China Women's Gymnastics Gold applicable to figure skating?

As everyone knows, there has been quite a bit of controversy over several members of the "Womens" Chinese gymnastic team falsifying their ages in order to compete... some speculated to be between 12 - 14. And then they won gold. When listening to the stories of all of the older gymnasts, how many of the gymnasts over the age of 16 have undergone mutliple surgeries and lost months or years of practice due to injuries? Lifting the age requirement for gymnastics is now becoming a serious issue.

I find it pretty applicable to figure skating... the same rigorous training, the more likelihood of injury as you get older and are subjected to more years of practice. Yes, I like to see skaters mature, but if ages are being falsified for the Summer Olympics... how long until the same thing starts happening in the Winter Olympics with figure skating? Now that everyone knows the age requirement is in place, how long will it be before a coach of a great skater figures out they will be slightly too young for the Olympics that they could compete in several years in the future and decides to falsify their age? If the age requirement for Mao Asada was known when she was younger, could her age have been doctored so she could have competed in the last Olympics? If the Japanese ladies team wasn't so deep, I would venture to say yes.

The only solutions I really see are either lifting all of the age restrictions in both the Summer and Winter Olympics, or having something along the lines of an "International Athlete Passport" that isn't just a passport distributed by the athlete's home country, but researched by an unbiased committee.

bethissoawesome said:

The only solutions I really see are either lifting all of the age restrictions in both the Summer and Winter Olympics

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How can that be a solution? Just because laws against murder are broken - nobody (or at least nobody I know) thinks about abandoning the laws against murder.

if i am not mistaken in the earlier years of figure skating, there was no age limit. mainly due to just having figures for the competition. if there was one they didn't abide by it. sonja, cecilia, megan being real young. along with some others.
nowadays -it isn't the jumps which they can do.(sometimes not correctly) it is the mind pressue i think. it is the outside expectations. but being that young they don't buy it.
also as far a gymnastics, i think all along the federations have been lying about ages. it just wasn't picked up. as they said no federation is going to go to the media and claim a inelligible gymnast if only by a few days, months or years.

I kinda agree. My beef is not that the girls are too young. they have proven they can do it and well. My problem with the situation is that if 12-year-old chinese girls are winning OGs, then all the countries should have that opportunity. A level playing field is all I am asking for. If the rule states that the girls must be 16, so be it. No matter how much one disagrees with the rule, in all fairness it must be obeyed.

The rules should be kept. They are there for really good reasons. The physical and mental stress of athletes competing in the Olympics is immense. The age restrictions are there to protect athletes. As for a solution, I think having stringent checks on their ages and is all they can do for now I guess.

sure, but how do we know the former winners, romanias, usa, russia were age elligiible,
we don't we just assume they was because no media or other outlet let us know. they federations wasn't going to tell us.
i thought there was a rumor that dominque mocieanu wasn't age elligile. i recall earlier ones not being age eligible. how do we know nadia was. we don't we just assume they was.
now adays because of internet access -it is harder to fudge the age eligiblity questions -if only by 1 day, month or years.

Chinese Ladies ignore the music on the Floor Work routines. The Figure Skaters are so much better at music.

The youngest figure skaters in Worlds/Olympics that I recall were pairs skaters. It was fashionable before the age requirements to have competitors as young as age 12 or 13 for the girl.

And as to past gymnastics champions, Nadia Comaneci was 14 in Montreal. There were no age requirements at that time.

Does anyone know exactly when an age requirement was set for gymnastics?

dorispulaski said:

Does anyone know exactly when an age requirement was set for gymnastics?

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1997 (right after the Atlanta Olympics). Here is what Wilkipedia has to say about past age controversies.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_controversies_in_gymnastics

They make the interesting point that years ago women's gymnastics was more about graceful movement, and the athletes typically had many years of ballet training. Agnes Keleti won Olympic gold medals in the 1956 Olympics at age 35.

But gradually the sport turned more and more to tricks that only children can do.

Karen Kelsall competed for Canada in 1976 at age 13. The rule then was, you had to be 14 but you could get in at a younger age if you had the recommendation of your national federation. (The 12-year-old U.S. wunderkind that year did not receive this special permission and had to stay home.)

In a 2002 interview, Romanian gymnast Daniela Silivaş, whose age was advanced two years in the 1980s, noted: "One of the officials of the Federation told me 'Look at the passport, from today you're not 13 years old anymore but 15.' Nobody asked me if I agreed to this, I was just a child. They needed gold medals and everybody who was involved in gymnastics knew about these practices.

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Ironically, Bela Korolyi was once Siliva's coach (but not at the time that she was competing at the World level.)

Nadia Comanici was 14 when she got all those perfect 10s, but that was OK becuse the rule then was that you had to turn 15 in that calandar year.

About this years' China girls, a lot of information is surfacing in which their ages given in previous competitions don't jibe with the claims being made now.

I think it would be really hard for this to happen in the U.S. Public records -- birth certificates, hospital and school records, etc. -- are so open here it would take a Herculean conspiracy to get away with it. All you would have to do is go to the girl's home town and ask her next door neighbor how old the kid was.

mycelticblessing said:

The rules should be kept. They are there for really good reasons. The physical and mental stress of athletes competing in the Olympics is immense. The age restrictions are there to protect athletes. As for a solution, I think having stringent checks on their ages and is all they can do for now I guess.

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Obviously in this Olympics, it was not the case. The "underage" Chinese girls were the ones that performed better, their team captain (20 years old) fell from the beam... and the US team captain, Alicia Sacramone, fell from the beam and landed on her back on the floor. The mental stress of major competitions doesn't affect younger athletes as much as it does seasoned ones. You can google online the many, many articles written now about how younger athletes are more eager to perform difficult tricks, as older ones are more aware of the injuries that could ensue. Not to mention a lot of the athletic ability to do more difficult tricks is present while younger before puberty. Why was the first ladies quad landed in Juniors? Why do young skaters keep "bursting" on to the scene to take International titles their first time in Senior ranks? They are more fearless and don't have the expectations placed on them that are noted after years of competing.

As for age restrictions protecting athletes, I kind of only believe half of that is true. The intentions are good, but does it really make a difference? Mao landed a triple axel as a Junior. Mirai and Caroline are skating routines just as difficult technically as "older" skaters. How is the age restriction protecting them?

The big problem I see is that eventually, I think it is inevitable that coaches will have more desire to train athletes that will meet the age requirement during the Olympic year, not when they are 19 going on 20. It's simply a better gamble.. there is less chance that the athlete will get injured, be ousted by an up-and-comer, etc.

age controversial

In a documentary made in 2003 about China's preparation for 2008 Olympics (Dream Weaver Beijing2008), Deng linlin and Jiang Yuyuan, among others, were filmed entered chinese gymnastic national team at 2003 at age 11 and 12.

So, how old are they in 2008?

the youtube link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TUGx-...eature=related

BTW, Bela and Martha are too sour-grape this time, and what's the advantage for being underage in a sports that needs strength and power? And where is the solid proof for all these accusation? (There are just too many China bashing these days, everything with China is bad bad bad, but how will this help our USA team or society?) If Chinese team was not strong, I am sure no one will make a fuss even if a 10-year-old girl was there to compete. Lose a game doesn't mean you have to lose your dignity too.

I was wondering how this controversy started and how they could prove it. They have passports as supporting documents, which is pretty strong evidence. I understand that Chinese girls look young. But gymnasts tend to look so young because many of them are small and skinny. There wouldn't be any scientific tests that you could examine one's age.

Bennett said:

I was wondering how this controversy started and how they could prove it. They have passports as supporting documents, which is pretty strong evidence. I understand that Chinese girls look young. But gymnasts tend to look so young because many of them are small and skinny. There wouldn't be any scientific tests that you could examine one's age.

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The controversy started because there have been articles, some even from within China, stating the ages of certain Chinese gymnasts at different competitons in the past... and those ages indicated that the gymnasts would NOT be age-eligible for the 2008 Olympics. And different articles cite different age/ birthdates for the gymnasts. China has a history of altering passports, birth certificates, etc. so that their athletes can, essentially, be any age they need to be. So just because He Kexin has a passport saying she is 16, that is not really strong evidence. All it means is that China can easily adjust He's documents to say whatever they want them to say. Even given the fact that Chinese tend to be small and look young, there is no way that anyone can ever convince me that He Kexin is 16. Deng Linlin looks about 12, she's missing a baby tooth for heaven's sake! The Chinese are cheating, I'm fairly certain of that, there just is no real way to PROVE it.

mycelticblessing said:

The rules should be kept. They are there for really good reasons. The physical and mental stress of athletes competing in the Olympics is immense. The age restrictions are there to protect athletes. As for a solution, I think having stringent checks on their ages and is all they can do for now I guess.

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Not only that, but Olympics is far different than any competition. You go from a girl to adult very quickly. Not only an adult but princess-like adult and it's far more interesting to see a girl who is just a little older and see how she matures into a young woman (or young woman into adulthood) rather than a little girl into an adolescent (and their parents just go crazy thinking about the endorsements or lack thereof). BTW, where was Carley Patterson, she wasn't at the Olympics, was she? I read she wanted to be a country singer.

lisadotdash said:

BTW, where was Carley Patterson, she wasn't at the Olympics, was she? I read she wanted to be a country singer.

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Here is a recent article about Patterson. It makes the point that it is not so easy to translate Olympic success into big money opportunities later.

http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-olycarly27-2008jul27,0,7029547.story

IIRC she was in a couple of the those Disson shows featuring skating an gymnastics. I think another one is planned by Disson this season.

Thank you for your explanations.

Yet, passports seem stronger evidence than the prior records reported in the media or competitions. It is all possible that the media or the administrative staff were just sloppy in reporting their ages and made simple errors. It's a lot of work to manipulate such official documents and when it's proven to be false, it's extremely shameful and damages the team's name forever.

It's very difficult to tell one's age by apparence and the maturity varies by individuals, especially in the cases of athletes.

Asians often look younger than their actual ages. I am a Japanese who is small and skinny, and people always assume that I am 6-10 years younger than my actual age.

On the other hand, there are, of course, some Asian people who look older than their actual ages. For example, Mai Asada as a teenager always looked older than her actual ages. She looked like 17 (to me) when she was 14 whereas her sister Mao Asada looked much younger than her actual ages. When Mao was 12, she looked like 9 or 10 (to me). When she won the Junior Worlds at 14, she looked like 12 (to me). When she won the GPF at 15, she looked like 13 (to me). Their body lines and heights are very similar. Only their faces are different, which totally changes the overall impressions they give to others.

Bennett said:

It's a lot of work to manipulate such official documents and when it's proven to be false, it's extremely shameful and damages the team's name forever.

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Apparently, its not all that much work in China to alter "official" documents, it happens all the time. The Chinese girl that won in Sydney in 2000 later admited that, despite what her "official" documents said, she was only 14 at the time of the competition. If you can be of any use to the country in any way, your papers can say whatever they need to say.

As for age restrictions protecting athletes, I kind of only believe half of that is true. The intentions are good, but does it really make a difference? Mao landed a triple axel as a Junior. Mirai and Caroline are skating routines just as difficult technically as "older" skaters. How is the age restriction protecting them?

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I think the age restrictions could be very beneficial for the skaters, and I would even be in favour of slightly raising the age limit.

It certainly doesn't mean that I think the young phenoms like Mao or Caroline are not competitive with more experienced ladies. Quite the opposite. It's because many skaters (especially female) peek at this age and quite often their jumping abilities are at their best. What's more, initially they are not under as much pressure as their more seasoned competitors. With this double advantage the young phenoms are more than competetive with the seniors, and often they are able to burst onto the stage, grab a title or two (or three), create quite a stir...

And then the growth spurt hits. Sometimes it can treat the skater gently, sometimes it can totally play havoc with the skater's body. Consistency, more difficult jumps, flexibility, spins, balance - all of those can be more or less affected, and greater attention paid to the elements that are now more difficult takes away from the skater's artistry and expression. The skater starts to struggle with her own body, but the media and fans rarely understand that and expect the skater to keep on winning and can be quite cruel if the skater fails to deliver.

I think it's enough to remember articles and posts about Kimmie, Miki, Caroline (after Nationals) or even Mao (after some of her worse performances). The girls are accused of being poor skaters, getting worse instead of improving, failing to live up to their potential, encouraged to retire and/or otherwise bashed. Struggling to regain top form under such heavy (and in many cases negative) pressure is extremely stressful. What's more, no one, including the skater herself, knows whether or not this struggle will be successful. Many skaters, like Naomi Nari Nam, Mai Asada, Aki Sawada, etc. have shown great promise in their younger days, but the growth spurt messed up their abilities, and trying to get them back only caused the girls to get injured.

Even the more fortunate of the skaters have suffered from the growth spurt. Back in 2006 Mao was accused of having poor spins, not deep enough layback, bad sit positions and poor artistry, especially when it came to her facial expression. However, it's enough to go back to Mao's performances as a novice to see that all those things were actually Mao's forte. Only after her body has grown significantly she started experiencing troubles, and the huge pressure to win generated by the Japanese media certainly didn't help any.

That's one side of the coin.

The second one is the well-being of the sport itself. I've read many times the opinion that figure skating in order to become more popular again needs stars, like T/D, Yagudin and Michelle Kwan, the polished skaters who are able to stay on the top (or close to it) for a long period of time (and I agree with that opinion). Also, I think that all fans would like to see polished, all-round skaters as champions... I don't think that getting rid of age limits would encourage this tendency. I think that we would see a lot of young champions, who would be all too quickly replaced with a new wave of young phenoms, perhaps even too quickly for a casual fan to remember their names.

What I would like to see is to slightly rise the age limit AND put a limit on the elements allowed in the SP and LP. No quads, no 3As, perhaps not even 3-3s (in competition, though I don't mind them trying those in practice). Instead the juniors should concentrate more on perfecting the basics. There is a high probability that they would lose the higher difficulty elements anyway, and good basics would help them to get through growth spurt. What's more, if the difficult tricks were forbidden in competition, the skaters would have to find some other way to stand out. I hope that it would encourage more expression, perfecting the elements, and more originality in spins, spirals, jump entrances and air position...
Hopefully, this would also decrease the media pressure on the juniors.

That's of course just my personal opinion.

There is no way they would ever limit elements allowed in competition at the International level. Sport is about moving forward to be the "highest, strongest, fastest" and by eliminating that potential (no more of element X allowed in competition), it takes some of the fascination for the casual fan (every 4th year for the Olympics) out because the phenom doesn't get to to perform the trick because it's not on the allowable list. We would never have seen Midori Ito land that awesome 3A of hers (and let's face it, Midori, Kristi, Tanya, and Nancy started to push the wave forward to the peak of skating's ratings). One of the complaints about Kwan was that she didn't push the technical envelope any further and it actually regressed some during her reign (no 3/3 for a long time and no 3A for ~10 years).

Okami said:

Also, I think that all fans would like to see polished, all-round skaters as champions... I don't think that getting rid of age limits would encourage this tendency. I think that we would see a lot of young champions, who would be all too quickly replaced with a new wave of young phenoms, perhaps even too quickly for a casual fan to remember their names.

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It's that way for me in gymnastics - and I even happen to watch the big gymnastics competitions outside the Olympics (Euros, Worlds), I am a casual fan who is mildly interested. And everytime I watch one of these big competitions I have the feeling that at least half of the girls are new. I would love to see a statistic about the careers of these girls - my feeling is that they are often half an olympic cycle. That impressive Russian girl who came fourth at AA, didn't know about her before these olympics and I just hope for her that she can maintain her abilities through 2012 and medal in London. But it's also quite possible that by 2012 there are other impressive 15-16 year-olds who will have taken her place till then. That can't be good for a sport.