Yearly Archives: 2015

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Worlds 2015 – You Guys, I Think We Broke the Judges

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One more day of qualification action still to come, when the US men will be taking us to pretty-boy rehab to try to teach us that we don’t need Sam Mikulak to have a good time. I’m not convinced yet.

DAY 1:
-The men opened qualification today, and I must begin with a confession. I did not watch Great Britain’s session, even though USAGym is lovely and made it available to us. I freely admit that I bit that hand that feeds me. I don’t feel good about it, but I needs my sleeps. Spending two whole days watching people pirouette themselves right off the uneven bars like a cow in a tornado takes a lot out of a person. As the NCAA coaches have taught me, time spent not watching gymnastics is just as significant as time spent watching gymnastics. You’ve got to take care of your body.

-But, that doesn’t mean I don’t still want to marry all of them simultaneously and keep them for myself on a secret polyandrous pleasure island. (Or, I mean, something legal…) I absolutely do. Trust me. Really, all relationships go through these rough patches, but we can get through it if we’re strong enough. I believe in us. The question is, do you Louis?
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Worlds 2015 – You Guys, I Think We Broke the Aly Raisman

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Can I break some news to you? There are guys in this competition. I know. Weird, right? Here are the scoresheets for tomorrow’s (tonight’s) opening day of Koheichella 2015.

The women’s qualification finished today, and I’m still slightly unclear about whether it was a fever dream or real life. Aly Raisman is inconsistent now, or something, and I don’t really understand what to do with that. At least no one tried to perform a Dirty Romania on us, so that’s always a positive.

DAY 2:
-Welp, the US went today. As expected, the Pink Eagles are leading by roughly a googol. That said, it didn’t go super awesomely awesome. They had three falls, which according to the Martha Rules, is six falls too many. When a third of the team is having a near emotional breakdown in the post-meet interview, you know it wasn’t an ideal day.

-The biggest news was that Carmen Sandiego stole Aly Raisman and replaced her with some nervous, erratic hot pink replica. Aly threw herself out of bounds on her opening floor pass, won the gold medal in the triple jump on her vault landing, and then 2010-2011ed her bars routine. Fortunately, in true “Here’s my beam-ah! NEXT BEAM-AH!” fashion, she came back and was solid enough to be useful on beam, although she did not get D panel credit for…really anything. The judges were just like, “No skills here…”  The US filed a petition on the D score, which Nellie Kim threw immediately into the round circular filing system in the corner of the room. Raisman won’t advance to any event finals or the all-around, though she will advance to an awesome narrative for next Trials season, so that’s something. I’M FULL OF REDEMPTION.

-Aren’t you really impressed that I got through two whole paragraphs before turning into a barrel of slime about the Maggie Nichols AA qualification situation? Because I am. I’ll just say this: Maggie would have needed a 12.985 on bars to take the second US AA final spot. And after that, I’m just going to stare straight ahead and blink a whole lot. Once Martha is done yelling at the team, she needs to buy Maggie an apology alpaca or something. Whatever they use for currency in Karolyiopolis. Because Maggie got hosed by the system here. Fight the power!
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Worlds 2015 – You Guys, I Think We Broke the Romania

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Before we get to the nonsense, the scoresheets for day 2 of WAG action.

And now, brace yourselves, because Romania.

DAY 1:
-Obviously, Romania’s performance is the big talking point because it was the worst thing ever to happen in the history of time. It was like the black death, but with more poor hip circles. I think we all felt it would be a mess going in (I may have used the words “garbage fire”), but I still firmly believed that Iordache would be able to pull them through to the TF anyway. I was wrong. Romania currently sits in 8th after the first day, and will drop pretty deep into the test event field when it’s all over since there are legitimately six more teams with a chance to pass them yet to perform. Something needs to be done. We can’t let Romania go the way of Ukraine. Nadia needs to throw some Nadia money at the problem, like now.

-It started out not completely disastrous, just sort of meh. Floor was OK, no major errors, just uninspiring (and I thought a little harshly scored). Vault was perfectly fine. And then bars was even worse than last year. Somehow. Jurca hit, and then the covered wagon fell into the gully, and everyone drowned while getting dysentery and losing all the cattle and children. It was very “How many times, Alyssa?” How many times, Romania? Even beam was wobbly and emotionally scarring, featuring yet another fall from Iordache. The rest of the world is too good right now for Romania to have one event be that weak. This will continue to happen, though the Romanians will still be a favorite to get out of the test event. They just need to cut up some old mats and wrap them around Ponor, resurrect Izbasa, commission Interpol to find Ana Porgras, and hurl Nadia into a time machine. It’ll be fine.
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Worlds 2015 – It’s Almost Here

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We’re swiftly approaching the beginning of the World Championship and our customary annual journey into forgetting what sleep is. First things first, I embedded my usual scoresheets for the first day’s subdivisions here for reference, just in case you’ve reached my level of nerdiness. It takes most people a lifetime. 

Day 1 lineup news and notes:
-The big news of the day is that Romania looked at Russia and said, “Anything you can garbage fire, we can garbage fire better.” Anamaria Ocolisan contracted 20 polios (or something) during training and will not be competing. Apparently, Andreea Munteanu is also down with a severe case of the Romanias and can’t be the replacement for some reason, so Romania will be putting up an old tire in the sixth position instead. The team is now Larisa Iordache and a random collection of limbs. She’s still enough to carry them into TF.

 -Maria Kharenkova lost the “Ick, these vaults, you guys” sweepstakes, meaning that the European silver medalist won’t be competing the AA in qualification. It will be up to Tutkhalyan and Spiridonova. Spiridonova as a top-two Russian AAer. Sit on that for a while. In better news, it seems Afanasyeva’s kidney looked at her and was like “CHECK IT, I’M THE BEST,” so she’s good to go now. Phew.

-Fragapane will not be doing the AA, competing on VT, BB, and FX. AAers for Great Britain are Downie 2.0, Harrold, and Tinkler. 

-Tea Ugrin will not be the alternate for Italy after all. In fact, she’s doing the AA in qualification along with the favorites to make the AA final, Ferrari and Ferlito. Fasana continues to be out on beam. Enus “Don’t Call Me Anus” Mariani is the alternate now. Are you worried about bars? I am. 

-Roxana Popa is indeed competing only bars for Spain. If you’re exceptionally concerned about beam, you should be.

-Brazil has four AAers: Saraiva, Barbosa, Hypolito, and Oliveira.

-Murakami is in for Japan, so let’s hope she once again proves why she was the next big thing for a hot second. This is a solid, relatively well-rounded team, and I’m excited to see how they do.

-Erja Metzler is out for Austria, so Austria will be putting up 5 on every event, except vault, where 4 will compete, all scores counting.

-Madison Copiak is the alternate for Canada. Black, Onyshko, and Woo will be doing the AA, and Black and Rogers will both be doing two vaults.

-Ida Gustavsson is out for Sweden, replaced by Marcela Torres on three events. Wagner will do vault and beam while going, “Remember that time you didn’t let me go to the Olympics? Suck on my continuing career.”

-Mackenzie Slee is out for New Zealand. Also out are Yana Fedorova of Ukraine (leaving Ukraine with just Kysla—remember when Ukraine was a country?), and Julia Rumbutis of Georgia, depriving us of the ability to never stop saying, “Rumbutis,” along with Eddachraoui of Morocco, Leinonen of Finland, and Kaylee Cole from Texas Dreams Of Bolivia. 

-15 people will (allegedly) be competing two vaults on day 1:
Maria Paseka (RUS)
Seda Tutkhalyan (RUS)
Oksana Chusovitina (UZB)
Ellie Black (CAN)
Brittany Rogers (CAN)
Ellie Downie (GBR)
Courtney McGregor (NZL)
Annika Urvikko (FIN)
Teja Belak (SLO)
Tjasa Kysselef (SLO)
Ana Derek (CRO)
Dina Madir (CRO)
Norma Robertsdottir (ISL)
Paula Mejias (PUR)
Najwa Dassalm (MAR)