The #Russian artistic #gymnastics team competes later today in team final at #olympics2016. Good luck!
Tuesday, August 9, 2016
Monday, August 8, 2016
Russian MAG win first team medal in sixteen years
It was an amazing moment. Sadly my camera work, never the best, suffered under the strain of emotion. I was hoping for bronze and never expected silver. Belyavski was the real captain of this team, his desire to win so evident throughout, Nagorny its beating heart, Stretovich the cool head. Kuksenkov and Ablyazin the engine and accelerator.
The pictures are poor, taken in a hurry on my iPad. But they capture the true passion of the moment. Molodyets, boys.
Men's gymnastics is the best sport in the world. And Russia, with a little more work on high bar, and more precision on floor, could soon be the best gymnasts in the world.
Sunday, August 7, 2016
WAG quals - results - and a reflection on Russia's need for revolutionary progress
See https://live.fig-gymnastics.com/schedule.php?idevent=6405 for the full information
The leaders in the main events in Olympic order are USA, Biles, Biles, Kocian, Biles, Biles. American gymnasts fill the first three spots AA, the first spot on vault, two of the top three on bars, and the top two in beam and floor respectively. The Soviet Union was never as dominant as this - nor was the scoring as inflated. Like the USSR, America deserves its success in general, but the bars scoring in particular has raised some eyebrows. I am reminded of the 1972 Olympics when the Soviet Union took almost all the gold - but then again in one, bars, the winner was East Germany's Karin Janz. Even in those days a slight sense of reality pervaded the scoring.
Still though, USA's dominance is unquestionable. Biles' vaulting and tumbling took my breath away. America has found its style of gymnastics victory and made it the style of gymnastics globally. Only the Netherlands has attempted to impose its own sense of direction on the sport's identity. It has, so far, made little more than a slight dent in the face of gymnastics as a sporting cultural form, but at least the ambition and imagination is there. Russia could do well to examine the thinking behind what this small country has achieved. Surely, with all their heritage of technical excellence and innovation, sprinkled with a flair for the individual and artistic, Russia could create a new paradigm for gymnastics that combines the elegance of the past with the athleticism of the new contemporary acrobatic gymnastics. In MAG, we see this in the work of Belyavsky and, for me, Stretovich, but the thinking needs to extend beyond the individual gymnast into the global planning of every gymnast's training right across Russia from toddler to champion, and into the competition strategy and programming of the best elite gymnasts.
Yes, the only answer is for our Russians to compete here with dignity, then to go home and think again. The gymnasts do not lack ambition or talent, but the coaching needs an overhaul. Russia needs to lead, not follow, in the sport of gymnastics and its coaches need to speak and live the rhetoric of winning ways if they are to succeed. Strategy and direction needs a total rethink. Change has to be in the air if Russia is to refresh and find its winning identity in women's gymnastics once more. Russia's coaches have proved remarkably effective in envisioning and implementing radical change in many different countries around the world - see what Alexandrov did for Brazil, Zaglada for Britain, and that's just a beginning! - now it is time to do the same, only better, for their own country.
I'll write more about this after the Games. In the meantime, congratulations to Aliya, Seda, Angelina, Maria and Dasha, and good luck for tomorrow's final!
I'll post images of the key results below, but you will find them easier to read at the link above.
Mustering up that musty magic
Moments after qualifying for the team, AA and UB finals, Aliya gave a short interview to Elena Vaitsekhovskaya for Sports Express. The accompanying pictures tell as much as the words.
Asked about her fall from beam, Aliya said, 'I have forgotten about it already. There is no point in remembering it.'
'It was very hard waiting for the competition to begin; I could only just bear it. Every morning, I wake up with the same thought, wanting it all to be over as quickly as possible,' said Aliya.
Asked about her bars performance, where she scored the highest of all to date, Aliya said, 'Can I tell you a secret? It was me who did it!'
Team captain, consoling a disappointed Angelina Melnikova
The life of a champion is essentially a solitary one, when it comes to the hard moments of competition.
Seda Tutkhalyan is the top Russian qualifier in the AA
Source - Sports Express.ru
Don't panic
Although they have tested my sanity to its limits, team Russia is OK. Seda and Aliya will have qualified to AA finals, Daria and Aliya to UB, Maria to vault. I assume they have qualified to team finals. They'll do better in finals now they have outed their natural, deeply held Russian need to test their emotional limits. Seda, 'Little Tiger' to her family, showed her value as a fighter, finishing first so far in the AA standings. The Olympics are her metier, and mistakes or not, she will only grow stronger. Then again, we are less than halfway through quals.
Angelina has had a hard day today, but she will finish these Games a better gymnast than she started, believe me. Support the girls and remember they are only human. They are also, quite remarkably, less than a point behind the leading Chinese team - who have been loudly touted as possible contenders for gold. I don't expect that Russia will fight the USA for gold on Tuesday, but I do think they will be ready to do their best.
And who knows what change will come after the Games ... new head coaches perhaps? Whatever happens, I see a great future for Seda and Angelina, and Dasha if she wants - hey, for Aliya and Maria too, if they decide they want it - as they lead the Russian team into the next quad.
Follow interim scores here - https://live.fig-gymnastics.com/schedule.php?idevent=6405
I am going to buy a bottle of something strong to relax my Russian nerves. I love the team, but four seasons in one day are really a little bit too much for me ...
MAG quals results - Russia in third!
For the sake of comprehensiveness, here are the scores from yesterday -
Team
http://sportgymrus.ru/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/komanda.pdf
AA - http://sportgymrus.ru/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/mnogobor-e.pdf
Congratulations to all the gymnasts. And good luck in the final!
More stunning photographs by Oleg Naumov for the RGF can be found at RRG's Facebook page.
WAG qualifications - some links
The Russian women step forward today to begin the defence of their team silver medal from the last Olympics, and to try to qualify to as many finals as possible.
I am not going to try to second guess the BBC's online, red button and other coverage today - it seems we just have to scrabble to find out where the best coverage is. The BBC is giving us wall to wall coverage of what matters, the action, and we are very lucky to have them even if it does annoy tidy-minded old me that there is no trustworthy definitive guide to what, where and when. We'll manage. The root guide is here - http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/live-guide. After that, it is a question of channel hopping. Everything will be online if not on the TV.
Start lists are here - http://sportgymrus.ru/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Startlist-s1-zhenshhiny-.pdf or you can visit RRG's Facebook page to view them.
Here are the lists of the subdivisions, and starting orders -
Rio start times for each subdivision are -
Sub 1 - 09.45
Sub 2 - 11.30
Sub 3 - 14.30
Sub 4 - 17.30
Sub 5 - 20.30
I can't find a separate listing on the BBC website for a broadcast of subdivision 2. Judging by the timings, I am guessing that this means that coverage of subdivisions 1 and 2 will be continuous.
You can follow live scoring at the FIG website, always hoping that it works. https://live.fig-gymnastics.com/schedule.php?idevent=6405
Good luck to all the gymnasts!
Saturday, August 6, 2016
BBC broadcast schedule today - Olympic gymnastics - times and channels for all three subs
I have been trying to track down a definitive online guide to the BBC gymnastics coverage but so far haven't succeeded. This is probably my fault - I cannot imagine that the BBC could possibly be so completely dunderheaded as not to publish one. I am going out later to do some errands and will try to buy a copy of the Radio Times. If I can find out any broadcast details there, I will share them with you, assuming that my typewriter works and there are enough pigeons available to deliver paper copies to you all.
In the meantime, the great news is that our generally wonderful BBC will be giving us complete, advertisement-free coverage of the competition, with great commentary from the inimitable pair, Craig Heap and Christine Still. Beth Tweddle will also be guesting. We'll miss Mitch Fenner an awful lot, but still we are in good hand - and I'll be hearing his voice all the time anyway, in my self-commentary. The first coverage of the first subdivision (Japan, Brazil, Korea, Netherlands) will be - I think - exclusively online. I found it by trawling the BBC sport app on my iPad. It begins at 14.20 BST.
Subdivision 2 (GB, France, USA, Germany) will be on BBC Red Button 1 at 18.25
Subdivision 3 (UKR, SUI, RUS, China) will be on BBC Red Button 2 at 22.30
At least, that is what I have been able to find out, please check your local broadcast schedules.
You can find a competition schedule for today, links to start lists (in the comments) etc at http://rewritingrussiangymnastics.blogspot.co.uk/2016/08/mag-quals-schedule-starting-order-links.html?m=1
Friday, August 5, 2016
MAG quals - schedule, starting order, links
The RGF has a useful page where you can access some of the key information- but I haven't been able to find start lists yet. Please post a link if you find them; I am posting here all the likely sites.
Well, here at least is a guide to those competing and in which subdivision. The times of each sub, Rio time, are
RGF- http://sportgymrus.ru/competitions/olimpijskie-igry-2016/
FIG - Live scoring - https://live.fig-gymnastics.com/schedule.php?idevent=6405
FIG - Event details - Event details - https://live.fig-gymnastics.com/event_detail.php?idevent=6405
Rio 2016 - full event schedule - https://www.rio2016.com/en/artistic-gymnastics
If you are in the UK or can receive the BBC, they are promising not to miss one minute of action, including 24 online channels as well as the usual terrestrial and red button channels. But I haven't been able to find a complete online guide to the broadcast schedule as yet. Again, if you manage to find the right link then please post in the comments.
Sub 1 - 10.30
Sub 2 - 14.30
Sub 3 - 18.30
It is the opening ceremony tonight! In London, TV coverage begins at 23.40 local time.
Good luck to all the competitors!
