Simone Biles 2016 USA National FX Day 1

Hot damn this floor routine is amazing. Biles is amazing. Even though we see her being amazing all the time it's still always feel new and refreshing. She makes gymnastics exciting to watch.

Maggie Nichols 2016 American Cup Floor Exercise

She moves stiff and kind of awkward but this was absolutely my favourite routine from American Cup. Very stylish and artistic.

Double Throwback Thursday

In the wake of Ross's and Maroney's retirement here are some of their routines that I liked. Admittedly these routines don't feel like 4 years ago to me. Time has really gone by.

Simone Biles 2015 USA Nationals Day 2 AA Routines

Biles is amazing.

  

Aly Raisman 2015 USA National FX Day 1

The main talk about this routine is the split 1/2 after the double pike. It's not well executed and I don't think she even hits 180. Or what kind of leap was that?

One thing I like to note about the code is that this corner rule is kind of a disaster. Basically you get gymnasts just dancing in the corner and nowhere else. Aly basically dances only in the corners. And those additional dance jumps after leaps are one of the most annoying things about floor routines today.

Either than that Aly is very good on floor. I Like how she does DLO as middle pass :).

  

Simone Biles 2015 U.S Classics Floor Routine

New choreography and music. Hopefully it will grow on me. I did like the low floor choreography starting at 0:51 mark. Everything else was typical American cheerleader type artistry. Music was not good in my opinion but maybe it will grow on me but I doubt it. Aside from those things her tumbling is amazing but gotta get that gogean leap around.

It's going to be hard to beat Biles in AA and floor finals at worlds.

Aly Raisman FX Jesolo 2015

The floor Olympic champion is back. If she gets everything credit her D-score is 6.4. I still dislike some of her style but her difficulty is exciting. I like how she replaced her 3/1 twists for DLO.

Edit: boo, the video has been deleted.

 (photo edit source: giveuslifeagain)

Simone Biles 2015 American Cup Podium Training

Amazing tumbling! Biles is amazing. I love all her passes. Normally I don't act like this but all hail Biles!

 

USA Wins Team WAG Gold || Nanning 2014

Full Results

1) USA 179.280
2) China 172.587
3) Russia 171.462

I watched live on Chinese feed. It's no surprise the mighty strong USA won. I enjoyed their strong difficult floor routines by Skinner and Biles. Yeah yeah I said Skinner :P. At least she woke me up because she does hard stuff that keeps me watching. I wonder what Ross's beam inquiry was about? Say what you want about Ross but she was the only one from USA that I liked on beam. I honestly do not understand how they scored so close to Chinese beam? My favourite part of team finals was China's beam, especially Huang Huidan's.

Romania qualified 7th but came in 4th. I'm happy for them. They were so close to 3rd with 170.963 for 4th place. I saw Iordache on beam and she was on fire. She scored the highest on beam with 15.5! I'm looking forward to seeing Munteanu's beam. She also scored high with 15.2.

Russia managed to take bronze. I saw Spiridonova and Mustafina on bars and they did good job. I only saw Mustafina on beam and floor she had some mistakes but she handled everything well. They fought to stick their vaults. I only saw Nabieva and Mustafina on vault. They did a really good job. They really needed those scores. They are fighters.

Not everything went well for China, Russia and Romania but they shouldn't be so hard on themselves. They are good teams they just need to hit hit hit their routines and maybe they can put pressure on team USA. They need more difficulty too but it's still mid quad. I think China, Russia and Romania knows what they need to do to improve for Rio. I hope they achieve what they intend to improve on. USA is too strong and of course they know they can't get lazy and expect to think they will always win easily. Congratulations to all the teams.    

Ross VS Key DTY || Pacific Rim 2014

I don't get how Ross can score the same execution score as Key's DTY. It probably has to do with the different codes? Key is a junior so the rules are different but I feel 9.5 for Ross is high. I do like Ross and when comparing her gymnastics to other gymnasts routines I can see the clean execution but not this time on the vault. What do you guys think?

 

Peng Wang Doha 2014 FX - Quad Twists

Say what? Let me work out his difficulty. Excuse me if I get anything wrong since I'm rusty with the MAG code.

Bwd 7/2 + Fwd 1/1 (E+C) 0.1CV
Bwd 4/1 (F)
Bwd 5/2 + Fwd 3/2 (D+C) 0.1CV
Fwd 5/2 (E)
Thomas Salto (D)
Fedorchenko (C)
Japanese Hstd (C)
Bwd 3/1 (D)

4.0 + 0.2CV + 2.5EGR = 6.7 D-score || His completions of some twists were iffy but it seems the judges gave him credit for everything.

Here he got 6.7D + 8.4E = 15.1

And here is Paul Ruggeri's routine because he does double saltos.

Kyla Ross Team/AA Routines From Jesolo 2014

I've finally got caught up with Jesolo 2014. My favourite would be Ross. I heard that she was coming back from a back injury? Well I think she did good at this competition. It's still early in the season and she has time to catch up. Even with watered down routines and a 1.0 deduction on vault she still managed to have the top AA score of 58.000. That's pretty impressive. Although I do think her e-scores were a bit high. I just wish she could be a bit less stiff in her gymnastics. Results.

American Cup 2014 Preview

It's that time of year again when the interesting and perhaps the most watched world cup begins, the American Cup. Sadly this year I will miss this event live but usually this competition gets uploaded quickly. I'm gonna try to avoid spoilers. The nominative list.

The MAG will have a strong field. I would say Mikulak (USA) and Hambuchen (GER) will duke it out for gold but I'm betting Mikulak will win. It will be interesting to see how these two do since they are some of the bests in elite gymnastics. Sergio Sasaki (BRA) could surprise us all and win. It's not that he can't do it but he's not talked a lot about. I'm guessing the podium will be something like Mikulak, Hambuchen, Sasaki or Orozco. I'm looking forward to seeing what rating Orozco will get for the Lou Yun 1/2 (I'm thinking still an E). Japan is sending Shogo Nonomura. I remember him being talked a lot about but not really making a big impact. I'm interested in seeing how he will do. Either than that the MAG competition should be good and competitive.

On the WAG side it looks like American superstars Simone Biles, Kyla Ross and Romania's Larisa Iordache will not attend this meet. We saw some exciting upgrades from Biles.

She is also working on a new choreographed routine. Many were excited to finally get to see it this weekend but it was not to be. I heard she's resting her arms/shoulders? I guess it's good to take a break since it's early in the season. USA will still field two strong AA'ers. Elizabeth Price and Brenna Dowell. I'm most excited to see Victoria Moors (CAN). Hopefully she will do the new full in tuck dismount off beam and the exciting 2/1 DLO. Ah and there is Sophie Scheder (GER) and her bar routine, I'm looking forward to that. I think she will be the class act on that event. There will be Giulia Steingruber (SUI) and Roxanna Popa (ESP). They could surprise us with finishing high on the podium. Then there are the Italians, Vanessa Ferrari and Carlotta Ferlito. Ferrari will be the interesting one to watch. She really is a veteran in this sport and she's been able to keep most of her hard tricks for so long. She's one that could surprise and medal on the podium. Last I saw she got back her Comaneci (E) on bars.

        

Double Arabian Tucked + Double Front Tuck!

This is an insane pass by Rohan Sebastian. Dbl Arabian + Double Front (D+D) 0.2CV

Kyla Ross || World without End Montage

Kyla Ross UB 2013 Worlds Prelims 15.133 (D- 6.4)

Love this routine. It's really beautiful.

 

Quick Thoughts on P&G Championships Day 2 WAG (USA Nationals)

- Things started off  well with my favourite Maroney doing a wonderful floor routine. She scored a nice score of 15.250 with difficulty of 6.1. Her leaps are iffy but I enjoyed this routine. She was so close to that OOB on her double pike. I think I have posted way too many Marney floor on my blog but here is another one from tonight.

-Ross's uneven bars as Al put it, "You don't need to know anything about gymnastics, but that was gorgeous." I couldn't agree more. I'm one of those few fans who think Ross has a chance at medalling on bars in Antwerp. I know she will have to face 2 Russians and 2 Chinese but she could pull it off and who knows she could surprisingly win gold.

-During the end things got really dramatic when Biles messed up her toe-on skill. Ross needed a 15.45 to win over Biles but it wasn't enough. I was actually surprised at Ross's 15.25 beam score but I can see where the judges didn't deduct. It's crazy to think that Kyla could have gotten 15.45 for the win. She did win the second day of AA but the combined scores of day 1 & 2 had her in 2nd overall. The results.

Overall I think Biles is the one to beat for AA worlds but this does not mean she is my favourite to win.

Steven Legendre 2013 P&G Floor Day 1

Tonight I was hoping to watch MAG US nationals but no live stream for international viewers :(. What the hell. I wanted to watch NBC coverage. Instead I was waiting and watching USAGym youtube video clips.

This was a nice routine for 15.900. Lots of nice double saltos.

Quick Thoughts On 2013 P&G Championships Day 1 WAG (USA Nationals)

- First, I love how USAG uploads videos so fast to youtube. Thank you to them.

-There were lots of nice double layouts being thrown out on floor. I really like that skill.

-I really dislike how NBC is using that colour triangle thing for their scoring system. And they still do that max and deduction system. Why are they trying to be so different? Is it really hard for them to be normal? Why can't they just use D-score and E-score?

-I was really impressed by Ross's DTY. Tim Daggat said he didn't know where the deductions came from but hello her leg separations in preflight gave some tenths away.

-No one stood out artistically on floor except maybe for Maroney. I dig her style but I always fear she will go out of bounds.

-The Amanars that Maroney and Biles did had huge 0.3 deductions in landings. Biles had a nice second vault.

-Biles beam was watered down (no 2 ff + layout) and a little shaky but her dismount in connection was insane and stuck.

Thoughts on 2013 U.S. Classics

The thing that I was most impressed from the Americans was their difficulty. I think they didn't try to peak or tried to hit all of their routines. I could be wrong though. A lot of them had some problems with their routines but it's not a major issue because this is not an event for them to be at their all time best.

Simone Biles did a cool DLO with a 1/2 twist out. I wonder what the FIG would rate it. Simone should just do DLO 1/1 because she can probably do that skill easily and it's a H. I think she's doing the DLO with 1/2 twist out just to get it named after her if she makes the USA team and successfully competes it in Antwerp. IMO the DLO 1/2 twist out should stay an F. IMO it's easier than the Dos Santos II (Arabian DLO), which is a G. Since FIG has "H" skills IMHO the Dos Santos II should have been rated H too, especially if the DLO 1/2 becomes G. Speaking of the Dos Santos II, Kennedy Baker does it. Edit: Kennedy pikes the Arabian skill. At first it looked laid out.

Kyla Ross won this meet and I was most impressed by her bar routine and her stuck DTY in podium training. I can tell she is working really hard to up her difficulty. I liked that she worked hard on her Van Leeuwen (toe-shap 1/2). She used to have leg sep but now she doesn't and it looks nice.

Maroney is still great on vault. That's not a surprise. I think her new floor routine is okay. I like the DLO but it went out of bounds. I think the middle section of her floor routine music (around 0:41 sec) is funny because it's something my parents would listen to. You know that weird old music tune, it's like an old folk love song. Actually a lot of her other previous floor music has that old feeling music. It's funny in a good way.

Other things that stood out were the difficulty the Americans were doing on floor. Some of the gymnasts were doing two H skills in their routines. I thought Lexie Priessman had interesting music compared to her old music choices. Mykayla Skinner does the DLO 2/1 twists and what's crazy is that she does the dbl dbl tucked as her third pass. One thing that the Americans did a lot was the tucked stand spins on floor and beam, yuck. Also they love to do leaps + tuck/pike backs connections on beam. It gets too boring and Simone Biles rarely gets those skills connected. IMO she should take those out of her routine. She does it once at this competition but earlier in the competition season she was doing more of them and not getting them connected.