Olympics [Prelims]

So, the Olympics have started!

China qualified first into team finals, while counting two major falls: He Kexin on bars, and Jiang Yuyuan on vault. He Kexin fell on her Pak Salto, yet she still qualified into bar finals, but unfortunally goes first in the lineup. Jiang Yuyuan totally bombed her Amanar, but fortunally still qualified for the all-around ahead of Deng Linlin. Yang Yilin was consistant and qualified third into AA finals behind Shawn and Nastia. She also qualified first in bar finals.

USA was a mess. On top of Chellsie Memmel's ankle injury that inhibits her to bars only, Samantha Peszek also injured her ankle and could only compete bars as well. That means that the USA went 4-up, 4-count on bars, beam, and floor. Shawn was strong, the only major issue was her downgrading her rudi to a barani on floor. Nastia was strong as well, qualifying into three finals (floor, beam, and bars). Alicia Sacramone on the other hand was weak, only qualifying into vault finals, after lading totally out of bounds on her fourth pass.

Russia was undoubtebly the strongest I've seen them this quad, easily qualifying third over Romania. Anna Pavlova ended up making three event finals (vault, floor, and beam), Ksenia Semenova made bar finals, Ksenia Afanasyeva made beam finals, and Ekaterina Kramarenko made floor finals. Pavlova and Semenova also qualified in the top 6 in the all-around, and will join Nastia, Shawn, Yang Yilin, and Jiang Yuyuan in the top group.

The highlight for me however was Japan. Japan qualified into their first team finals ever in Olympic history (Japan finished eighth), and also qualified their first event finalist (Koko Tsurumi on beam) in a non-boycotted games since 1964. And as a analysis by Gymnast.com shows, the difference between Japan, France, and Brazil are really close. Gymnast.com took the three highest scores (similar to team finals) and came up with these totals for Brazil, France, and Japan.

Brazil - 176.900
France - 176.325
Japan - 176.125

BTW: Here is Koko Tsurumi's history making beam routine.

TSURUMI - BB
Uploaded by Gymnicestics

You can find full results here: at http://www.nbcolympics.com

If this girl doesn't make beam finals...

in Beijing, I'm going to cry.

Koko Tsurumi - 2007 Toyota Cup EF

Olympic Teams.

Announcements of Olympic Teams have been dwindling in for the last month. So far, this is what (I've been aware off) that has been announced.

JPN: Kyoko Oshima, Koko Tsurumi, Miki Uemura, Mayu Kuroda, Yu Minobe, Yuko Shintake
GER: Oksana Chusovitina, Marie Sophie Hindermann, Daria Bijak, Anja Brinker, Katja Abel, Jolene Mobius
FRA: Marine Petit, Pauline Morel, Laëtitia Dugain, Cassy Véricel, Marine Debauve, Katheleen Lindor
PRK: Hong Su Jong, Hong Un Jong
CAN: Elyse Hopfner-Hibbs, Nansy Damianova

Japanese Gymnastics! [WAG]

My latest montage; it features some of the greatest Japanese gymnasts in history!
I hope you enjoy!

Japanese Team Announced.

The NHK cup concluded May 6th, as the final competition before the Japanese team was chosen for the Olympics. This competition is to Japan as the US Trials are to America. The winners of this competition were Hiroyuki Tomita for the men and Kyoko Oshima for the women. Some upgrades were leaked via the IG site, where it was announced that Koko Tsurumi, the highest placing woman in the all around in worlds last year, have added another layout to her front aerial, bhs, back layout combo. Kyoko Oshima, the winner for the first time since 2002, said;

"I'm proud of myself to attend the Olympics again and I'm very happy...We'll unite and our goal is to proceed to the team final."

The 2008 Olympic Teams are as followed;
Mens : Hiroyuki Tomita, Kohei Uchimura, Koki Sakamoto, Takehiro Kashima, Makoto Okiguchi, Takuyo Nakase.
Womens : Kyoko Oshima, Miki Uemura, Yu Minobe, Koko Tsurumi, Yuko Shintake, Mayu Kuroda

Favourites for the teams that did not make it include
-Hisashi Mizutori
-He Xuemei
-Keiko Mukumoto
-Momoko Ozawa

Overall, the mens team has the capabilities for the silver medal again, just like at Worlds last year. The women's team might be able to fight for a spot in team finals, as their balance beam and floor scores have significanlty sky-rocketed.

Japanese Olympic Trials

Here are the results of the second day of final trials for the women's gymnastics team.
1) Kyoko Oshima [59.250]
VT - 14.400 | UB - 14.700 | BB - 15.050 | FX - 15.100
2) Miki Uemura [59.100]
VT - 15.550 | UB - 14.800 | BB - 15.100 | FX - 14.650
3) Yuko Shintake [58.500]
VT - 14.400 | UB - 14.600 | BB - 15.400 | FX - 14.100
4) Koko Tsurumi [57.500]
VT - 13.900 | UB - 14.550 | BB - 14.550 | FX - 14.500
5) Yu Minobe [57.400]
VT - 13.550 | UB - 14.500 | BB - 14.700 | FX - 14.650
6) Mayu Kuroda [56.850]
VT - 13.000 | UB - 15.600 | BB - 15.400 | FX - 12.850
7) Momoko Ozawa [56.700]
VT - 15.000 | UB - 12.900 | BB - 14.750 | FX - 14.050
8) Manami Ishizaka [56.000]
VT - 13.800 | UB - 14.050 | BB - 14.200 | FX - 13.950
9) He Xuemei [55.100]
VT - 13.550 | UB - 14.200 | BB - 13.350 | FX - 14.000
10) Rie Tanaka [54.500]
VT - 13.800 | UB - 13.550 | BB - 13.450 | FX - 13.700


Overall results from trials are;
1) Kyoko Oshima
2) Miki Uemura
3) Yu Minobe
4) Koko Tsurumi
5) Yuko Shintake
6) Mayu Kuroda
7) Momoko Ozawa
8) Rie Tanaka
10) He Xuemei
12) Manami Ishizaka