thiago_simoes

Russia and Japan for sure. The third spot could be a total surprise, such as Uzbekistan, but I doubt it. I'd say Bulgaria, but Italy and Israel could take its place. Ukraine, Azerbaijan and Belarus would be the dark horses. Unless China has major upgrades, I believe they have no chance of getting a medal. It's hard to predict anything else at this point because we still need to know which nations will qualify. Europe: I don't think Spain will qualify. Turkey is more likely to qualify, but Germany, Finland or Estonia could also pull of a miraculous qualification. Of course, Ukraine might get the European quota, what means the WCh quota would be reallocated. Americas: Mexico is the clear favorite here. US and Canada are its nearest rivals. Brazil has suffered with major problems and, now, I'd say we have no chance at all of qualifying. Oceania: It's either Australia or New Zealand, but Australia has the edge. Still, either nation will be the weakest of the bunch. Africa: I'm not sure if Egypt's qualification will be uphold because apparently two gymnasts from the group tested positive for doping. I don't think any other nation from Africa follows the minimum requirements for qualification, so we shall see what FIG will do. Asia: Uzbekistan is the favorite for qualification. It's leaps and bounds ahead of the remaining countries available for a quota. South Korea and Kazakhstan are the only other nations which would be interested in the quota, but they are considerably behind Uzbekistan. Maybe Thailand would be interested too, who knows?

LOL, this looks like Bolivia at the South American Artistic Gymnastics Championships. There was a year when the Bolivian girls beat the Peruvian team for the bronze medal and I was like "noooo way, this is huge", even though there were only four teams competing.

Yay, a medal in total for Sri Lanka! Is that a first?

Yet another fourth place for Mexico. I believe it's the fifth time they finish fourth in recent years. How frustrating! Judges, give them a medal already!

2013. It was not only the last, but the only one so far. Brazil was supposed to participate at the WC stages, but when the girls got to the airport, someone in the delegation tested positive for Covid. I'm not sure what's the status of the group now, but word of mouth has not been positive and even at their best, the girls would not come close to Mexico's level this year. Olympic qualification should be between the US and Mexico, with maybe Canada and Cuba as dark horses. Canada has lots of new gymnasts this year on their group, so I'm curious to see what they can do. Last year the Canadians won a medal at the Grand Prix series, so I hope they keep the level high this year too.

Tashkent is such a weird stage. There's always Russian drama and unbelievable scores. I remember Kabaeva throwing a tantrum in 2003 or 2004 and it was such a scandal in RG forums at the time. LOL. Anyway, as I mentioned earlier, you can't underestimate the big name countries. Even Turkey hit their routine today. Sixth place for Mexico with excellent scores overall, but the level was high here despite a depleted field with no Russia and Bulgaria. There are still lots of stages this year, and Portimão is usually the weakest of the WC stages, so I hope Mexico keeps getting funds for the travel expenses and don't give up this year. They deserve a medal.

Of course, I had to be the only one who thinks the OG were more memorable in the 20th century, LOL.

I'm very excited with the possibility of a medal for Mexico tomorrow. But I guess their best shot was in the all-around, since Ukraine had mistakes in both routines. In a field with Israel, Ukraine and Belarus, and Uzbekistan competing at home, gymnasts from other nations have to do their absolute best in order to get a medal.

I'm amaaaazed with her! She currently has the third highest combined difficulty in the world, behind only the Averinas. This is insane! She's going to be a star!

The Mexican group scored 36.300 today and I'm super excited because Mexico is getting closer and closer to a World Cup medal! This is the highest any country from the Americas has scored under the current code, and for this specific competition, it was just .300 less than Israel and .550 less than Belarus. I can't stress how important this is. There's a real chance for an all-around medal here; currently, Mexico is sitting in fourth place. I really hope Mexico wins a medal here; in fact, more than one. This looks like it will be a fantastic year for the Mexicans and Olympic qualification should not be too hard. This is excellent for this sport, and any serious fan knows how much we need more diversity on the podium.

He's not going to the Olympics for sure, but Valentina Rodionenko still stated that he's being considered for the team. The Rodionenkos are completely insane, we all know it, but ValRod has now shown how out of touch with reality she is. What an irresponsible, dangerous person. Dalaloyan needs to recover. Period. He should only be back to full training in six months.

Yes, the point is that it all comes down to personal taste. I just can't enjoy it no matter what. It's either over too fast or slow and boring. This sport almost makes me like Parkour for kind of fitting in the middle: it's not over too fast, but it's also not so slow that I would be bored watching.

I'm surprised with how much you guys seem to like sports climbing. For me, it's the worst sport in the current Olympic program. I could even pick breakdancing over sports climbing, to be honest.

Jennifer Gadirova will miss the European Championships. At this point, it's more and more likely that one of the Russians and Larissa Iordache will be the ones qualified to Tokyo. Last year I thought Iordache had no chance of qualifying at all, but now that Great Britain, Italy and France either lost or are not allowed to use their best gymnasts, the path is wide open for Iordache.

I mentioned that there's a chance for a medal in the All-Around, but that does not mean that one of the Brazilians is absolutely going to take it. You see, the thing with gymnastics is that you have to keep an eye on what everyone has been training and which upgrades they are planning. All-Around is a very open event, and seriously six or seven countries can achieve medals, including the US, Russia, China, Brazil, Japan, France and Great Britain. Rebeca Andrade currently has the second highest difficulty on vault, only behind Biles, and her execution has been fantastic in training. Biles has a new, more difficult vault, and she's hands down the favorite for the gold medal. But Carey, Rebeca and Ellie Downie will have a great battle for silver and bronze. Of course we have vaulters like Shallon Olsen, Giulia Steingruber, Corine Devillard, Oksana Chusovitina and Alexa Moreno still going strong, but at this point, they are one step behind Biles and the other three I mentioned, both in difficulty and execution. Now, predicting medals in men's gymnastics is a lot harder because there are many serious contenders. For example, most people who are hopeful for a medal in the horizontal bar for their fellow countrymen are probably not aware of what Uchimura and Miyachi have been training. On paper, their routines should easily give them gold and silver on this apparatus, especially because they'll receive slightly boosted scores thanks to home advantage. The same goes for Nina Derwael on the uneven bars, but Sunisa Lee now has an even more difficult and clean routine, which should put a hard fight against Derwael. It all comes down to how they will perform on that particular day, of course, but results from 2019 and especially 2018 should not be taken seriously when predicting medals in 2021.

It's always amusing to see the predictions in gymnastics. You guys quickly go from pondered and rational in other sports to completely out of your minds in gymnastics. I kind of love seeing it lol.

Interesting. I thought you would pick Ellie Downie instead of Taeja James. Does she has some crazy major upgrades?

LOL, you're right. I predicted 15 medals, which would be 4 less than in 2016, but I believe that no one who follows the sport in the country would be happy with anything other than 20 medals or more this time. If our judokas and volleyball teams had been in better shape, I would have predicted over 20 medals for sure. Also, on paper, Brazil can challenge for 6 medals in artistic gymnastics, and if we manage to get 4 or more, I would go crazy. Our chances are: men's rings, men's horizontal bar, women's all-around, women's vault, women's balance beam and women's floor. I believe women's vault is our "safest" medal with Rebeca Andrade. Of course, she has to qualify first, but she's in excellent shape in training, maybe the best she has ever been.

Who would you pick for these three medals? I'm just curious.

Brazil: Athletics - 0-2 Boxing - 1 Canoeing Slalom - 0-1 Canoeing Sprint - 1-2 Cycling - 0-1 Fencing - 0-1 Football - 0-2 Artistic Gymnastics - 1-3 Judo - 1-2 Sailing - 1 Shooting - 0-1 Skateboarding - 2-3 Surfing - 2-3 Swimming - 1-2 Open water swimming - 1 Taekwondo - 0-1 Tennis - 0-1 Volleyball and Beach Volleyball - 0-2 Weightlifting - 0-1 So, worst case scenario is 10, best case scenario is around 30. Judo, volleyball and artistic gymnastics could realistically provide more medals, but it would be far too optimistic to expect more than what I'm already expecting from these sports. There are also very long shots in table tennis and archery; chances are like 5% in these sports. I'd say 15 is a solid number -- a little bit conservative, but solid nevertheless.

Oh, I totally forgot about Alexa Moreno! It will be interesting to see what she can do.

There's a chance. He can still qualify through the Apparatus World Cup series. Currently, Liu Yang from China is ahead of Petrounias, but there's a chance Petrounias can still beat him on average points. Highly unlikely at this point, but I believe it's not impossible. China could also try to earn an extra quota through the Asian Championships. Now, this quota would be open to any Chinese gymnast, so it's a lot more interesting for China to earn this quota than accept the one from the World Cup series, which would be restricted to Liu Yang. Let's suppose he gets injured before the Olympics, for example; China would lose this quota this way. But if they refuse the quota from the World Cup series and accept the quota from the Asian Championships, instead, they can take whoever they want. In this case, Petrounias would be second best, and would receive the quota instead. This is a lot more likely to happen. That being said, Petrounias has been absent from competition for over one year now, and the other competitors are very fierce. China could realistically send both Liu Yang and You Hao to the Olympics, and other nations have their own specialists already qualified -- Turkey has Çolak, Ukraine has Radivilov, France has Said, Italy has Lodadio, Brazil has Zanetti. It could be anyone's game.

Poor Ziaziulin. He always finishes fourth, even when it comes to small medals. I believe he's secretly Brazilian.

Thank you. Somehow, I failed to realize how weird the rules are for such a simple sport. It's like they were bored with the way things were and decided to change everything based on arbitrary decisions. I wonder why some federations act like this. Stupid rules that prevent the best athletes from competing should not exist. Period. It's pretty much like artistic gymnastics where we'll have a very limited girl from Singapore competing at the Olympics, while extra gymnasts from Ukraine, Brazil and Australia will have to stay home, even though their level is miles ahead of what the Singaporean girl can reach. At this point, in artistic gymnastics I don't feel like the best will compete at the Olympics, but instead we'll see lots of smaller nations with very poor displays of gymnastics simply because the IOC wants "diversity". I'm all in for diversity, but if a gymnast can't reach a bare minimum level compared to the top guns, so leave this person home.

I don't quite understand how ties are broken. Here, both lifters had the same best weight in C&J, 206. Then, their second best result was also the same, 200. Then, one lifted 195 and the other lifted 194. How come the one with the third best lift got silver? I'll have a wild guess here and say that body weight is what matters, but then again the lighter of the two lifted the heaviest weight, and still got silver in C&J. Why?