thiago_simoes

At this rate, he is going to get a medal at Worlds as well. He's doing fantastic!

An Icelandic gymnast qualified to the vault final. What a nice surprise!

Retired Kazakhstani gymnast Sabina Ashirbayeva has been suspended for doping and will lose the medals earned at the 2017 Asian Championships. Not sure about what will happen to the silver medal she won at the Berlin World Cup stage last year, but this is sad news, for sure. She was one of my favorite gymnasts.

It's sad but no one cares about the Universiade in Brazil. Some athletes decide to pay for the travel expenses and their accommodation, which leads to strange things like two very weak girls being sent to compete in rhythmic gymnastics at the 2017 Universiade while Jade Barbosa, who could have earned a medal in artistic gymnastics, stayed home. I don't blame our Olympic Committee, though. They gave LOTS of money to all federations for the 2016 Olympics, but every day it seems like there's a new scandal being mentioned on the newspapers because a president of a sports federation, or a politician, stole part (I mean, a huge part) of the money that was meant to help the training of the athletes.

You're right. The federal police knocked on their door and now they're acting all surprised. There are three different police forces in Brazil: civil (they basically investigate crimes), military (they patrol the streets) and the federal police (they combat terrorism, drug trafficking, money laundry... all the big stuff). If the someone from the federal police knocks on your door, you know you screwed things up BIG time. Apparently, the federal police is asking questions about the 2011 World Championships which were staged in Brazil and caused a huge loss of money for the Brazilian Handball Federation. The president of federation at the time was also accused of corruption and money laundry. I think they changed the president, but the federation is pretty much short of money so they have no means to send athletes to major competitions. The Brazilian Olympic Committee usually helps when things get rough, but they are also short on money, and they have to invest in other sports too (rumors say that Valeri Liukin will be hired as the head coach of the women's artistic gymnastics team, and if this turns out to be true, the BOC will be the entity responsible for paying his salary, so they are not wasting any more money on the handball federation anytime soon).

I forgot about Melanie dos Santos. Nice work for her, but probably my least favorite routine in the final. Still, gold medal for France. Oh, well.

Golgota with the gold medal. Almost unbelievable, but not undeserved.

It's interesting to see a routine with great choreography and full of personality from van Gerner, and right after it a routine with bad choreography and lacking in personality from Basile. The tumbling was pretty good and difficult, though, so that should give her a good score.

Weird. I thought choreography in the middle of the dance jump series was not allowed on floor, but Fenton did it anyway. This kind of choreography breaks the sequence of jumps, and reigning World Champion in 2005, Alicia Sacramone, failed to qualify for the final in 2006 at the World Championships because she performed choreography in the middle of her series of jumps. Is it allowed now?

Wait, isn't she injured? I assumed she was, because she has enough potential to reach 14 on floor and this would have been enough for gold.

I love how van Gerner looks like one of the Spice Girls.

On paper, of course, this is not impossible. But we're talking about absolutely no mistakes from Becky Downie and Claudia Fragapane, especially on beam, and they always screw up somehow. This year only the medalists on women's team will qualify for the Olympics, and it's going to be an easy victory for the United States, followed by Russia (if they hit) and either Japan or China in third. Canada and France and the dark horses, Brazil, Belgium and the Netherlands are the long shots. Great Britain could easily sneak in third if the program had more consistency instead of high difficulty with few and far hits when it counts (but it worked in 2015 because Russia had a rough day, so who knows).

Nope. No way even your best girls could score above 165. They are simply not consistent enough.

Millousi ALWAYS finds a way to crush my hopes on her. I've given up.

I don't quite like this routine from Wevers, but she finally nailed it. it should be enough for gold.

When did French girls begin to perform all all those amazing bars routines?

Nice work for Devai, though her vaults were considerably sloppier than in qualifications. Still good enough for gold, so that's okay, I gyess. Melnikova did everything she could. Silver is still pretty good for her. Not sure about how I feel about Golgota winning bronze. Her first vault received 0.1-0.2 more than she actually deserved, while Voss should have received 0.1-0.2 more for her first vault, so... Anyway, good for Romania not to go home empty handed.

For those interested in how women's artistic teams are performing this year, these are the top performances so far in 2018. The top 24 teams at the 2018 World Championships will qualify for the 2019 World Championships, China - 166.100 (Qualifications / Asian Games) Russia - 165.195 (Team Final / European Championships) France - 164.063 (Qualifications / European Championships) Canada - 163.075 (Commonwealth Games) Great Britain (actually, England) - 162.650 (Commonwealth Games) USA - 161.000 (Pacific Rim / projected score since girls performed 11 out 12 routines) Netherlands - 159.563 (Team Final / European Championships) Brazil - 159.370 (City of Jesolo Trophy) Belgium - 159.331 (Qualifications / European Championships) North Korea - 158.500 (Qualifications / Asian Games) Australia - 157.450 (Commonwealth Games) Italy - 156.300 (City of Jesolo Trophy) South Korea - 155.300 (Qualifications / Asian Games) Hungary - 154.130 (Qualifications / European Championships) Argentina - 154.067 (Qualifications / South American Games) Japan - 153.950 (Qualifications / Asian Games) Spain - 153.430 (Qualifications / European Championships) Ukraine - 153.163 (Qualifications / European Championships) Switzerland - 153.129 (Team Final / DTB Pokal) Romania - 152.600 (City of Jesolo Trophy) Germany - 152.250 (Qualifications / DTB Pokal) Cuba - 150.100 (Qualifications / CAC Games) Colombia - 149.950 (Qualifications / CAC Games) Mexico - 149.900 (Qualifications / CAC Games) Egypt - 149.800 (Qualifications / Mediterranean Games) Puerto Rico - 148.550 (Qualifications / CAC Games)

Rugby, probably.

Except that in Cinderella the girl did nothing but stand there (well, she went to the ball, if that counts), while here the players worked their asses off and no man was needed for them to be amazing.

It's amazing how you can NEVER underestimate Russia. This is their weakest team in years, and still they absolutely delivered in the final. Unbelievable. France did well, but they can't rely on Charpy performing three events, though I'm not sure they have anyone better to take her spot, to be honest. I must also mention that Melanie dos Santos was AWESOME, and her individual all-around score today (56.266) is currently the third best in the world in international competition. She's a threat for an all-around medal at the World Championships for sure! Netherlands was mostly solid, especially van Gerner (yay, I'm so happy for her!). Everything went their way so they could earn the bronze medal. And it's time for the British program to reinvent itself if they want to challenge for a world medal. Bad beam rotation aside, none of the girls are up to par to Great Britain's best gymnasts to date. They're average at best, and when you count the USA, China, Russia, Japan and even Canada and Brazil, they're in big trouble for the next World Championships if things don't change. Nice to see Ukraine in fifth (I said they could surprise) and Italy in sixth (from not going to the final to placing ahead of two teams, this was such a nice improvement). Spain had a couple of mishaps here and there, but still a good competition considering their level, and Hungary did basically what they could (still, nice for them to even make team finals).

Ireland!!!

What an amazing goal from Spain under pressure!

HUGE news: Russian-born gymnast Ekaterina Vedeneeva will now represent Slovenia. She should easily qualify for the 2020 Olympics (but then again, we all know how bad things were for Elizaveta Nazarenkova at the 2016 Olympics Test Event, so one can never be too sure), but the most important thing is that she's good enough to earn a lot of major medals, such as at the European Games, World Games, Universiade and the World/Challenge Cup circuit, and even maybe at the European Championships and World Championships.

Russia brought their weakest team in many years, so I'm surprised they even qualified in second. I thought they would qualify behind Netherlands and Great Britain, but I was wrong. It's Russia, so you can never count them out, but I think France should take gold if the girls hit (and this is a big if). Ukraine could be a big surprise and win bronze if they hit, but again this is a big if. And let's see what Italy can do now that Belgium has given up their place in the final. I'm really curious about the outcome of this event. It looks like Canada, Brazil, Japan and, of course, China and the USA, are in better shape than most teams from Europe. Even Australia could challenge for the top 8 at the World Championships.