The All-Around Finals took place on day 3 of the competition in Cincinnati. In the morning session, World Cup's John Orozco outlasted a very strong field. He was the only competitor to qualify for all six events in tomorrow's Event Finals. Orozco was also the top qualifier in three of the events: vault, parallel bars and high bar.
SCATS' Sam Mikulak finished behind Orozco, and qualified in all events except for floor. Mikulak was the top event qualifier on rings. Seven points separated [...more]
Another marathon day of competition concluded with today's level 9 competition. The top qualifiers advance to tomorrow's all-around competition and Sunday's individual event finals. There were no surprises as Orlando Metro's Sean Melton (84.50) edged past Xtreme's Allan Bower (84.10) in what's shaping up to be a replay of last year's all-around finals. Melton also had the day's highest scores on [...more]
The first 14 hours of competition are over for the Level 10s (all age groups). There were three sessions, with the third session involving the regional team competition. The top qualifiers advance to Saturday's all-around finals and to Sunday's individual event finals. The JO Nationals is a qualifying mechanism for the VISA Championships and also determines the makeup of the level 9 Junior National Team. Now for the results! [...more]
The 2009 men's JO Nationals will take place this week (May 7-10) in Cincinnati, OH. Sadly, there will be no televised coverage of this great event. About the only video coverage we'll be able to access will be on YouTube. You would think that an event of this magnitude would at least deserve a live webcast. Afterall, with all the existing technology, a webcast would be cheap and easy to produce. USAG needs to think long and hard about this [...more]
MeetScoresOnline (MSO) now has embedded YouTube video links to complement their online scores. This new free service of connecting gymnastics scores to videos is an exciting development which could take MSO to the next level of being the major gymnastics portal. MSO's founder, Karl Stubsjoen, is looking for advocates to get the word out. [...more]
We don't know who this person is, but he (she) brings up some good points. The blog Brusqueness commented on American male figure skater Evan Lysacek's recent accomplishment in winning the World Championship, the first for the U.S. in 13 years. The blogger continued, "Don't expect him to appear on a box of Wheaties anytime soon." Good point. He (she) goes on to say that "men's figure skating (like men's gymnastics) lacks a broad appeal to the general public."
The blogger goes on to point out the many examples of [...more]
Four members of the U.S. Men's National Team have been selected to compete in the World Stars/World Cup meet in Moscow May 29-30. During that same weekend, Joey Hagerty will be competing in a new event, the Champions Trophy, in Frankfurt, Germany. Raj Bhavsar, among the four chosen to compete in the Moscow event, will be competing for the first time since the '08 Beijing Olympics.
Here are the five chosen to compete internationally: [...more]
Alright, we finally got sucked into Twitter. Not sure how long this experiment will last, but why not try it out? After months of hearing Leo LaPorte (The Tech Guy) harp about it on the radio, it wore us down. Coach Rick at Gymnastics Coaching pushed us over the edge after he hopped onboard. Good grief, now we actually have a reason to go to [...more]
Gymnastics Coaching alerted us to the announcement that Illinois A.D., Ron Guenther, has promoted Women's Gymnastics Head Coach Bob Starkell to Director of Gymnastics. He will remain the women's head coach, and Justin Spring has been promoted to Associate Head Coach, assuming all head coaching duties. Visiting Assistant Coach Ivan Ivankov will become the new full-time Assistant Coach. Starkell will handle the [...more]
With the pressure of the team competition out of the way, Saturday night's event finals enabled the gymnasts to let it rip. They were competing on their best events and the prizes were for national championship and/or All-American status. The evening's spotlight shone on Oklahoma's Steven Legendre and Ilinois' Paul Ruggeri as they each brought home two national titles in impressive and exciting fashion.
The floor competition was very tight, but Legendre was able to successfully defend his [...more]
