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I'm not upset. In fact, I'm pleased with the new developments in the the sport.
Yesterday evening, I was talking with a friend about gymnastics when Cathy Rigby came up. I watched her silver medal winning beam routine from the 1970 World Championships and was happily with the stylistic beauty throughout her routine. (That press handstand, OH! I love it!) But the more and more I looked at routine, the fewer skills there were and the more poses I noticed.
Just because something is pretty, doesn't make it better. Cathy (and the other Olympic caliber gymnasts of that era) were all fabulous, but the fact is, they'd all be eaten alive by today's standards. And maybe that's okay. Both sets of gymnastics live in independent spheres.
For example, As much as I respect Nadia, there's no such thing as perfection. Even in her classic bar routine, she shuffled her feet, in a landing that Tim Daggett would deem "not a stick". Seven times during the Montreal Olympics Nadia earned a so called "Perfect 10" and each every time she made at least one mistake. She'd never receive a 10 on those routines today, and with the exception of a very few vaults, no one would even have a chance.
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Change isn't necessarily a bad thing. If nothing ever changed in gymnastics, Gymnasts would still have to climb a rope in competition and the hardest skill in Aly Raisman's floor routine would be a roundoff back handspring. Is that really what you want? Difficulty and artistry can coexist, and all things considered, I think that today's gymnasts are doing a pretty good job at incorporating both. We live in a world where 9 (yes, 9!) American gymnasts can hurl themselves over a giant table, do 1.5 flips and 2.5 twists and often land flawlessly. Is that not enough of a trade off to miss out on a few "prettier" skills?
Completely agree, the gymnastics today is much more difficult and it is the difficulty forced by the new rules that keeps it interesting
ReplyDeleteI also agree. I was a dance coach. I am obsessed with So You Think You Can Dance. I love going to the ballet. When I want to see pretty, that is what I do. I love the current gymnastics code. I DON'T like that so many gymnasts get hurt and wish coaches and gymnasts wouldn't out winning before career ending injury potential (so afraid of that on vault at the coming Olympics for Russia and Romania). But I for one am a fan and think that there are still many balletic artistic gymnastics and agree that Jordyn's floor in its presentation, musicality and well done dance skills is very artistic.
ReplyDeleteThank you! It's nice to hear this opinion from someone who is actually educated about gymnastics. I completely agree with you. Different does not = wrong. Gymnastics is, first and foremost, a sport. The highly athletic turn it has taken is not a bad thing. I agree that Jordyn's floor routine is lovely. It suits her well and she has a great sense of rhythm. I just wish that the current code didn't encourage so many injuries! But even that is debatable. Sadly, they are part of the sport. Always have been, always will be.
ReplyDeleteYou make a very good point, Bekah! However, I don't like it when gymnasts chuck difficult skills and forget about controlled clean landings, pointed toes, straight legs, etc. Even you know that gymnasts do chuck skills because the difficulty will most likely get them a higher score overall despite a low execution score. That's a careless, bad part of what gymnastics has become.
ReplyDeleteargh this post reminded me that I'm still bummed about Ana Porgras retiring ...
ReplyDeleteI only agree with some of what you said. I do appreciate the growing difficulty of gymnastics, but I /do not/ appreciate how a lot of gymnasts will "add" more difficulty and forget about execution. A good question would be, Which would you rather see: a perfectly executed double twisting Yurchenko or an Amanar with horrid form but still landed? I, for one, would go for the former, but in today's code a perfectly executed DTY wouldn't score anything near an Amanar that's landed even with awkward foot-shuffling (and judges are always hesitant to give anything above a 9.5/9.6 in execution because of the belief that "nothing is truly perfect," so forget about that "perfect" DTY getting its due credit).
Something that's also worth mentioning is that a lot of today's routines are a bit cookie cutter, since it's the easiest/most efficient way of racking up points. On beam, who doesn't do a front aerial walkover+back flip flop+layout stepout combination? Or some sort of switch split+some sort of back salto combo? And the uneven bar dismounts are practically all the same, too (double layout or full twisting double tuck). It's boring when almost all the ladies are doing the same thing.
Why does it have to be Keleti or Raisman? It can be Afanasyeva, Izbasa, Iordache, Grishina. Jordyn's routine is ok IMO, goes well with the music, she shells it well and it really suits her, it shouldn't receive artitsry deductions but it's far from being a masterpiece (IMO again). This quad there were so many lovely gymnasts (Porgras, Demy, Mustafina, Vika, Iordache, Izbasa, Vega, Finnegan, Maroney, Sui Lu, Izbasa and a ton of others who had the artistry and the difficulty. Isn't that what gymnastics is about? I just watched Iordache's gogean, god it's gorgeous, fully around, so high and she actually hits the oversplit and then I go and see Raisman's and it's just ugly.
ReplyDeleteYou like what YOU like but it doesn't make it wrong. Artistry is so subjective that while you sit there and claim Mustafina, Komova, & Izabasa artistic I find them anything but. I'd rather watch Aly Raisman on floor 500 times in a row than be subjected to Viktoria Komova's more than once.
DeleteI believe the poster of the previous comment commented on Raisman's gogean (1.5 split leap). This is not subjective, it's a fact, her gogean is not good
DeleteNo, it's not enough of a trade-off, sorry. I would rather see a FX with a roundoff back handspring than one with no choreography and a cowboyed double front and boring double pike.
ReplyDeleteAnd as lovely as Ana Porgras was, I find it sad that her 2010 beam was the best of the lot that year. She had so many little wobbles and checks. There's no way she would have medaled under a 10.0 system.
Yes, Jordyn Wieber's FX is great. But a handful of artistic gymnasts doesn't make up for the fact that there is barely enough time to fit choreo into FX these days because of all the dance jump/spin requirements.
No, no, no. It is not better these days and I would take less difficulty for the 10.0, more creativity, compulsories, and choreography any day ever.
it looks like you're young (no more than 20 right?)and you're used in a different style of gymnastics but for us, the older fans who made our moms put pigtails in our hair to look like Olga, spent hours and houts in front of our mirrors trying to do Nadia's ending pose on FX and grew up watching the soviets and romanians like Silivas and Dobre is so hard to see the Wiebers and the Raismans dominating the sport. They are lovely hardworking girls and I wish them all the best but they're not what gymnastics is about
ReplyDeleteIt's hard for me a 28 year old to hear women like you complain about the sport today. As much as I want it to be, it is not 1976. Sports and athletes change. Enjoy getting nostalgic watching old grainy youtube videos but this is the sport now so either deal or don't watch. Simple as that. Those who dominate now deserve it whether you think they do or not.
DeleteI'm sorry if I offended you in any way. I didn't want to offend anyone, I specifically said how hardworking and lovely Aly and Jordyn are and I have great respect to every single gymnast, again I wish them all the best. This article asked a question, if we're willing to sacrifice the artistry for the power tumbling. I answered this question based on my opinion and experience trying to show I have nothing personal againist the gymnasts competing. Did I ever say they don't deserve to dominate? I just said I don't like this trend of gymnastics. And please, be a little more kind, those old grainy youtube videos are part of the history of the sport and the gymnasts in them are legends.
DeleteI like both, I really enjoy watching elegant artistic floor routines that are expressed well, and beam routines that flow and are smooth, but I also love watching someone do an incredibly difficult beam routine or tumbling passes. I deplore a code that has such a push for extra difficulty, it IS too difficult now. What I MOST love, is when a powerful gymnast executes great form and artistry. The code does not reward those who pay too much attention to the 'look' of their gymnastics, it's obvious why it has gone in this direction. Change is not a bad thing, but in this case, they need to reign in the difficulty and reward artistry more than it is currently.
ReplyDeleteAleftina Priakhina, Tatiana Groshkova and Olessia Dudnik are three that come to mind- they all showed incredible difficulty when it wasn't needed and they were innovators. But all three were still artistic and elegant in their gymnastics. Sarah Finnegan is a good modern blend, probably the best one. But there is such sloppiness out there now and people are going to hate that when they contrast it to what gymnastics was.
Try watching the 80's and 90's. This is what people miss not so much the back handsprings from the 70's
ReplyDeleteI agree with everything you've said in your post and all but one of the comments: that business about only young folks not appreciating the lameness - I mean, elegance - that was gymanastics in the age of the round-off backhandspring on floor.
ReplyDeleteI'm undoubtedly older than anyone on here and even remember Olga's first appearance, so I think I can safely say that WAG back then had a dubious claim to being in the Olympics, consisting as it did (pre-Olga) of (often slightly matronly) young women performing the most basic of skills on rudimentary equipment.
However, if people decide that's what they want, then let's just pull gymnastics out of the Olympics and have it as some kind of senior citizens' recreational activities.
The late 70s and 80s had lots of less than perfect performances, as there were (often Russian) gymnasts chucking their skills at qualifying meets, but the memory people have is a rosy one. I can't say that I've seen anything that much worse in execution that some of that stuff today.
Reading this, I think you have misunderstood what people are complaining about, or at least what you are talking about isn't what I am complaining about. I don't want old-school 1970s gymnastics back. What I want is for the code of points to be adjusted so that there is greater reward for COMBINING your difficult skills with artistry. Here, artistry should not under any circumstances be confused with execution. Something can be well executed and not be artistic (see: Aly Raisman). The fact is, one does not have to eliminate the other, but when you get nothing from the code of points for an artistic performance, many gymnasts are simply not going to attempt to be artistic in their performances. I love the athletic turn of gymnastics in a lot of ways, but there's a point at which WAG DOES lose something by being just a series of tricks with some thrown together poses in between. For context, I'm 28. The first Olympics I remember is 1992. You don't have to go back far to find artistry and difficulty combined, but as the code of points (and the way judges interpret it) consistently fails to reward artistry, you see fewer and fewer ladies paying attention to it, and I think that's a shame.
ReplyDeleteHow do judge and value something as subjective as artistry? Is it really fair considering you would have to pander to certain judges preferences rather than performing something you feel is artistic? Art is expression and vice versa so who is anyone to tell someone else that they are being artistic enough?
DeleteAnd for the record, I for one find Aly Raisman's floor to be artistic. I think the music flows well, it gets the audience involved, her dance has come miles from what it was, she moves to the music and has some great skills with it. Let's say me and you are on the judging panel...do we get into a debate over who is right and who will decide who is right? Where is the formula for judging "art"?
The problem with Aly if her toepoint. I love her floor, it's very cleverly done and it IS artistic. She moves to the music well. The other issue I have with her, aside from flexed feet, is that her low-to-beam is so ungraceful. She is an excellent gymnast nonetheless.
DeleteArtsistry on floor is judged by deductions. These are, in general, lack of expression, lack of creative choreography, failure to relate to the music..there are more, but they generally fall under those categories.
The thing is, gymnastics is and always has been a subjective sport. It's not track or swimming. That's part of the problem, but let's be honest, it's also part of the sport. If it wasn't, gym blogs wouldn't spend half their time debating over scoring. I'm not a detailed expert on how to build a code of points, and I'm not saying it's easy to reemphasize artistry, nor am I suggesting how to do it. All I wanted to emphasize in my comment is that much of the artistry debate seems to get completely polarized into 'people who miss the 70s' and 'people who don't care whether things are pretty as long as they are hard'. I just don't think these are the two polls of the debate. I think that most people who complain about lack of artistry see no reason why the women can't maintain their skills and ALSO have artistically executed movements, good toe point, more grace in their dance, etc. Sure, not every gymnast is a ballerina, just like not every gymnast is a powerhouse, but those who are BOTH should be rewarded more than those who are one or the other. I do know that there are mechanisms for this in the code of points. Maybe I underestimate how often they are employed, I don't know.
DeleteI think Aly Raisman is an excellent gymnast. I do not want to imply otherwise. I do not think that she is artistic. I don't think this is any more insulting to Aly than saying that McKayla is not a great bar worker. Everybody has their strengths. I think her floor is well choreographed to make up for her lack of artistry, but to me, she always looks like she is just throwing tricks. It's fun sometimes. I am certainly glad she's on the US team. I do not, however, think she should score as well as a girl with similar mistakes and similar start value who is substantially more graceful or expressive. I think those qualities should increase your score, just like higher tumbling and better handstands on bars do. That's just my personal opinion, but I certainly don't want it to come, or think it needs to come, at the expense of difficult skills.
Thanks for pointing out Nadia's imperfect "perfect 10" routines. I can't express to you how much it bugs me when I see that bars routine landing and then the score that follows. No way in hell would that receive a 10. I love Nadia because of what she has done for the sport but I think they place too much emphasis on those perfect 10's that were achieved when gymnastics was very, very different. I mean back then an American could be nearly perfect and still fail to medal just because they didn't come from an Eastern bloc country. I for one, am glad the sport has changed. I also couldn't figure an athlete's score to save my life under the 10 code but now I can actually figure what a girls D- score is and can come pretty darn close to finding the same amount of deductions for the E score.
ReplyDeleteEastern block countries have received lots of gifts throught the years but when Nadia received her 10 Romania wasn't anything close to a powrhouse, she got a 10 because she was just SO much better than the girls who have received 9.9
DeleteSo you tell us that you'd trade this:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h4BmCAn8OUE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHobEqh8dWY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hgwMLqAqwVg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ThXBCPzzb9Q
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KvUfzxfLeE8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TYhRIdBpwpg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RKBpVBuHyGc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6X7qFDiscE
for a 1.5 to a double arabian punch front?
And you consider Wieber's routine the most caprivating? It's fun to watch but seriously?
People Aly DOES NOT move well with the music. She's standing without moving for 3 seconds and wait for the music AND at one point she's just jumping around (we do the same thing in our gym for warm up) You can say Jo's routine is artistic but NOT Aly's
ReplyDeleteAnnon @ 1:15pm. Thank you for illustrating how artistry amplifies the complete package. Why not do hand stand pirouettes, front walkovers, shushanovas? As a choreographer the lack of fluidity from movement to movement bugs me these days.
ReplyDeleteok, I'm a dance teacher and choreographer and in my opinion Jordyn Wieber's floor choreography doesn't define artistry. as other people said it's fun to watch and she works well with the music but there's no fluidity in her movements and there's way too much handwaving. also let's not forget that those russian girls weren't born to be ballerinas. They've had ballet lessons and worked hard with choreographers all those years, that's why they have those beautiful routine because they bother to work hard on them
ReplyDeleteI love beautiful balletic gym just like the next person, but if people are really so nostalgic for the old way and they would rather watch an elegant dance and a round off, back handspring over skills of today like they claim, then the elegant athletes of Rhythmic Gymnastics would be a hell of a lot more popular. The main crowd pleaser in Artistic Gymnastics are the big, high flying tricks that only a handful of elites can perform after years and years of training. If all everyone did was a round off back handspring on floor (of which most basic level cheerleaders can do), then the fickle fans would bitch and moan about that, too.
ReplyDeleteI was trying to find a way to express my opinion and Aunt Joyce posted sth in his blog that is exacly what I wanted to say: Who gives a shit about tumbling when you can dance like this?! Screw the code and bring back all the points for overall impression.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=DUoaD5EYG6k