SPOILER - Women's gymnastic team event

**thisthingcalledlove** · 08-18-2004, 03:42 AM

Originally Posted by OwenEvans

BiG, I so agree: the US girls were spectacular but it's no disgrace whatsoever to come 2nd to the Romanians (did the US coverage show Nadia C doing an uninhibited "happy dance" in the stands upon final confirmation of results?? very cute).

Everyone I know here who watched is seriously ga-ga over Annia Hatch - what a beautiful woman! What height off the vault!!!!!!! And she seemed to be enjoying the atmosphere and all the other performances so much. She is a Goddess!

The girl from the US with the Greek music (Kupets, I think) had horrible choreography. It seemed like half the time she wanted to raise the roof...she was thinking of the wrong music...

**Joesitz** · 08-18-2004, 07:24 AM

I give a lot of credit to the judging of these events. The gymnastics bigwigs really worked on getting rid of the hanky panky. And yes, a silver medal is nothing to sneer at for the Americans. As for the 'dance' in the floorwork... well...I just don't see shaking one's bottom to the beat of the music as a big dance step, and that pausing, sometimes two breaths, before a big trick doesn't exactly make the 'dance' any better.

But the Americans could use Lori Nichols or Twyla Tharpe for next year's Worlds.

Why not?

Joe

**euterpe** · 08-18-2004, 08:58 AM

I agree, Joesitz. The US ladies really need to work on those 'dance' moves. They don't dance so much as they just stop tumbling. There's no thought put into it, and it shows.

The Romanians were so much better, as their dance moves were woven into the routine and they went smoothly from dancing to tumbling and back.

**JonnyCoop** · 08-18-2004, 10:49 AM

I agree as well. Plus I didn't see any sense at all of FEELING the music or even especially coordinating the routine to it. Guess it's the gymnastics version of putting all your mental energy into executing the big tricks and having nothing left for selling "the program".

Actually I'm in favor of getting rid of the music altogether -- for one thing, the men don't have to do it; they're not expected to go out there and be cutesy and shake their thangs and it being 2004, the women shouldn't have to either. Plus it's distracting. I realize that top-level international gymnasts are used to 45 different things going on at once around them while they're doing their routine, but having someone's floor exercise music start right in the middle of one's beam routine is one less thing they would have to put up with.

**lavender** · 08-18-2004, 11:31 AM

I swear it's just not in the cards for the US to win on a regular basis. It's usually the Russians or the Romanians that will always win.

**artekgwent** · 08-18-2004, 12:10 PM

Originally Posted by lavender

I swear it's just not in the cards for the US to win on a regular basis. It's usually the Russians or the Romanians that will always win.

Well, it's not in the cards to win if they (the US) don't improve an obviously weak part of their program: no real dance moves in the FX. It's so much nicer to watch the Romanians & other Eastern countries, where the moves are so much more fluid, musical, and expressive. Not to mention much better music choices. If dance is a part of the requirements why not take it seriously? I'm not commenting here on whether it should or shouldn't be, just that it IS, therefore a well-prepared competitor should be having better dance training & choreography. Why is that so hard for US? And why act surprised when the judging reflects this?

**lavender** · 08-18-2004, 01:19 PM

Originally Posted by artekgwent

Well, it's not in the cards to win if they (the US) don't improve an obviously weak part of their program: no real dance moves in the FX. It's so much nicer to watch the Romanians & other Eastern countries, where the moves are so much more fluid, musical, and expressive. Not to mention much better music choices. If dance is a part of the requirements why not take it seriously? I'm not commenting here on whether it should or shouldn't be, just that it IS, therefore a well-prepared competitor should be having better dance training & choreography. Why is that so hard for US? And why act surprised when the judging reflects this?

I agree and Martha should have known.

**thisthingcalledlove** · 08-18-2004, 03:14 PM

Originally Posted by euterpe

I agree, Joesitz. The US ladies really need to work on those 'dance' moves. They don't dance so much as they just stop tumbling. There's no thought put into it, and it shows.

The Romanians were so much better, as their dance moves were woven into the routine and they went smoothly from dancing to tumbling and back.

I remember during the early-late 90's, when the US women actually had interesting FX's. The Romanians were considered boring at the time (Simona Amanar was tantamount to...a fridge break, even though she was consistent). I heard Belu put that team together after the 2001 scandals...