The No. 1 Gymnastics Podcast in the Galaxy

155: University and Pan Am Games

Manrique Larduet excessive celebration toronto 2015 pbars
Manrique Larduet (CUB) urges the crowd to show their appreciation for his parallel bars routine at the Pan American Games. © Grace Chiu

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In the News

This week Mary-Anne “Mez Monckton from the Australian national team, Uncle Tim and Jessica chat about:

  • Pan Am Games Team Finals and All-Around Competitions:
    • Do we like Elfi Schlegel better on on ESPN or NBC?
    • We answer the most important question of the meet: Where’s Marta?
    • Cuba, Cuba and more Cuba! Manrique Larduet (CUB) and Marcia Videaux Jimenez (CUB) thrilled us.
    • Yamilet Peña (DOM) and the Execution score vaulting problem; should Yamilet Peña have gotten credit for her Produnova/buttahara/chalk skid mark landing?
    • If Manrique was deducted for excessive celebration, was it justified?
    • Was Daniele Hypolito (BRA), aka “Hypolito The Great” and “No Gripz Hypolitz,” unfairly deducted for a fall on her beam dismount?
    • Yes, darling of the Games, Flavia Saraiva (BRA)  touched the beam for a 1.0 deduction but Jessica doesn’t care.
    • Winning with a fall: the Sam Mikulak (USA) vs Manrique all-around showdown.
    • Did the US team make the right decision by not letting Donnell Wittenberg (USA) repeat his Cassina after slamming his head against the ground and possibly suffering a concussion in all-around finals?
    • Jorge “The Hair” Vega (GUA) and his ode to Japanese gymnastics.
    • Ellie Black (CAN) informed the world that she is the shield maiden of the North!
    • We love that Maddie Desch (USA) went for all her difficulty, including a laid-out full on beam.
    • Who would we put up in a team final on beam? Amelia Hundley (USA) and Ana Lago (MEX).

    University Games in Gwangju, South Korea:

    • Mary-Anne “Mez” Monckton (AUS) on her experience competing at the Uni Games after nine months out for ankle reconstruction.
    • Mez talks about her coping mechanisms for handling disappointment.
    • A MERS outbreak may have kept some teams at home, but the bars almost falling on judges, plastic sheets on the beds, and unpredictable schedule kept the competitors living the phrase, “be prepared for anything.”
    • The Russian training system in action: how Maria Paseka hit her routines by laying around a lot.
    • With a score of 92 (higher than Kohei’s (JPN) in the last two Worlds), is Oleg Vernaiev (UKR) now THE legitimate threat to Kohei?

GYMTERNET NEWS

Our weekly roundup of the latest news stories from around the gymternet include:

  • Steve Nunno is coaching, maybe, we hear….
  • Nia Dennis has left her longtime gym, Buckeye, for Legacy Elite Gymnastics in Chicago.
  • Keira Brown has officially transferred to Penn State.
  • Kyla has a new skill on bars; a Bhardwaj (Pak full) watch the video by Deanne Hong Productions.
  • We read your feedback about Aly Raisman’s statement on eating disorders in The Body issue of ESPN magazine.

 

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Julie
Julie
8 years ago

Hey guys, love the long episode!

I have to say, I completely disagree with Jess on the issue of deductions for vault. It is only logical that when you are performing one skill, you will get less deductions than if you are performing multiple skills. You can only deduct for so many things from one skill. Yes, there are additional deductions since there is pre-flight but still. To add more deductions would really be to do so only for the sake of taking more deductions, which really is unnecessary,

Besides, how does it hurt the scoring overall if there are less deductions on vault? Everyone vaults and everyone gets less deductions on vault than on the other events. It does not hurt anyone since it is the same for all.

I think the real problem here is that the E-score panel in vault does a horrible job differentiating between a good vault and a mediocre vault and simply fails in giving correct scores. There is no reason Aliya and Aly with their bent knees and crossed legs should be getting essentially the same scores as vaulters like Larissa or Gabby/Jordyn (generally, sometimes Aly’s Amanar looked good and Gabby’s didn’t look great, but I still think Gabby’s form was better).

Ryno5656
Ryno5656
8 years ago

Interested to see Kyla’s Bhardwaj. Unfortunately the video that is linked is private.

Kirsten
Kirsten
8 years ago

I like Elfi on ESPN more than on NBC. I never thought I’d say this, but now I do believe that Tim Daggett’s “negativity” on NBC bleeds over into the other commentators. Tim commentates like a judge. Al just says whatever he’s thinking at that moment. Elfi is somewhere in the middle but she really did go along with most of what Tim said. Tim just has a certain presence that overshadows the people he’s with (which is not necessarily a bad thing, but it definitely feeds into NBC’s need to create drama). Anyway, when she’s by herself, Elfi commentates more like a casual fan (“Oh, that’s so beautiful!”). Strange to say, she doesn’t strike me as a gym nerd, but rather as someone who did gymnastics a long time ago and still happens to like it. As he said on the show, Tim Daggett is a gym nerd so he can be a lot more critical. I’m enjoying Elfi on ESPN. I think her time on NBC gave her a bit of a bad rap with gym fans, but she’s better than some give her credit for. Not the best, but not bad either. I guess it just shows how the people you’re with affect how you commentate, plus whatever NBC asked them to do as far as creating drama.

Kirsten
Kirsten
8 years ago

Test

Kirsten
Kirsten
8 years ago
Reply to  Kirsten

I like Elfi on ESPN more than on NBC. I never thought I’d say this, but now I do believe that Tim Daggett’s “negativity” on NBC bleeds over into the other commentators. Tim commentates like a judge. Al just says whatever he’s thinking at that moment. Elfi is somewhere in the middle but she really did go along with most of what Tim said. Tim just has a certain presence that overshadows the people he’s with (which is not necessarily a bad thing, but it definitely feeds into NBC’s need to create drama). Anyway, when she’s by herself, Elfi commentates more like a casual fan (“Oh, that’s so beautiful!”). Strange to say, she doesn’t strike me as a gym nerd, but rather as someone who did gymnastics a long time ago and still happens to like it. As he said on the show, Tim Daggett is a gym nerd so he can be a lot more critical. I’m enjoying Elfi on ESPN. I think her time on NBC gave her a bit of a bad rap with gym fans, but she’s better than some give her credit for. Not the best, but not bad either. I guess it just shows how the people you’re with affect how you commentate, plus whatever NBC asked them to do as far as creating drama.

Kirsten
Kirsten
8 years ago

Sorry for the “test” comment. For some reason, my actual comment wouldn’t post at first. Feel free to delete the “test” if you want to. This was a great episode!

Elaine
Elaine
8 years ago

I loved this episode, especially the behind the scene info on University Games. Interesting view point we don\’t often get to here.

I do have one disagreement that I just can\’t not say something about. I did not like Elfi and the ESPN commenting of the Pan American Games. I have two main issues. One, I consider myself a big gymnastics fan. I did gymnastics as a kid and now I take adult lessons, the 10(ish) days a year we get to see gymnastics on TV are all like Christmas for me, I religiously listen to the Gymcastic Podcast, oh and my Twitter account is all about gymnastics… when watching my favorite sport on TV I don\’t want to hear \”oh that was pretty\” and \”she will be pleased with that routine\”. Don\’t tell me something was pretty, tell me what the skill was and who it was named after or what the difficulty is or if it was a skill that had to be in the routine… ect. I know when something is pretty. I am watching the TV. I would like to learn something.

Also, these Pan Games were the very first gymnastics meet that my boyfriend has ever watched. (seriously ever). I spent the first thirty minutes of the women\’s team explaining things like \”what is a tumbling pass\”, \”why you rebound out of some skills and want to stick your landing on others\” and that \”yes it is okay if an athlete wants to use a spring board to mount the beam\”. After he had watched about an hour he was already sick of the commentators \”talking down to him\” (his words). I believe he said that if they say one more time that a front landing on the vault is blind and thus harder he was going to throw something at the TV.

I understand that commentating isn\’t an easy job. I also get that not everyone flipping through the TV stations that stop on a gym meet is a gym nerd and knows ALL THE THINGS. However, I do think some of the commentating should be at a higher level of gym knowledge than \”she stepped out on the floor and that\’s a penalty\” and \”oh that\’s a pretty move\”. If it takes NBC creating drama between Simon and Kyla (or whomever) to get Daggett to tell me what vault was just done and what Madison\’s start value on beam is, I\’ll take it.

Just my two cents. 🙂

Keep up the great work with the Podcast!

Lauren H
Lauren H
8 years ago
Reply to  Elaine

I agree with you, Elaine. I get that gymnastics isn’t as popular as Football, Baseball, etc. in the US, but I don’t think dumbing down the commentators does the sport any good. I don’t ever see Football or Baseball commentators talking to their audience like their all watching the sport for the first time. Instead, they assume their audience are experts, and talk to them as such. The same respect should be given to gymnastics fans that tune in to watch the sport they love. When I tune in to watch any sport for the first time, I don’t expect a lesson about it. Nobody should. That’s what books and google are for.

Anonymous
Anonymous
8 years ago

I have used my diva cup for gymnastics, and it worked great. Admittedly, I\’m pretty low-level (front/back tucks and clear hips are about the highest level skills I work on) so it wasn\’t being exposed to the forces that a high level gymnast would experience, but I never had any trouble. It stayed in place without a problem and was appropriately flexible. That said, it is a very bizarre sensation on trampoline that takes some getting used to and was a little unnerving at first. But all said and done, after a couple of test runs I was far more confident with the diva cup than I was with a tampon for athletics.

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