2023 World Junior Gymnastic Artistic Championships (3/29-4/2, Antalya, Turkiye)

[Hatsumomo]

Mia Mainardi of Argentina wins vault. The Argentinian team in the stands are elated.

 

[Puffin]

The chatbot subtitles remain hilarious with
Jayla Hang = jailer Hank
Mia Mainardi = “me and my naughty”

 

[Hatsumomo]

Those sound like gymnast nicknames on GGMB

 

[Hatsumomo]

Armenia is apparently training pommel horse stars. Banger routines from both gymnasts. They go 1-2 and were first and last to go in EFs, respectively. Very cute shot of Manukyan (the leader) and their coach cheering on Khachatryan during his routine.

 

[Hatsumomo]

Gaddi with a 13.666 to beat for gold.

It looks like Escauriaza tweaked her ankle when she fell on her Gienger. It looked like she was in pain before remounting to do her dismount.

Nobody does straight KCHS anymore. They’re all straddled up.

Nakamura does her Def in mid-final warmup.

Yamaguchi up. Bit of leg separation on a handstand. Jaeger nice and high. Crisp routine. Nails her dismount. Girl is as cool as a cucumber. Reminds me a bit of Boginskaya’s early days where the moms would offer her candy because her icy demeanor scared the other girls. 12.500

Rivera next. Off on a handstand after her transition to the HB. Falls on her Hindorff. This has not been a good competition for her. Her UB could be great and a huge asset to the USA team, but she needs consistency.

I wonder if the wobbles and falls is not just the fact that it’s early in the season, but that this crop of juniors lost out on training and competitions due to the pandemic and more focus being on the seniors to get qualifications to the Olympics through. Score is taking forever. Rivera just looks pissed with herself. 9.900. Ouch.

Perotti, who even with the bun on top of her head doesn’t reach the low bar. Good amplitude on her release skills. Step on her dismount. 13.100. 3rd place. Gaddi guaranteed gold or silver depending on Nakamura.

Nakamura is the final gymnast. NAILS the Def! FUCK she falls on her handstand turn after her Pak! Sticks her full-in dismount. God dammit that routine would have been a banger if not for the fall. But she’s definitely a future UB star. Ugh, I wanna cry at that fall. 12.533. Would’ve been silver if not for the fall.

 

[RedBirdie]

Far too many gymnasts had hands slip on that vault table.

 

[Claire]

yeah this is approaching sydney levels of questionable results due to vault

 

[Claire]

how many gymnasts have had a hand slip on their block this competition? I can think of hang, rivera, and mika

 

[Hatsumomo]

It also happened to some gymnasts in the qualifications and AA.

 

[Bob]

Jayla looked like she came in really flat and low for the first vault, on the replay her fingers were almost bent back double. I thought that was why she slipped.

 

[J175]

It feels like just about everything that could have gone wrong for the Americans has so far. Honestly thought they would be the dominant team in this competition, with Russia absent and who knows what China are doing.

 

[Rich]

but that this crop of juniors lost out on training and competitions due to the pandemic and more focus being on the seniors to get qualifications to the Olympics through. Hopefully, they will still learn to compete this year.

 

[Bob]

That makes it extra impressive that the Italian, German and Japanese Juniors looks so good with such good basics. Italy had a horrendous time in the pandemic and Japan was shut down for a long time. In general Europe had no training allowed for over a year off and on. The US had a far shorter sports shut down.

 

[MaryClare]

Yep, but so did all gymnasts of that age. The restrictions across Europe lasted a very long time.

In GB for instance, all junior athletes were classified as recreational and were unable to train from March 2020 until April 2021. Save for 6 weeks in September/October 2020. They could only do what was possible to do outdoors.

 

[RedBirdie]

Pandemic doesn’t really hold as an excuse in the US. Lockdowns were short here and in some places nearly non-existent. And in the case if the 3 US juniors who competed at junior worlds, their coaches didn’t have senior athletes vying for Tokyo.

 

[irichluck21]

Yeah, COVID isn’t the issue here.
The issue is that this meet is held in March, when US juniors are not at peak.
Snyder and Hardie just dominated at Jesolo going 1 and 2 and they are in the same age group, so it is definitely not a COVID reprecussion.

This group of juniors has essentially 0 experience competing internationally.
The junior standouts from last year all turned senior. Sumanasekera, Zhou, Caylor, and Johnson were the stand outs and had the most international experience.

A combination of inexperience at the international level, early in the season, and format of competition is really what the issue is.

It is clear that this format and/or the date is really the issue. The Americans were far from consistent, but so were the rest of the athletes. No one really has hit every single event so far.

Helen Kevric and plenty other athletes competing here also competed at Europeans last year. Kevric must be carrying an injury but all the other athletes that have experience have also been inconsistent at these Worlds.

The men are having a similar problem as well, though they seem to have a few more athletes hitting the majority of their routines.

 

[RedBirdie]

Nobody does straight KCHS anymore. They’re all straddled up.

Even in the Development Program, they’re all doing straddled.

 

[Puffin]

The US did not look competition ready here and the question is why did the US junior team not peak for Worlds? Would it not be the biggest competition for the juniors this year? The US team used to be able to peak early for competitions such as Scam etc but although the potential exists - they didn’t look competition ready

I don’t think Covid can be a valid excuse here because the teams that have done well here - Italy and Japan - were subject to many more restrictions and lockdowns than the US

 

[Hatsumomo]

This is why I really hate the revocation of the grandfather clause and why there needs to be a junior World Cup circuit. There’s so little opportunity to get some experience and when some of these juniors will be eligible for the Olympics next year and have virtually no major international competitions under their belts. The Olympics being your first major comp is kind of rough. Sometimes you get a Kyla Ross or an Anastasia Grishina.

 

[irichluck21]

It was odd to have the meet in March.

The last version was held at the end of June, which makes more sense.