Back in the day gymnastics

[ClaudiaWinklepanda]

Anyone remember that amazing move on the asymmetric bars (as was) where female gymnasts would hit the bottom bar with their hips with a massive wallop and fold themselves in half?

The vault looked like it had been borrowed from a local school hall, and compared to now the gymnasts looked they were just pottering up to it rather than sprinting like mad.

Bloody loved the gymnastics as a kid (still do).

I can still do the foldy in half move (if we are thinking of the same thing). Did it on some outdoor gym equipment at the playground the other day to show off to the kids. DS8 was very impressed - it's rare I impress him these days.

I can't do a handspring anymore though sadly. I think it would end in disaster.

Actually on 2nd thoughts nope! I can't do that foldy in half move. I can do a much less dangerous 'kip' which they still do today.

I thought the dead loop was the one where the gymnast stood on the top of the high bar.

Haven't they moved the bars further apart since then?

Little Girls in Pretty Boxes by sports journalist Joan Ryan exposed the abusive training of elite gymnasts and figure skaters as long ago as 1995.

Elena Mukhina, Julissa Gomez and Christy Heinrich all featured in her book, and so very many others sacrificed in the quest for the next Olympic gymnastics champion.

I adored the sport and still remember the breathtaking performances by the likes of Korbut, Kim, Comaneci, Milosovici, Boginskaya and Khorkina.

But once you know what might be happening behind the scenes you can’t quite feel the same way about it.

I am glad modern champions tend to be young women with careers that span more than one Olympics, rather than the teenagers of the past who seemed to be so easily discarded from one competition to the next.

Hopefully their greater maturity also goes some way to addressing the power imbalance between coaches and gymnasts.

I am not sure even Simone Biles would be where she is had she been British..

as you say not only does the GB system not allow for late developers or those on slightly different paths (well technically it does, but it’s rare), the “elite track” system has a Range and conditioning event that all gymnasts training for elite must do, and pass (or they don’t progress to the following year) each year until they are 13.

even if they aren’t “elite track” all split jumps etc must be 180 degrees or it doesn’t count.

simone’s physique is all power and acrobatics. Even at the level she is now it doesn’t allow for the classic lines and 180 splits. I doubt she would have passed through BG’s elite track as she would have struggled with the range. It wouldn’t have allowed for Simone’s incredible acrobatics as difficulty is limited.

for those interested- this is an example of the routine for 12 year olds:

www.facebook.com/1399857433671615/videos/1168101323541522/?mibextid=rS40aB7S9Ucbxw6v

Lordy, I'd forgotten about that move. That was spectacular too.

What I mean @Girasoli is the move where they were holding the top bar whilst they swung their legs underneath the lower bar with such momentum that their feet swung up towards their hands. The bars were closer together then.

Beautiful moves to watch, some now banned

%3D%3D

I love this one

vm.tiktok.com/ZGe7Thr1c/

An example of the cruelty, watch Kerri Strug's second vault in Atlanta.

Good grief, that routine has all the crazy moves in it! I would have loved that as a kid, and now I'm wincing through it.

My family have links to Olympic gymnastics of the early years. Someone in my family was asked to throw the Olympics by the Russian gymnasts because they would lose their home and car as soon as they touched down back in Russia if they lost.

Has the floor size ever changed on gymnastics? After watching the floor finals today when there's moves that Simone biles (and others) are doing they need a long run up to get that speed and momentum even more now than a few years ago. Thinking it would make sense to make it a bit bigger for safety just like they've changed the bars distance, the bars material, the vault shape, putting a cushion on the beam

No it’s always been 12x12.

it’s now sprung, and padded, so gymnasts now actually wouldn’t need as much momentum to get the same speed and height.

the penalties for going out of bounds have reduced though. Back in the day I think it was 0.5 and pretty much ended your comp if your foot went over the line.

If they made the floor bigger the gymnasts would invent new moves with more twists and turns that would again take them right to the (new) edge.

I remember Nadia Comaneci getting the first perfect 10 and the scoreboards not being able to cope with it because they hadn't been set up to include a perfect score. She was fantastic but only 14, all the female gymnasts were very young and we didn't know about all the doping and puberty delaying that the communist bloc countries did to all their athletes, with many horrible consequences down the line.Olga Korbutt was brilliant too. I'm very glad to see these days that there are plenty of gymnasts in their twenties and no one of 14 can compete in the Olympics nowadays.

I took DD to a few gymnastics lessons at our local club about 5 years ago, it chilled me that inside each toilet cubicle door was a poster basically saying don't complain about anything you see in the club.