A. Gymnast Alliance

Yesterday, a big gymnast alliance furor developed over the news that Ellie Downie’s complaint of weight-shaming in British gymnastics—including that she was told to lose 6kg over two weeks and that she was told to send daily photos of herself in her underwear to prove her diet—has not been upheld. Which is British for denied.

The English Institute of Sport went on to say, “Bruf bruf procedures bruf bruf bruf,” but I have more questions than that. Like, for instance, [Pauline Tratz yelling EXPLANATION PLEASE dot gif].

The behavior that Ellie Downie describes here is patently unacceptable, so if the complaint was not upheld, what’s the implication there? That you’re claiming that Ellie is lying? Or, that you’re claiming what she was asked to do was OK? Or, that you don’t have enough evidence to proceed? What?

These sport organizations have done far too little to earn trust for anyone to simply accept “we looked into our behavior, and it turns out that shhhh” as a satisfactory or complete answer, and the coldly bureaucratic dismissal of this complaint will only impede efforts to improve the sport. Why would anyone bother putting themselves through the strain of making a complaint about the painful way things are done if the only predictable outcome is a closed door?

A. Actual Gymnastics Is Coming

You guys. There might be…real gymnastics…kind of soon?

Japan is planning to hold its senior nationals from September 20-22, with most of the big names in attendance and grouped in the same subdivision—competing on September 22 at 3:00pm local time. Asuka Teramoto is on the list for her return from the ill-timed Achilles injury that had seemed to dash her Olympic hopes, and she’ll be rotating with Mai Murakami, whom we all need to see compete full of spite and greatness after the events of 2019 that shall not be named. Also in their group will be team stalwart Hitomi Hatakeda and the return of erstwhile VT/FX star Sae Miyakawa. I’m eager to see what she’s about at this point.

On the men’s side, current Best Gentleman Kazuma Kaya will be there, competing alongside Kohei and Kenzo, who are trying to make their returns to the fold after an ouchie of a 2019. Kohei recently announced that he’ll be focusing exclusively on high bar for the maybe-Olympics as a +1 individual for Japan. So…um…sorry Miyachi the king has spoken?

China is slated to hold its nationals at a similar time in September, but I haven’t seen a schedule breakdown of what’s happening each specific day of competition yet, so if anyone has that…

Let’s just hope there’s some sort of broadcast and then a pirated stream of that broadcast that someone records from inside their septic tank while their aunt coughs up a lung right into the microphone like usual.