The most fascinating gymnasts and coaches of 2013.
Uncle Tim, Blythe, and Jessica chat about:
- Our picks for most fascinating people of 2013.
- Routines from 2013 that people will still be talking about 20 years from now.
- Victoria Moors at the Tokyo International.
- Oleg Verniaiev and Danell Leyva at the Valerie Liukin Invitational.
- Tatiana Nabieva’s retirement.
- Plus Rowena Needham, Kohei Uchimora, Mykayla Skinner and Sam Mikulak’s cool new skills.
We give our opinions on the latest news stories from around the gymternet:
- Our fantasy gymnastics teams.
- The bars falling down in Ellie Black’s gym.
- Aliya Mustafina’s fan Q&A session on VK.com (translations thanks to World of Gymnastike).
- A Gabby Douglas gymnastics update.
- Lexie Priessman and Amelia Hundley health updates.
- Simone Biles new choreographer.
- The airport adventures of Sam Peszek and Eric Stonestreet (Cameron on Modern Family).
- Our two solutions for making elite floor more fun with less tumbling passes even though the Stork Stand is here to stay.
- We respond to listener Questions & Comments:
- In tirade news – Jessica responds to a listener’s upset over her designation of cheerleaders as wearers of “slutty” outfits.
- The best camcorder for recording gymnastics meets.
- Should USAG hold a red-carpet award gala like USA Swimmings Golden Goggles?
- GymCastic’s Top 6 Episodes of 2013
- By the Numbers: 2013’s Top All-Around Gymnasts
- A Gym Nerd’s Guide to NCAA Bars
- 65: NCAA Judge Dean Ratliff, Early Recruiting & Saving Temple Men’s Gymnastics
- Episode 62: Pavlova to Azerbaijan, Oleg (Finally!) in Stuttgart & The Mexican Open Extravaganza
- Episode 48: Kyla Ross
- Episode 40: Michigan’s Stacey Ervin
- Episode 39: Victoria Moors
- Episode 38: Svetlana Boginskaya
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The Sam Peszek / Eric Stonestreet thing was the best/randomest thing ever!
Hi Gymcastic!
I am a big fan of your show and have been meaning to ask this question for a while now but my pride keeps getting in the way (I figure New Year… time to let that go). I have been a gymnastics fan since the ’96 Olympics (where I wanted to BE Dominique Moceanu) and wouldn’t consider myself a four year fan. While I know more than the casual gymnastics viewer I am by no means an expert. And I learn so much every time I listen to your podcast. However, one thing I continue to struggle with is connecting names of skills with what they look like. I know things that are talked about ad nauseam on NBC (ahem Amanar) but other than that I struggle. Where can I go to learn about these skills? (sorry I took a while to get to my question) I have looked on youtube but a majority of the videos seem outdated, and wouldn’t include some of the newer skills. Obviously that is better than nothing but I would love to broaden my knowledge of skills up to a point where it includes skills from the last quad. Any advice would help. Thanks!!
Hi Lisa,
We’ll try to do a better job of explaining the skills. As mentioned, some great resources are the YouTube eponymous skill video tutorials. The Gymnastics Wiki one of my personal favorites. Full of gifs. http://wagymnastics.wikia.com/wiki/Balance_Beam_Skills
MostapenovaFan on youtube has awesome videos showing all the skills in the CoP. I don’t think (s)he has done the updated 2013-2016 CoP but it’s not that much different now anyway. Sporteverywhere regularly uploads routines where they name all the skills the gymnasts are doing, plus what they’re worth and connection values. Good luck! 🙂
Great show! Glad you’re back online for 2014.
A quick word about the fundraiser idea:
As a professional fundraiser myself, I have put on a number of these big gala type events, and while it is good for PR, there is very little money that is usually raised. This type of event has very high costs (usually several hundred thousand dollars), and it is very common that just breaking even is considered a success. The big money for things like an endowment is not raised this way. Even if you found someone to underwrite the costs of the event, it still is not likely going to raise enough to make much of a dent on something like an endowment. That’s why these are usually done as annual operating fundraisers.
Hey @lisa I have the same problem, especially with all the Shaposhnikova and Hindorff variations. If you go on YouTube, there are a number of videos demonstrating “named gymnastics skills”. I especially recommend MostepanovaFan’s videos. Hope this helps!
@lisa Thanks to Nastia I now know what a Deltchev is. Even if it’s a Hindorff or a Jaeger or a Tkatchev or a Khorkina, if you just scream out IT WAS A DELTCHEV!!!1!!1!!!, it totally makes life worth living.
So having said that, I nominate the Deltchev as the most fascinating of 2013! 🙂
Re: Objectification
While in general men have not been objectified to the degree women are, to declare that this is true for all men is inaccurate in that it ignores the very real objectification of the bodies of men of color, particularly African American men, both historically (in slavery) and today.