine she went out of bounds on her double pike. Actually a lot of the gymnasts went out of bounds on their double pikes, hmm. Afanasyeva scored a low 13.600 and still won! It's great that Afanasyeva is still committed to continuing. It seems she will only get better on beam and floor with more work and time. Oh and she can still do a decent DTY which is good for her and Russia.

New Russian senior Shelgunova may have some bad form and execution faults but she is a steady and consistent competitor. She did a good job of staying on beam and doing an okay floor routine. She won beam with 14.050 and also won 3rd AA. Beam final scores were low but Grishina and Mustafina could have posted huge scores if they competed in EF.

Overall I was impressed most with Mustafina's and Afanasyeva's upgraded beam routines. It's great that Paseka can still do the Amanar, although it still looks scary with bad execution. Russia is not at full strength and they don't have the depth of USA so it's encouraging to see the Russian Olympians competing and getting back into the groove of things. It's early in the season so most of them will hopefully get better when the real competitions are on. I haven't forgotten about the talented Komova who is sitting out due to back injury. Hopefully she will be ready for worlds.

I think the Russian coaches still have a lot of decisions to make for the European team. Some things are still not clear. If they bring Shelgunova she could make AA finals if her other teammates falter but most likely that might not happen and she doesn't have much difficulty to contend for EF medals. So will the Russians just bring her for qualification? Or will they take Afanasyeva who could win a floor medal. Will Paseka still be able to do the Amanar in April for Europeans? As we all know she is not great on any other events. Paseka's bars is okay but if they have Grishina and Mustafina on the team Paseka's bars will not be received well by the judges. So basically she is a one event woman. I think Russia still has some internal competition. Also there are some up and coming world cup events. Afanasyeva and Paseka to the French Cup. Grishina, Shelgunova and Dementyeva to Cottbus Cup. Looks like Aliya will just compete at internal events.

Call me bias but I hope Afanasyeva makes it to European Championships. She missed 3 European Championships in a row, due to injuries or getting back in shape from injuries. Maybe this is her chance again? But on the other hand I feel Afanasyeva has been given many chances and maybe it's best for Russia to give other girls chances. I say maybe Shelgunova does need the experience and Paseka should be rewarded for her Amanar. I think Universiade will be perfect for Afanasyeva. Maybe Afanasyeva missing a lot of Europeans will be a blessing in disguise. Maybe she'll make it to worlds? I hope so.

I'm also glad to see that some other older veterans like Pavlova, Myzdrikova, Kramarenko etc are still competing. Pavlova's regional team won gold :)

*photo credits sportgymrus

Some 2013 Russian Championship Routines

From London To Rio Gala Montage

Here is the montage of the gala, From London To Rio. It features many stars like Ponor, Izbasa, Afanasyeva, Pavlova, Paseka and so on. It's a teaser montage and I believe the show will be fully available on the 12th of February. I'm happy that this came out today especially on a snowstorm like today. Enjoy!

News Roundup - Komova injured?

-I just read a new article that talks about how Komova might miss this year's European and Russian Championships. She is having some kind of back problem and will have a proper diagnosis within 2-3 days. I hope it will not be serious. Hopefully she will be fine for worlds in October. Source 

-There will be a gala competition in France called From London to Rio. The list of gymnasts are pretty impressive. It will include artistic, rhythmic, and trampoline gymnasts.

MAG - David Belyavskiy, Emin Garibov, Alexander Klochkov, Vyacheslav Veselov,
WAG- Catalina Ponor, Sandra Izbasa, Ksenia Afanasyeva, Maria Paseka, Anna Pavlova(!)

Gala starts February 1-2 Official Website 

2012 Team Russia Forever

Montage made by SuperGymmie