Pan American Games 2019

[vinipereira 3,264]

4 hours ago, heywoodu said:

Rhythmic gymnastics? I very strongly doubt that. Much like dressage for example, if you have no knowledge of it you've got no idea what the hell is going on. At least in sports like swimming or athletics one can simply see who finished first or jumped the highest or something. 

 

Well, I think it's a very "artistic" sport that many people like to watch. Obviously I'm biased because in Brazil it seems very popular during the Pan Ams (open TV show the whole competition), maybe because Brazil wins the most golds in the team events. But it's like Figure Skating here (the most popular winter sport), which I don't think many people know how the scoring works, but watch it for the beauty?

 

[heywoodu 15,178]

12 minutes ago, vinipereira said:

 

Well, I think it's a very "artistic" sport that many people like to watch. Obviously I'm biased because in Brazil it seems very popular during the Pan Ams (open TV show the whole competition), maybe because Brazil wins the most golds in the team events. But it's like Figure Skating here (the most popular winter sport), which I don't think many people know how the scoring works, but watch it for the beauty?

 

That's how it works here, unlike rhythmic gymnastics, which apart from the obvious handful of diehards, just really nobody cares about or finds impressive or interesting to watch and mostly calls it a bunch of people throwing some hoops and ribbons around  

[thiago_simoes 1,423]

1 hour ago, heywoodu said:

That's how it works here, unlike rhythmic gymnastics, which apart from the obvious handful of diehards, just really nobody cares about or finds impressive or interesting to watch and mostly calls it a bunch of people throwing some hoops and ribbons around  

 

I know this question is kind of off topic, but what happened to the Netherlands? The Dutch group was very active in the late 90s and earsly 00s, and from 1995 to 2007 Deventer hosted one stage of the Grand Prix series. The group even won a bronze medal at the 2000 Grand Prix Final. What happened that rhythmic gymnastics basically vanished from the country?

[heywoodu 15,178]

1 hour ago, thiago_simoes said:

 

I know this question is kind of off topic, but what happened to the Netherlands? The Dutch group was very active in the late 90s and earsly 00s, and from 1995 to 2007 Deventer hosted one stage of the Grand Prix series. The group even won a bronze medal at the 2000 Grand Prix Final. What happened that rhythmic gymnastics basically vanished from the country?

Something from an unknown date (I assume the 1970 mentioned is wrong, since it's talking about events in the 90s and 00s, but with time travel technology one can never be too sure):

https://resource.wur.nl/nl/show/Nationaal-kampioene-stopt-met-ritmische-gymnastiek.htm

 

It's about a triple Dutch champion retiring. It says she became Dutch champion in 2000 for the first time, winning all events, and a year later doing the same. However, KNGU (gymnastics federation) then decided to stop the whole rhythmic gymnastics national team to focus all resources in women's artistic gymnastics. Van Montfoort says her coach (a Bulgarian who was world champion herself) got fired and she had to go train at her local team. She and some others kept on going because the 2003 world champs were supposed to be held in the Netherlands, but eventually they retired.

[thiago_simoes 1,423]

1 hour ago, heywoodu said:

It's about a triple Dutch champion retiring. It says she became Dutch champion in 2000 for the first time, winning all events, and a year later doing the same. However, KNGU (gymnastics federation) then decided to stop the whole rhythmic gymnastics national team to focus all resources in women's artistic gymnastics. Van Montfoort says her coach (a Bulgarian who was world champion herself) got fired and she had to go train at her local team. She and some others kept on going because the 2003 world champs were supposed to be held in the Netherlands, but eventually they retired.

Too bad. But I can't say they were wrong. I mean, Sanne Wevers became a world-silver medalist, European champion and Olympic champion. And, quite frankly, she was nobody just three or four years ago. This is the most surprising case I've seen in my life of an older gymnast blossoming very late in her career and winning almost everything. I'm not sure she can still fight for medals, but you never know.
 

Edited April 18, 2019 by thiago_simoes

[heywoodu 15,178]

2 minutes ago, thiago_simoes said:

Too bad. But I can't say they were wrong. I mean, Sanne Wevers became a world-silver medalist, European champion and Olympic champion. And, quite frankly, she was nobody just three or four years ago. This is the most surprising case I've seen in my life of an older gymnast blossoming very late in her career and winning almost everything. I'm not sure she can still fight for medals, but you never know.
 

 

To be fair, this does sound kind of 'Dutch': blooming much later, probably because for young athletes there's still a ton of people who keep telling them (and rightfully so in my opinion) they shouldn't go 100% for their sports career, but also make sure they've got some serious education to fall back on.

[thiago_simoes 1,423]

1 minute ago, heywoodu said:

 

To be fair, this does sound kind of 'Dutch': blooming much later, probably because for young athletes there's still a ton of people who keep telling them (and rightfully so in my opinion) they shouldn't go 100% for their sports career, but also make sure they've got some serious education to fall back on.

I made a mess out of my previous reply, so I'll just make things clear here. Sanne Wevers was 24 when she got her first major medal and 25 when she was Olympic champion. Usually female gymnasts reach their peak from 18 to 20, and very few of them remain a threat for major medals after 23. You have to be a very special kind of gymnast to keep fighting for medals as late as 27 (she was just one month shy of turning 27 when she became European champion). This is incredible. I'm even more impressed after learning that she probably focused on her education first.

[intoronto 5,678]

17 hours ago, Olympian1010 said:

How do you know the broadcast schedule already, I looked for one the other day, but couldn’t find it.

I don't know the schedule, just an idea (as of December 2018) of which sports are planned to be broadcast.

[vinipereira 3,264]

[vinipereira 3,264]

Notable changes (some of which were discussed here) include: Swimming at the second week in the same days of Athletics; Judo being held in the last days, as Taekwondo goes to the first days; most Cycling events being held from the second weekend on; all Boxing finals in the first week; Women's Volleyball tournament after Men's (Peru might be fighting for gold after all).

 

I think Toronto had some problems keeping the excitement for the second week (at the second Sunday, 233 out of 364 events had already been held). I don't think this will be a problem in Lima. In fact, the second week will be VERY busy.