Recent content by MaryClare

If Szabó was born in 1969, she won junior euros when she was 11

Yes that is true. When my grandmother was a ballet student (1960s) they had to use home made things to slick back their hair, hairspray was reserved for performances only. However I would doubt that by the 80s it was particularly difficult to get hairspray especially for elite athletes. But yes...

A key plot in the Svetlana Khorkina biopic is how going for a haircut in Sydney enabled her to bounce back and win UB gold. She is portrayed as having a pony tail until the day after AA finals. Daria Skrypnik and Daria Spiridonova were the stunt doubles and they had to do a million takes because...

Why would someone in the federation make her cut her hair? Gymnastics coaches tend to, even today have pretty conservative views about what look is acceptable for a gymnast. Was Camelia’s hair do also forced upon her? Because that’s the only acceptable excuse for it

I wasn’t born yet, but Shushunova not one of my favourites from that era. But Silivas was just….ugh

I hate Daniela Silivas. I have always hated Daniela Silivas. Even in 2003 when I’d spent 18 hours downloading Seoul videos and everybody told me I was just a kid and didn’t know anything. I was right

My problem is that I just don’t believe that, had her comeback been successful, she’d have been anywhere near as critical of USAG/Karoylis

I’m guessing it’s because they wanted her exposed to the world for the shortest time possible

Why did USAG never properly pursue it?

IIRC she had decent skills back, just lacked the stamina needed for competition routines

I can believe it, I’ve heard rumours of regional head coaches falsifying gymnasts for the national games and that’s often where it begins.

That’s wild. Imagine falsifying a gymnasts age to compete at a mid quad individual worlds in Hungary 😂. With ex Soviet gymnasts, you find surprisingly few born in a year where they’d turn senior the year after an Olympics.

Poor Mrs Cheng has probably just left one candle sitting on the kitchen counter by mistake 😂

North Korea once sent someone to the junior friendship competition (druzhba) who had competed at the universiade the year before on a completely different date of birth.

Cheng Fei 2004?