gymn Digest Tue, 2 Aug 94 Volume 2 : Issue 159

Today's Topics:
Bart
GG: Bashing Host on TV :(
GG: W, AA
GG: W, AA (fwd)
GWG and other stuff
I solved the BartConner mystery
Misc
names (6 msgs)
names and EF
Oh Yeah And ...
RSG Results from Goodwill
Shushunova's husband
Texxx Part 2 (2 msgs)
Texxxxxxx? (2 msgs)
We decided (kinda)...
Women's EF

This is a digest of the gymn@athena.mit.edu mailing list.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: Mon, 1 Aug 1994 23:13:01 -0700 (PDT)
From: ***@netcom.com
Subject: Bart

>
> >Actually the comentators are told by network brass what to say etc.
> Blame THEM !<
>
> Get real Texx. TV ain't that simple.
>
> Bart isn't going to say something he doesn't believe just because some
> production person tells him to. He may take poor >>direction<< from some
> knuckleheads, but I don't think he says stuff he doesn't believe because some
> producer told him he has to. Give him more credit than that.
>
> David Michaels

No but they tell him "I wanna hear more smalltalk, Bart!"

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 01 Aug 94 22:57:39 EDT
From: ***@aol.com
Subject: GG: Bashing Host on TV :(

Just when the GG competition had gone fairly well for all concerned, a
certain coach has to blast the hosts by drawling sarcastically into the TV
camera "We just looooove Russia!"

I certainly hope the Russian audience (not to mention the rest of the world)
did see not that picture (whether they speak English or not). As an
American*, I'm embarrassed.

Mara

*and a conservative Republican at that

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 01 Aug 94 22:57:34 EDT
From: ***@aol.com
Subject: GG: W, AA

>Nunno (to Shannon): ...You have the opportunity to redeem yourself

As if a silver medal AA is nothing! I wonder what he said to the whole team
after they finished <gasp> 4th...

>Ted Turner, re glitches at the Goodwill Games in general (gymnastics
computer scoring isn't the only problem): "There's glitches
everywhere. There's glitches at the Olympics, too. ... When you put on
an event of this magnitude, you're going to have glitches."

>From what I've read in other press, etc, apparently Mr. Turner was *not*
pleased with the general quality of the venues (not only gymnastics).
Personally I think they did ok. Yes, there were glitches (the pool, the
scoreboards, etc), but considering everything else they are dealing with in
Russia, they did just fine with GG.

Mara

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 1 Aug 1994 22:31:18 -0500 (CDT)
From: <***@owlnet.rice.edu>
Subject: GG: W, AA (fwd)

Susan was kind enough to embarass me in private, but this was too
funny, so I had to pass it on to everyone:

| >Good thing we all know acronyms around here... so much easier to write
| "GG: W, AA" than "Goodwill Games: Women's All-Around". But then
| again, I just wrote it and so have defeated the purpose of
| abbreviating it in the first place.<
|
| Esp. since you're talking about the Goodwill Games: Women's event Finals ...
| righto Rachele?
|
| Susan

Well, well, I feel awfully silly now. <grin> Needless to say, let's
be a little forgiving of commentators on TV -- they have no chance to
"proofread" what they're saying, and as I have just elegantly
displayed, it's rather easy to mess up...

Now, what *I* want to know is did this really slip by that many of
you, or were you just all being nice to me in my old age? (And no, I
don't want you to *really* answer that, Gymn's got enough traffic as
it is. If you feel compelled to anwer, though, feel free to email me
directly.)

Rachele

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 1 Aug 94 23:18:53 18000
From: <***@freenet.scri.fsu.edu>
Subject: GWG and other stuff

I just finished watching event finals and was impressed with Shannon's
performance.She looked a little "hungrier" for the gold today than in the past
two days.Overall I was happy to see the performance level improve over
the Brisbane world championships.I can't wait till Dortmond.

Just about everything has been covered on the women's side so I'll
start with the men.First of all,does anyone know who will be
representing the teams?I know who isn't there($cherbo,Ivankov).

I'm not very sure on how good (or bad) the US team will do.It depends on
whether the other countries sent b-teams.Our team consists of 4 of the
top six,so this is our B+(or A-?) squad.Anyway,these gymnasts have a past
history(with the exception of Chainey,whose gymnastics tends to be on
the rough side) of being inconsistent in international
competitions.Drew and Blaine haven't competed much outside of the US
so they're a big question mark.Scott's averaged 4 falls(!) out of the 4
major international competitions he's been in.I HOPE they
don't allow Scott to anchor the team on EVERY event this time. Hopefully
they can pull it all together and give the US a much needed boost.

I was very saddened to hear about Christy Henrich's death.I'd been a
fan of hers since '89.She didn't have the natural ability of the other
gymnasts but she worked her ass off and was a VERY fierce
competitor.She wanted to be the best and did everything it took for
her to reach her goals.I'll miss her.

Someone asked the question "How widespread is anorexia among
gymnasts?"I'm afraid to say that it's most likely worse than we
think.I know of two ex- gymnasts from my gym who suffer from eating
disorders.I'd say 99.9% of them keep it a secret for fear of
embaressment and/or threat of getting kicked out of gym.At my former
gym,the woman's coach(who weighed about 85 lbs) called the girls "Fat"
right to
their face!!They'd usually burst into to tears and we(the other
gymnasts) would have to console and reassure them.(This happened A
LOT!)Most of the top gyms
have weigh ins every week.When you compete at such a high level in
gymnastics you have to keep you weight down otherwise your performance
suffers.Some coaches approach this problem the right way,while others
approach it the dangerous way.I don't think Christy's coach was to
blame,I think she wanted to win and would do anything to do it and
unfortunately she got lost and took the wrong path.

Did anyone see the national trampoline and power tumbling
championships last week.Wow,they did AMAZING things.The power tumblers
blew me away with their difficulty and height.Hopefully they'll repeat
it and you'll be lucky enough to catch it.It's a must see!

Unfortanately this will be my last MAJOR post for a while. :( I'll be
resuming(in reality starting) my elite career at Brown's Metro in
Orlando.I won't be leaving until the 15th,but I'll be very busy
preparing for the move so i won't have much time.I'll be leaving my
computer here,but since I'm only 4 hours away I'll come home often and
keep up with the gymn posts.Thanks for listening to my ramblings.I'll
send posts about Wendy and Brandy as soon as I can.I'll be attending
the world championships in November with Susan and Beth,but they'll
probably beat me to the computer.

Talk to everyone ASAP,

Billy


--

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 1 Aug 1994 22:57:37 -0700 (PDT)
From: ***@netcom.com
Subject: I solved the BartConner mystery

> BTW, for those who don't know, AOL members are allowed 5 e-mail
> addresses at a time, and can delete/change them at will, which is why this
> was (and unfortunately still _is_) such an easy stunt to pull.

Its stunts like this that causes many of us serious netters to write off anyone
with an AOL or DELPHI adderss as either a troublemaker or a total moron.
Maybe you all arent but you got alot of comrades who do stuff like this.

A frind of mine calls an AOL address a "badge of syupidity".
Perhaps this is wrong, but Caleb here makes a good point.

> >Is there anyone we can tell (like IG or Bart or something . . .
>
> I understand your frustration, but IMHO, Bart wouldn't care about a very
> stupid and sarcastic letter. He might, however, be somewhat upset at the
> fact that he is being accused of using drugs and being a poor-quality
> announcer (sarcastic or not) by serious and level-headed gymnastics
> fans--some of the comments which I personally believe are going above and
> beyond constructive criticism.

Besides being a computer person, Im also into broadcastting tech.
I freelance in both fields.

I dunno, he takes it pretty well when Ken & I gang up on him.
We ribbed the *&^%$# outta him last time !
Methinks we owe him a trip to Happy Tap next time, because we've picked on him
so much.

Ken slipped a dirty limrick on the teleprompter once right in the middle of
Bart's script. He kinda choked as he tried to ad-lib.
We never worked with Cathy. I dont think we'll pick on her if we ever do.
Bart is FAR more teaseable...

Behind the scenes, theres a certain amount of practical joking and teasing
to break the tension. We played the "snake in the can" joke on
"The Voice of Purdue Basketball" so many times its obscene.
He ALWAYS FALLS FOR IT !

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 02 Aug 94 02:11:05 EDT
From: ***@aol.com
Subject: Misc

>After Hollywood's somewhat less than glorious experience with Mitch, I don't
think Bart stands a Snickers-bar's chance in the underworld of even being
considered for a part. He's so short, there are very few leading ladies who
could play opposite him...<

Don't forget Bart's starring turn in the cinema classic "Rad" where Bart
plays the bad guy and spends most of the movie standing on steps so that he
doesn't look like the midget he is.

Susan

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 01 Aug 94 22:53:00 EDT
From: ***@aol.com
Subject: names

>I said that Bart has a hard enough time staying up on guys gymn, That it
seems a little far fetched for him to knows girls gymn too !<

Frankly if I can keep up on both watching at home then he with his background
in gymnastics, large expense account, and bonus of going to many meets that I
can't even see should be able to easily. I don't buy the excuse at all. It's
his job to know about both.

Susan

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 1 Aug 1994 22:18:46 -0700 (PDT)
From: ***@netcom.com
Subject: names

> >I said that Bart has a hard enough time staying up on guys gymn, That it
> seems a little far fetched for him to knows girls gymn too !<
>
> Frankly if I can keep up on both watching at home then he with his background
> in gymnastics, large expense account, and bonus of going to many meets that I
> can't even see should be able to easily. I don't buy the excuse at all. It's
> his job to know about both.
>
> Susan

So you say that he should know pronunciations of ALL names, past & present,
moves, faces past & present, & history of sport of womens & mens gymn ?

I am not disagrreing with you, I just want clarification of your statement.

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 02 Aug 94 10:41:22 BST
From: ***@axion.bt.co.uk
Subject: names

>They ABSOLUTELY heard the announcer. Either they chose
>to ignore her or their "expert" told them to pronounce
>it another way.

What kind of expert are you if you get it wrong though,
but lets not just rain on Bart and Kathy here, I cant say I
have seen any broadcast of any sport where everyone agrees
on the name of the competitior, I mean I have even known
some sports personalities change their names because
they know the
TV people will never get it right.

The pronounciation or the spelling of the name should be
sorted out, its a common decency surely. How come there isnt
some form of group which represents the gymnasts themselves
for just this kind of thing, call it a union if you like
but most sports have something like this.

This group could go around making sure the names were spelt
correctly and they could even produce phonetic spellings of
the names for the TV people, or would this be just too
simplistic
to work.

Clive

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 2 Aug 1994 09:09:32 +1000
From: <***@pharm.med.upenn.edu>
Subject: names

>>They ABSOLUTELY heard the announcer. Either they chose
>>to ignore her or their "expert" told them to pronounce
>>it another way.
>
>The pronounciation or the spelling of the name should be
>sorted out, its a common decency surely. How come there isnt
>some form of group which represents the gymnasts themselves
>for just this kind of thing, call it a union if you like
>but most sports have something like this.
>
>This group could go around making sure the names were spelt
>correctly and they could even produce phonetic spellings of
>the names for the TV people, or would this be just too
>simplistic
>to work.
>
>Clive


Very simplistic in theory, but are these people going to get paid? Where
do they come up with the money to travel? Are you tacking this job onto
another one? Have you ever worked a meet? - they can be rather hectic.

Why don't all the people who are whinning and complaining, make tapes of
how you think (experts that you are - and some of you genuinely are) the
names should be pronounced and send them to the commentators - until you do
something stop bashing others. The day only has 24 hours in it, there are
a lot of names to learn, remember, plus everything else about gymnastics to
remember, and to discuss - intelligently. Lets enjoy the gymnastics and be
grateful that we can watch it, instead of it being baseball games, football
previews or basketball postviews.

Mayland

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 02 Aug 94 15:15:03 BST
From: ***@axion.bt.co.uk
Subject: names

>Very simplistic in theory, but are these people going
to get paid?

Aha, you see the thing if you have an association is you have to
become a member, and members pay dues dont they. But
remember were not talking about something the size of the UN
here, you only want an organisation dealing with the well
being of the competitors. Its not that difficult, plenty of
sports have similar set-ups.

>Where do they come up with the money to travel? Are you
>tacking this job onto another one? Have you ever worked a
>meet? - they can be rather hectic.

Its as hectic as any other sporting event but they get by dont
they, you dont see John Madden running onto the pitch at
the superbowl and everyone cheering on TV "yea way to
go Jim Mooden"
It doesnt happen does it, so why should we say oh yes
lifes hectic
who cares. Thats a kop out.

IMO if you get paid to commentate then the least you can do is
to get it right. There is no real excuse for getting the
a competitors name wrong.

>The day only has 24 hours in it, there are a lot of names
>to learn, remember, plus everything else about gymnastics to
>remember, and to discuss - intelligently.

So how come they can get it right on most other sports, you dont
get the same treatment for say athletics do you.

>Lets enjoy the gymnastics and be grateful that we can
watch it,
>instead of it being baseball games, football
>previews or basketball postviews.


Clive

Expressing my views

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 02 Aug 94 11:15:49 EDT
From: <***@MIT.EDU>
Subject: names

> Thank you to Texx (I think it was Texx!) who clarified
>that Bart and Kathy cannot hear the announcers in the arena and

It was Mayland.

> Basically, I just think it's a shame that so many top
>foreign gymnasts go through their entire careers having their
>names mispronounced by EVERY American commentator, not
>just Bart and Kathy. I honestly cannot think of a single
>commentator who ever pronounced Boginskaya, Artemov or
>Korolev right - and these are world and Olympic champions
>we're talking about! Don't they deserve the common courtesy
>and respect of having their names pronounced correctly? And
>now if Dina Kochetkova should go on to have a brilliant career,
>the precedent has already been set of mispronouncing her name.
>That just bothers me.
[snip]
>So the Russians are doing their
>homework. Why can't the Americans? It just can't be that hard.


Actually, in Sunday's competition, I heard the Russian announcer
mispronouncing "Miller" as MEE-yer, so it's not only the American
announcers who do it.

--Robyn

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 02 Aug 94 00:42:24 EDT
From: ***@aol.com
Subject: names and EF

>By the way, was it my imagination or did she mysteriously change leotards
midway through the competition? That made me
wonder whether the EF were actually held on the same day in St. Pete. Because
of the time difference, they could have been on two different days and TBS
could still manage to air them in one night. I only wonder because of the
leo change and also because the men's seem to be on 2 days, not one.<

Yes she did change leos but no the women's EF were not on two days ... only
one. I imagine she changed it because if you saw her in vault she was
sweating someonething fierce. All the girls were and Bart and Kathy did
mention that it was hot in there. It's so hot in St. Pete that I heard
they're having a lot of trouble making ice for the figure and speed skating.

Speaking of Leo's. Reebok makes the leos for both the US and Russia and
Russia's warm-ups are far better then ours and until this recent crop Russia
has far far better leos then the US. Those black vevlvet ones are gorgeous.

Susan

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 01 Aug 94 22:53:15 EDT
From: ***@aol.com
Subject: Oh Yeah And ...

Steve's snotty "we love Russia ... really we do" was totally uncalled for.

Susan

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 02 Aug 94 12:44:30 EDT
From: ***@aol.com
Subject: RSG Results from Goodwill

From the AP ...

All-Around
1. Amina Zaripova, Russia, 39.000 points.
2. Yekat Serebryanskaya, Ukraine, 38.400.
3. Olga Gontar, Belarus, 38.375.
4. Amaya Cardenoso, Spain, 37.500.
5. Katarzyn Skorupinska, Poland, 37.350.
6. Albena Angova, Bulgaria, 37.125.
7. Caroline Hunt, United States, 36.750.
8. Olga Vershinina, Russia, 35.250.
All-Around Individual Apparati
Hoop--1, Zaripova, 9.750. 2, Serebryanskaya, 9.600. 3, Gontar, 9.500. 4,
Cardenoso, 9.400. 5, Angova, 9.400. 6, Skorupinska, 9.300. 7, Hunt, 9.050. 8,
Vershinina, 8.950.
Ball--1, Zaripova, 9.700. 2, Gontar, 9.600. 3, Serebryanskaya, 9.600. 4,
Cardenoso, 9.350. 5, Skorupinska, 9.350. 6, Angova, 9.300. 7, Hunt, 9.250. 8,
Vershinina, 9.000.
Ribbon--1, Zaripova, 9.750. 2, Gontar, 9.700. 3, Serebryanskaya, 9.550. 4,
Cardenoso, 9.400. 5, Skorupinska, 9.400. 6, Angova, 9.300. 7, Hunt, 9.200. 8,
Vershinina, 8.800.
Clubs--1, Zaripova, 9.800. 2, Serebryanskaya, 9.650. 3, Gontar, 9.575. 4,
Cardenoso, 9.350. 5, Skorupinska, 9.300. 6, Hunt, 9.250. 7, Angova, 9.125. 8,
Vershinina, 8.500.

Susan

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 2 Aug 94 0:01:20 EDT
From: <***@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu>
Subject: Shushunova's husband
To: gymn@MIT.EDU

No Susan, it's not your imagination. I believe Elena's husband IS
literally old enough to be her father. As TBS said, they met when she crashed
her car and she took it to his repair shop to be fixed. I have a friend who
knows Elena and her grandmother (the grandmother lives in Chicago), and he told
me that Elena's husband was 40 or so when he and Elena got married. That was
several years ago, so he's somewhere in his early 40s at the minimum. But Elena
seems happy, so let's wish her hubby a long life!

Beth

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 02 Aug 94 01:58:31 EDT
From: ***@aol.com
Subject: Texxx Part 2

Whoops, hit the wrong key and away it went!!

anyhow . . .

Commentators must be held accountable for their commentary. Producers can
suggest and lead them on ---- but what they say is their own decision. Don't
let anyone off the hook because you think the "network brass made them do
it." They're all grownups with their own opinions. No one makes their mouths
move.

David

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 1 Aug 1994 23:36:42 -0700 (PDT)
From: ***@netcom.com
Subject: Texxx Part 2

>
> Commentators must be held accountable for their commentary. Producers can
> suggest and lead them on ---- but what they say is their own decision. Don't
> let anyone off the hook because you think the "network brass made them do
> it." They're all grownups with their own opinions. No one makes their mouths
> move.

Sure they do. Its done with pieces of paper.
Some of the paper has pictures of presidents on it

You do as your told or it out you go.

No, they are accoutable for SOME of what they say, not everything.
I suppose if they really had any credibility, they could get in a fight with
the producer and quit. Im sure you'd LOVE John Madden doing play by play on
gymn ?

Now I dont mean to say Bart is any genius, he aint that, but hes not as stupid
as he looks on TV. Some of that stupidity comes from directors and producers
catering to dumb audiences, some is due to Bart not being a seasoned
anchor.

Mary Lou has a better screen presence than Bart.
She evades the producer problem by writing.
Editors are not as bad as directors.

I thank you for getting me going on this, tonight has been most therapeutic.

Tomorrow I am going to cover a tractor pull. Easy, and no bozos !

You are right though, we need to take these announcers aside and yell at them.

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 02 Aug 94 01:50:05 EDT
From: ***@aol.com
Subject: Texxxxxxx?

Now Texx, are you really saying that the producers wanted to make Bart and
Kathy look dumb?

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 1 Aug 1994 23:23:26 -0700 (PDT)
From: ***@netcom.com
Subject: Texxxxxxx?

>
> Now Texx, are you really saying that the producers wanted to make Bart and
> Kathy look dumb?

You betcha I meant to say that.

You must keep in mind who watches most tv sports.
The demographics do not paint a nice picture of the USA.

So we turn up the heat and demand that they trim out a little football and
give us some gymn. So they half ass it. They know there are more viewers
there watching gymn, but they dont want to lett the beerswiller start channel
surfing, so they keep the conversation dumb. Even when they DO gives a whole
hour of gymn, they are contious of the guys who tune in TV sports by habit, so
they try to keep the attention of the "dummies" out there.

Backscenes TV is NOT a pretty sight. Fortunately, I have covered very little
gymn. I would have decked a few producers by now.

By the way, I thank you all for letting me get this off my chest.
If I said any of this stuff to a network boss, Id never work again !

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 02 Aug 94 12:50 EDT
From: <***@MVS.SAS.COM>
Subject: We decided (kinda)...

Well, after much agony and amidst the dreams and fears,
we have decided to let Amy take more hours of
gymnastics this year and continue in her regular school.
This way we can gauge her commitment to the sport (rather
than to the school). It'll also give the family a
little more time to adapt to the world of competitive
gymnastics and the lifestyle that goes with having a
gymnast in the family. Basically, it's up to Amy now.
She is not on trial or anything. She's just sampling
the water and will decide for herself how important
this is to her. Then the family will do what we have
to in response.

Thank you, to all you folks out there. Your direct
responses to my post and just the interaction that
goes on here about the various gymnasts, competition,
etc. were very helpful in giving us some perspective
on the world of gymnastics.

Thanks,
Twilah

For those of you who missed the original post...
>
> Date: Tue, 21 Jun 94 9:40 EDT
> To: Alternative Approaches to Learning Discussion List
> <ALTLEARN%SJUVM.BITNET%UGA.CC.UGA.EDU@unx.sas.com>
> Subject: Gymnastics Academy or not?
>
>
> My daughter is 6 years old, very intelligent, very sociable, and
> has ADD (cannot focus on one thing when other things are going on).
> This past week she was spotted by one of the area gymnastics coaches
> who is now actively recruiting my daughter for her gymnastics
> academy. She says that my daughter has potential for world-level
> competition and she wants to coach her. She won a gold medal in the
> NC State Games and was the highest scoring competitor.
> In order for my daughter to get good training, she asks
> that we take our daughter out of her regular school (a year-round
> public school which we love) and place her in their private school
> so that she can have her academics in the morning and train for 3
> hours every afternoon. The academic program sounds at least as
> good or better than the one she is now in. Her school day would
> begin at 9:00am and end at 5:40pm plus one Saturday a month. The
> teacher/student ratio is 1/10. However, it is at least a 30 minute
> commute one-way to school each day. Also, the tuition is very high.
>
> Knowing that this kind of opportunity only comes once in a lifetime
> and it's a large investment for 10 years of her life. It is very
> difficult to know what to do. So we'd like your opinion. What would
> you do if you were in our shoes? Also, we'd like to hear from anyone
> who's had to make this kind of decision before.
>

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 01 Aug 94 22:26:06 EDT
From: ***@aol.com
Subject: Women's EF

Geez Pod finally won a title with two vaults with no visible deductions. What
does this kid have to do to get a 9.9 anyway? She could fly over the top of
the vault with a big sign that says "Hey I'm really cute and powerful please
give me a good score" but that would be redundant.

While I give Shannon oodles of credit for hitting the second vault what's
with her scores? This whole meet she's been drastically over scored (IMHO) on
every event. Her vault is ugly, incorrectly performed, and has a big step yet
she still scores only marginally less then Pod (and I'm talking vault one
here where they were both starting from the same place). Shannon has at
*least* 3 tenths worth of deduction (and that's being kind) and yet never
scores less then the mid 9.7's (and usually 9.8+). Her second post flight was
identical to her first which leaves the "not enough power" excuse disappear
since with the RO she should be able to push it up higher from the horse and
for god's sake LAY THAT SUCKER OUT!

Kochetkova stuck both with good height and was duly ignored. Nothing overly
spectacular but not deserving of 6th either.

Chussy is a shadow of her former self on this event (well make that a really
*big* shadow) and finished way too high here ... which I guess is okay since
she was so often gypped on this piece earlier in her career.

Khorkina get's the most original gymnast (ever) award. Every piece has her
own unique spin. It's not just one or two new tricks but completely new
routines from start to finish. The fact that a girl with those legs can do a
piked Quervo without benefit of a RO is absolutely incredible. It gives every
Yurkina fan hope.

If it was up to me (and most of you are thankful it's not I bet) it would
have gone Pod, Khorkina, Bican (I've still never seen anyone do the double
twist better then Golea back in '87 though Lysenko came awful close a couple
times) & Kochetkova and then Shannon.

Bars ... Just give it to the whole Russian team and let's go home. Wow.
Khorkina actually owns this event (look closely you'll see her name engraved
on the side). Kochet is no slouch and has the best and truest double lay I've
ever seen. Too bad she didn't stick it here. Boulkhova is beautiful (Lysenko
can't do it anymore so someone's got too) ... too bad she had an error.

What happened to Pod?

Piskun has improved too much for words. I mean take a tape of the '93 Am. Cup
(or '92 Chunichi) and look at it next to this set and the difference will
blow your mind.

Shannon is nice but nothing new and tiny breaks here and there. When Shannon
first came on the scene she did every big trick in the book and did it pretty
darn well form wise. The form is still pretty good overall (few gymnasts have
what I would call "great" form) but the tricks have gone and what was great
in '90 and '91 is now ho-hum at best ... and those are the tricks she hasn't
pulled yet. Of course, it hasn't seemed to effect her winning everything in
sight.

I'd have gone Khorkina, Kochetkova, and then Miller for the medals. Oh and
Bart Bican had *three* release moves and not two. When they make mistakes
that are that obvious one wonders what exactly their purpose really is.

On beam Martin's mount was neat (who is it that's done that before?) but her
pauses were longer then Stovbchataya's.

Marianna was clean and pretty decent here but not better then Kochetkova
(even with Dina's break) or Bican.

I was all set to say "Yes Shannon deserved this win" until I saw Fabrichnova.
Shannon's only deduction was the one controlled slide on the landing. The
other gymnasts with harder sets (namely Kochetkova and Piskun) blew it with
breaks while Shannon was incredibly solid. Then Fab went. I'm sorry but her
routine is obviously much harder then Miller's and with a stuck landing. I
have no idea how that can be worth *less* then Shannon. Sure Fab's full turns
suck but Shannon has the most timid leaps (silly really since she *can* leap)
this side of Deva. All in all Fabrichnova's routine was superior in both
difficulty, execution, and the only thing the judges seem to notice; that
stuck landing. I'm so confused.

In my book it was Fab, Miller, and then Kochetkova

On floor Fab's tumbling is the best ... and Chussy's Shus is an "E" move.
Damn Khorkina for going OB. Kochetkova is powerful but ugly. Shannon was
Shannon.

Misc. Notes ....

All these Shushunova flashbacks (and is it just me or did Elena's husband
look old enough to be her father? a la Dudnik <inside joke>) and not one
mention of the fact that Vera Kolesnikova won the '86 AA.

Next time Kathy says something really stupid I'm gonna' replay her '84 triple
twist on a loop saying over and over "that'll be a slight deduction" (FYI,
she fell *off* the podium and onto a judge)

I really miss the puke colored checker board mats that Russia usually regales
us with.

All this stuff about Shannon not going to Dortmund is simply sour grapes on
Steve's part.

What is with that Donna chick? [to Webster] "8 years in gymnastics and you
finally take home an international medal" this is her first big meet you
nitwit!

About the men ... without Ivan and $cherbutsu I didn't even know that BLR
had a men's team. I mean at '93 Uni Games Ivan was too young and they had to
suit up a coach to fill the gap.

Susan

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End of gymn Digest
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