Today, we add another group of five girls headed to London in 29 days. The group from Canada was announced earlier today. Kristina Vaculik, Victoria Moors, Brittany Rogers, Dominique Pegg, and Ellie Black, along with althernates Jessica Savona and Maddie Gardiner, will travel to London to compete for a spot in the team finals.
After winning three events (AA, Beam, and Floor) at the junior national competition in 2006, Kristina Vaculik looked like a great choice for Beijing four years ago. She had another great year in 2007, all but establishing herself as one to watch for in Beijing by winning the national title and placing 14th in Stuttgart. However, an untimely elbow injury kept her out of competition until Elite Canada competition almost a year after having her elbow surgically repaired. in 2010 competed at worlds and was 2 places shy of qualifying to the AA Final, after winning another AA national championship. She took a break this year from competing for Stanford University to prepare for London, a decision I'm sure she is now happy she made.
Photo Property of Kristina Vaculik's personal Twitter
Many people looking at the contenders for Canada's Olympic Team, many people thought there were two locks for the team after the untimely injury of Peng Peng Lee, Vaculik, and first year senior Victoria Moors. She went to London to help qualify Canada to London, and while she was there, she picked up a silver medal on floor, her best apparatus where she is known for her beautiful tumbling. Afterwards she made a quick stop to Madison Square Garden, where she placed 4th AA in the American Cup. She has so much poise for someone so young, and I personally think she is Canada's best hope for a medal, which would be on floor. Here is her floor from the Pacific Rims Championships from April 2012. Do you see that first pass?
Brittany Rogers is the veteran of this team. At 19, she has been to Pacific Rim Championships, 2 world finals in 2009 before she had an injury plagued 2010, where she fractured her ankle on beam which wouldn't heal. It was almost a full year before she was allowed to train again, and getting back into this shape was hard. She took part in a World Cup Event, and had some success on vault, leaving with a silver medal. Early this year, she helped Canada qualify a full team to London at the test event. After a not-so-great national championships, many people began doubting her chances to get to London. She performed exceptional at trials, using the selection process to her advantage. In Canada, National Championships count as 40%of the decision, while trials counting for the other 60%. She really came out on fire and trials and became the third gymnast to be named to the team.
Photo property of Gymnastics Fan's Instagram
The next gymnast named was Dominique Pegg. After a steady junior carrer, Dominique was expected to do great things as a senior. Her first senior meet was in Worcester Massachusetts, at The American Cup. She placed seventh out of eight gymnasts, showing she could improve as a gymnast. This meet was all for experience, with she got a lot and grew as a competitor. At Pacific Rim Championships a few weeks later, she placed eighth all around and won gold on vault. A month later, she placed third AA at the Canadian National Championship. the next year, she was in Tokyo for her first world championship. After she departed from Tokyo, she was supposed to compete at Pan American Games, but she broke a bone in her hand, and didn't compete. Already this year, she was at a world cup event, and competed amazing at trials, she was in the lead after the first day, allowing her to travel to London in July.
First year senior Ellie Black had to wait a little longer than the others to find out her Olympic Fate. While the four girls above found out almost immediately that they were going, poor Ellie had to wait all afternoon to see if she would compete in London. She doesn't have much experience, just a couple of Elite Canada meets, but to quote Bekah from Get A Grip Gym Blog, "Internationally Inexperienced Doesn't Equal Untalented." I'm very much looking forward to seeing this gymnast in London, especially on vault, which is her strongest event!
Okay, So I think I'm going to start a new series called What To Look Forward To, which is a post I'll write a day or so before a competition. Since Men start to night, and women to morrow, I'll post a bunch of videos, all of which are powered by Youtube, courtesy of USA Gymnastics. These are my top picks to look for tomorrow night, and why. Please tell me what you're looking forward to most in the comments! 1. McKayla Maroney's Amanar McKayla truly performs this vault better than anyone I have ever seen. She gets so much block, and her form is almost perfect. Look how much height she gets from her block!
Sorry for the bad quality, my screen capping skills aren't the greatest! Click to enlarge
2. Jordyn Wieber's Bars Bars are not Jordyn's strongest event, and I think it will be interesting to see it she can hit under the pressure she will be under at Trials. Everyone is expecting great things from Jordy, myself included, and if she can't hit bars at trials, it will be interesting to see if she can at the games, where as many gymnasts documented, is way more pressure than at trials. I hope she can pull it together at nationals, because when she hits, it is a great routine to watch.
3. Gabby Douglas on Beam I love Gabby, I don't think I could be anymore straight forward. She is one of the best gymnasts in the US right now, and watching her gymnastics is a treat for me. However, beam is the one little clink in her armor. Here's an analogy for you guys, Jordyn Wieber is to bars and Gabby Douglas is to beam. (Incase you couldn't tell, I LOVE Jordyn Wieber also). Anyway, she has come such a far way from where she was klast year on this event. Must I remind you? Anyway, if she can hit here, I think it will solidify her case even more than she already has, maybe even have a shot at the title.
4. Bridget Sloan's Bars She is a true dark horse. Not many people see her on this Olympic team, and think she could possibly punch her ticket because of her experience (2009 World AA Champ) and this routine. She's had a string of injuries, but this event looked great at nationals, but she showed some room to improve, which hopefully she will showcase that improvement at trials.
5. Lastly, Nastia's Bars Disclaimer, this is not a full routine, just her #dismount, in the words of Spanny Tampson. (You can read her expectations for Nastia here, along with her hilarious reaction to various parts of Nastia's comeback.) If Nastia wants to even think about London, she needs to go four-for-four, which might not even be enough. She needs to do her full routine, #dismount included.
So, this is just a few little things I think will be routines to look for tomorrow and Sunday in San Jose. Feel free to comment about what you want to see. Look for another post like this one on Saturday, where I'll look through routines from night one and name the top 5 important story lines for Sunday, which of course will be my opinions. Good luck at trial for the men, which begin in an hour on NBC, and the women tomorrow night!
Okay, this is the last part, the floor. Again, this probably won't be accurate, but, this shows that it has happened before. Tianjin 1999 Gold-Andreea Raducan [ROU] Silver-Simona Amanar [ROU] Bronze-Svetlana Khorkina [RUS] Sydney 2000 Gold-Elena Zamolodchikova [RUS] Silver-Svetlana Khorkina [RUS] Bronze-Simona Amanar [ROU] Anaheim 2003 Gold-Daiane Dos Santos [BRA] Silver- Catalina Ponor [ROU] Bronze-Elena Gomez [ESP] Athens 2004 Gold-Catalina Ponor [ROU] Silver-Nicoleta Sofronie [ROU] Bronze-Patricia Moreno [ESP] Stuttgart 2007 Gold-Shawn Johnson [USA] Silver-Alicia Sacramone [USA] Bronze-Cassy Vericel [FRA] Beijing 2008 Gold-Sandra Izbasa [ROU] Silver- Shawn Johnson [USA] Bronze-Nastia Liukin [USA] Tokyo 2011 Gold-Ksenia Afanasyeva [RUS] Silver-Sui Lu [CHN] Bronze-Aly Raisman [USA] So, after averaging everything off, these are the place where these top three gymnasts find them selves due to history. Ksenia Afanasyeva-3 Sui Lu-12 Aly Raisman-6* *Cassy Vericel did not make the french 2008 Olympic team, so that average is by two numbers, not three. Anything can happen, and I am not expecting any of this to actually happen come floor finals in London. I hope it's a good competition and much luck to all of the gymnasts headed to London!!
Let's apply the same rules for beam. I am expecting absolutely nothing with this round, because of the fact with beam, falls are much more common. Let's do this just for fun. Tianjin 1999 Gold-Ling Jie [CHN] Silver-Andreea Raducan [ROM] Bronze-Olga Roshupkina [UKR] Sydney 2000 Gold-Liu Xuan [CHN] Silver-Ekateria Lobazniouk [RUS] Bronze-Yelena Prudunova [RUS] Anaheim 2003 Gold-Fan Ye [CHN] Silver-Catalina Ponor [ROM] Bronze-Ludmila Ezhova [RUS] Athens 2004 Gold-Catalina Ponor [ROM] Silver-Carly Patterson [USA] Bronze-Alexandra Eremia [ROM] Stuttgart 2007 Gold-Nastia Liukin [USA] Silver-Li Shanshan [CHN] and Steliana Nistor [ROM] Beijing 2008 Gold-Shawn Johnson [USA] Silver-Nastia Liukin [USA] Bronze-Cheng Fei [CHN] Tokyo 2011 Gold-Sui Lu Silver-Yao Jinnan [CHN] Bronze-Jordyn Wieber [USA] Averaging these places we can predict our podium from this year will place Sui Lu-20* Yao Jinnan-14 Jordyn Wieber-11 All this goes show is how unpredictable gymnastics and beam is. Let's cross our fingers that all the beam finalists stay on!! Good Luck to the future beam finalists in London! *Fan Ye did not make her country's Olympic team in 2004, so Sui Lu's average placing was thrown off a little by dividing by two instead of three*
Now, lets take a look at bars from the past three Olympics. Tianjin 1999 Gold-Svetlana Khorkina [RUS] Silver-Huang Mandan [CHN] Bronze-Ling Jie [CHN] Sydney 2000 Gold-Svetlana Khorkina [RUS] Silver-Ling Jie [CHN] Bronze-Yang Yun [CHN] Anaheim 2003 Gold-Hollie Visa [USA] Silver-Chellsie Memmel [USA] Bronze-Elizabeth Tweddle [GBR] Athens 2004 Gold-Emilie Lepennec [FRA] Silver-Terin Humphrey [USA] Bronze-Courtney Kupets [USA] Stuttgart 2007 Gold-Ksenia Semenova [RUS] Silver-Nastia Liukin [USA] Bronze-Beth Tweddle [GBR] Beijing 2008 Gold-He Kexin [CHN] Silver-Nastia Liukin [USA] Bronze-Yang Yilin [CHN] Tokyo 2011 Gold-Viktoria Komova [RUS] Silver-Tatiana Nabieva [RUS] Bronze-Huang Quishuang [CHN] So, if history repeats it's self, our top three from Tokyo (might) finish about these places this year. Viktoria Komova-4th* Tatiana Nabieva-4th* Huang Quishuang-7th Good luck to all the bar finalists in London!! *These averages are divided by two, not three like the others. Hollie Vise and Chellsie Memmel, the Gold and Silver medalists from Anaheim in 2003 were left off of the 2004 Athens Olympic Team.*
Next I'm going to analyze the vault final, to use history to try and predict these podiums in London. Tianjin 1999 Gold-Elena Zamolodchikova [RUS] Silver-Simona Amanar [ROM] Bronze-Maria Olaru [ROM] Sydney 2000 Gold-Elena Zamolodchikova [RUS] Silver-Andreea Raducan [ROM] Bronze-Ekaterina Lobazniouk [RUS] Anaheim 2003 Gold-Oksana Chusovitina [Uzbekistan]* Silver-Kang Yun Mi [PRK] Bronze-Elena Zamolodchikova [RUS] *I couldn't find the country codes for Uzbekistan, so if you know them, please comment!* Athens 2004 Gold-Monica Rosu [ROM] Silver-Annia Hatch [USA] Bronze-Anna Pavlova [RUS] Stuttgart 2007 Gold-Cheng Fei [CHN] Silver-Hong Su Jong [PKR] Bronze-Alicia Sacramone [USA] Beijing 2008 Gold-Hong Un Jong [PKR] Silver-Oksana Chusovitina [GER] Bronze-Cheng Fei [CHN] Tokyo 2011 Gold-Mckayla Maroney [USA] Silver-Oksana Chusovitina [GER] Bronze-Phan Thi Ha Thanh [VIE] Using averages we can predict that our top three for Tokyo will end up around these places come London. McKayla Maroney [USA]-28 Oksana Chusovitina [GER]-6** Phan Thi Ha Thanh [VIE]- 5 Again, this really proves nothing, just that gymnastics is a crazy sport, where literally anything can happen. Only time will tell what will happen in London, but all I can say is, let the London countdown begin today, 30 days left. **This average is a little messed up due to Hong Su Jong [PKR] being suspended for 2 years after being tested positive for an illegal substance, so this average is only added and divided by 2 numbers, not 3 like the others**
