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.

Year of the Pommel Horse :D

Well not really but in the Chinese New Year it's the year of the horse and I thought I would share some of my favourite pommel horse routines. Okay admittedly I don't know much about pommels but I just like these routines. I'm trying to learn more about pommels so today I watched a bunch of Olympic and World routines. If there are any cool pommel routines you guys want to share please leave a comment.

Just Because... Xiao Qin PH 2007

I can never get tired of this routine.

 

Worlds 2013 MAG Day 1 Event Finals Results

FX - Full Results

1) Kenzo Shirai JPN (7.4) 16.000

What can I say he is a twisting machine. Very awesome routine. I love his hard twisting combos and the quad. This guy has some major endurance power.

2) Jake Dalton USA (6.7) 15.600

I enjoyed his routine. He does lots of nice double saltos which is a nice change from the twisting fest. He rivals Kohei's 3/1. Dalton stuck a very nice 3/1. I also liked Legendre's routine but he had way too many hops on his landings.

3) Kohei Uchimura JPN (6.4) 15.500 Best execution 9.1

Best execution 9.1. I love how clean Kohei is. He's very precise and beautiful to watch. The 3/1 twists was beautiful and stuck.

PH - Full Results

1) Kohei Kameyama JPN (6.9) 15.833
2) Max Whitlock GBR (7.2) 15.633
2) Daniel Corral MEX (6.8) 15.633

Highlights - What a thrilling event finals to watch. I was not expecting Kameyama to win. He is very good on pommels. He is clean and has nice lines. Zhang Hongtao was my favourite for execution. He is really clean too bad about his difficultly but it's still a hard routine to do.

SR - Full Results

1) Arthur Zanetti BRA (6.8) 15.800
2) Alexander Balandin (6.9) 15.733
3) Brandon Wynn (6.7) 15.633

Everyone was really good here with the exception of the French guy. They are all so strong, my arms hurts just from watching them. 

Some 2013 NHK Uchimura Routines

PH, SR & PB view more videos Marcos Aurelio

Part 1: Favourite Things From This Quad

It's that time of year again when gym fans starts to blog about their favourite gym moments of the year. I'm going to blog about my favourite moments of the quad, '09-'12. I might have missed some moments but these are some moments I can think of off the top of my head. It's been a crazy quad. I am really happy that I was able to see it all unfold. There were so many disappointments and happiness. I'll start off with 2009-2010.

One moment that comes to my mind was when Koko Tsurumi won 3rd AA in London 2009. Her clean execution was refreshing. I'm glad that Tsurumi was able to win medals at a world championship (WC). I really liked her beam and her very beautiful Ono pirouettes on bars. She even won 2nd in UB EF.

2013 - 2016 MAG CoP Analysis

Edit: The link don't work no more. You can download MAG code from the FIG site.

Here is my analysis of the MAG code of points. If I misinterpreted anything please correct me in the comment section. I am still learning the MAG CoP and will hopefully understand it more by the time 2016 Olympics games rolls around. I compared the the '12 CoP with the new '16 and there seems to be very little changes, which is a good thing for me I guess. I already mildly know how to calculate D-scores for each apparatuses. Vault is obviously the easiest to determine D-scores. I'm most familiar with FX, VT and HB. Men count the top 10 skills. The skills are grouped into 5 different groups and the gymnast must compete one skill from each group. A maximum of 4 skills can only be used from one same group.

Floor Exercise: Not a lot has changed from the old code. By now pretty much everyone knows that only one rollout salto can be performed. The skills from the '12 code and the new one still seems to be the same. Pretty much floor scores will still be closely the same as the '12 code.

Pommel Horse: This apparatus is hard for me to understand. It's kind of like the equivalent to understanding WAG's Uneven bars. From what I can see not a lot has changed from the '12 code. But honestly I don't know enough about PH.

Still Ring: This apparatus still seems the same as from the '12.

Vault: A lot of vaults have been downgraded a point lower. The Shewfelt vault (Yurchenko 5/2 or Amanar) is 5.6, a lot different from the WAG code now. There are three 6.4 vaults, the Yang (3/1 front handspring), Ri (Tsuk dbl tuck 1/1 twist) and Piked Dragulescu. Those three vaults are the highest difficult vaults in this code. I'm going to have to get use to the lower vault D-scores. The calculations for vault finals will be (DVT1 + DVT2)/2 + 10.00 – (VT1 ex deductions + VT2 ex deductions), same as the WAG.

Parallel Bars: The Bilozerchev - Peters, and Dimic are all consider the same elements now. Tsolakidis I is now a G element instead of E. 

High Bar: Not much has changed. The connection value for on bar D/E/F + flight D/E/F or vise versa will now be worth 0.1CV instead of 0.2CV. C+C or more (both flight) is new for 0.1CV. I suspect C+C to be very popular. 
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So that's my attempt at analyzing the MAG CoP. From what I understand not a lot has changed. I could be missing some valuable information. 

Gymnastics Olympic Event Finals Day 1, Part 2

The competition will start in about 5 minutes. I'll be watching here live: BBC

EDIT 1: HELL YEAH, Zou Kai! He was on today on floors. Uchimura had tooo many twists but at least they were CLEAN, I'm happy he won silver. No more event finals for Uchimura. Russia's Ablyazin had a pretty sick routine, congrats to him. Floor Results

Women's vault finals was a DIRTY competition. I felt so sorry for the majority of the ladies. Especially for Maroney. What a sad day. I thought she had it. Honestly, I thought she had still won even with the fall but it wasn't meant to be. I'm happy that Izbasa won but I hate to be a downer but she was pretty scrappy and her vaults weren't really pretty. She didn't fall so she deserved her win. I really want to see her step it up in floor finals though. I would be more happy for her on floor if she wins. OK so Maria Paseka's Amanar was not fully rotated and she had huge landing problems but got third, oh well that's the COP. Vault Results

In Pommel Horse finals Smith and Berki tied but Berki won with the better execution. Berki was truly the cleaner gymnast. He floats much better than a heavy and a bit laboured Smith. Congrats to all the medalists.

PH Results

Gymnastics Olympic Event Finals Day 1, Part 1

This competition will start tomorrow at 9:00 AM EDT time. It will feature the men's floor exercise and pommel horse. The women will only have their vault finals.  Each event will only have 8 competitors. The best 8 gymnasts went through a grueling process to qualify to an event. They will vie for a gold medal as a specialists. I love the event finals. 

Floor: can go in anyway. I would love for Kohei Uchimura to do his double triple tuck, yes double triple tuck or known as the Ri jong Song. It's a crazy skill worth 7 tenths. I'm not expecting him to do well if he goes all out. He has already won his most important gold medal (AA) and that's all that counts IMHO.

There is Zou Kai from China. He's not liked much by fans but he will be one of the strongest competitors. He is really good on floor.

Koczi of Romania has good difficulty but way toooooo much twisting combos with even worse form than Zou IMO. He got a pretty good score in prelims.

There is also the stylish Gonzalez and fan girl favourite Dalton. Uchimura and Zou will go up 1-2 first, so they will both have to be almost perfect and impress the judges.
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Vault: I'm all about Maroney. She must win the vault title. She has IMO the best Amanar in the world. She will have some competition IMO from Izbasa, Paseka and Chusovitina. Yamilet Pena Abreu is also another fierce competitor. She can do a tucked double front vault (Produnova) but she usually falls on it and sometimes doesn't get credit. It will be interesting to see if she can land the Produnova in finals. Also shout out to Black and Rogers from Canada for making the finals.
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Pommel Horse: It will definitely be all about Smith VS Berki. I really don't care about this event. Wouldn't it be cool if Tommasone won? Allez allezTommasone, sorry I couldn't resist.

Start List for tomorrow:  CLICK HERE
I'll be watching live coverage here: BBC

Some British Gymnastics

Louis Smith PH - I admit that he is good but look at how cocky he gets at his dismount.
Beth Tweddle's New FX - It was a watered down set. I actually like the music choice but the dancing is still not artistic enough. Presentation is not her forte.
Beth Tweddle's UB - I'm still rooting for her and I hope she can win gold but I'm really starting to favour Douglas and Mustafina over her. It looks like bars will be an epic battle at the Olympics.

Sellathurai PH Gold at Maribor Cup

Australia's Prashanth Sellathurai WON gold on PH at this weekend's Maribor Cup in Slovenia. I have always liked his pommel work. He beat Smith and Berki, ha. Too bad Sellathurai did not qualify to the Olympics if I'm correct.

D-6.6 + E-9.125 = 15.725

Some MAG European Vids

Smith D-6.9 + E-8.855 = 15.755

 

VS

Golden Berki D-6.9 + E-9.058 = 15.958

 

Marcel Nguyen Gold PB 15.766

 

Vlasios Maras Bronze HB- 15.266 - I liked this routine

Friday Gymnastic News

Since I already started talking about the Canadian National's I felt like I should finish what I started. There hasn't been any official scores out yet but the very reliable gymnastic blog gymnasticscoaching.com has a lot of Canadian National news. I especially liked how he had some MAG details.
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MAG Europeans is going on in Montpellier, France. Here are all the details from: International Gymnast
The official website: ffgym.com
Tons of videos are being uploaded here: GymPOWER1 YouTube Channel
Official European YouTube Channel: europeangymnastics

Olympic hopeful Louis Smith of GBR tied with world champ Krisztian Berki of Hungary on PH in qualification. But with the tie breaking rule Berki finished first because of Smith's lower E-score.

Berki D-6.7 +  E-9.2 = 15.9
Smith D-6.9 + E-9.0 = 15.9