A. Everything’s fine. This is all fine.
Jane Doe #2, in addition to confirming her own experience of all those fun Larry Nassar details that we heard about from Jane Doe #1, is also naming the Karolyis.
The lawsuit further accuses Bela and Marta Karolyi of:
- Striking the gymnasts, scratching them until they bled and encouraging parents to hit their children.
- Depriving gymnasts of food and water and searching the gymnasts’ rooms to find and confiscate hidden food.
- Screaming obscenities at the gymnasts; telling them that they were fat; and requiring them to strip to their underwear so that their physical appearance could be judged in front of their peers.
What was that, NBC?
Great.
It’s looking more and more like the organization won’t just be able to pull the USA Gymnastics Special and cover the volcano in wallpaper again about this one.
Remember that “you know, it’s so much better than it was in the 80s” lie we all kept telling ourselves?
B. Man-gymnastics things
Soon, USAG is going to run out of distractionnouncements to throw at us every time one of these stories breaks. Last time, it was a slapped-together press conference announcing the shocking news of Valeri taking over as the new NTC. (WHAT???) This time, USAG was all ready to go with a same-day announcement that Kevin Mazeika just isn’t cutting it—what with all the 5th place finishes—and so, like a Real Housewife’s face, the US men’s program is getting a casual “restructuring.”
Mazeika’s former position is changing its name from “National Team Coordinator” to “High Performance Director.” You might be wondering what the actual difference is between the two jobs, but it’s really quite simple. The High Performance Director will be asked to take on all the responsibilities of the National Team Coordinator, except with more winning medals at the Olympics and less not-winning medals at the Olympics.
Once the US men finish 5th at the 2020 Olympics, the position will again change its name to “Super-Duper Head Awesome Winning Bro Guy.”
C. CAMP
Good news! Good timing! The national team is back at the beloved ranch where nothing bad has ever happened and where dreams are made and also sisterhood. Hooray! FLOWERS AND RAINBOWS. CUPCAKES AND SPRINKLES. BUTTER AND SUGAR.
FUN FOR THE WHOLE FAMILY.
Remember that time they all went to the ranch to roast marshmallows like they always do?
This weekend, the juniors, new seniors, and “you don’t get to go to the tour or college, so…this instead” old seniors are back for another end-of-year non-competition-related camp. This time, they have to show “one-third routines.” (So, just do your beam mount…? DONE. THANK YOU VALERI GOODBYE.)
This release—and the updated 2017 calendar—also indicate that the US will be sending gymnasts to the Stuttgart and London World Cups in addition to American Cup and Jesolo again this year. Four whole competitions before April? What life is this? What country is this?
D. NCAA training
Ah, phew. NCAA, the refuge from all the yuck. And yes, I am choosing to ignore the last year of Penn State and Arizona State when I make that statement. Thank you.
The NCAA teams have been doing an excellent job so far this season of waiting until 30 minutes after I publish this post every week to release their most interesting training footage. Keep it up.
LSU has another intrasquad video out, this time with the word intrasquad spelled correctly. I’m going to take full credit for that. I’m basically changing the world, you guys. Good job, LSU.
Confirmation of Zuchold-Schleudern achieved.
Polina Shchennikova is training the dreaded round-off 1/1-on vault entry. Such a rebel.
Sydney Snead is back to the 1.5 on vault after doing the full in her freshman year because of residual injury reasons.
Sabrina Vega is, in fact, still alive. Mystery solved.
Shut up, Chayse Capps.
And finally, the latest swag-o-meter update is at level BEAM.
E. GymCastic
This week, we were joined by Charlie Burrows to talk about the latest that’s going on with Cirque. In gymnastics news, we broke down the changes at the FIG and had some…views…about the legacy of Bruno Grandi, while I did the true hero’s work around here by performing a deep examination of that music video Simone was in. Nobel Prize, please.
I so love how no one shows any full routines but everyone comments how everyone hit ( well “pretty sure” everyone hit). I guess that means no one actually fell? Of course, I expect edited perfection in all posted videos, I just get amused when they try to act like it was unedited perfection.
I knew better than to believe it was all over in the ’80s, but I so wanted to believe it hadn’t extended into Marta’s reign. There’s some chance that’s still true, I suppose, but not one I’d count on.