Rumors Around the Gym: Rebecca Bross possibly planning a return

So I was just cruising around the internet looking for Rebecca Bross photos  to put on Tumblr. And it said that Bross hasn't ruled out coming back to gymnastics. She has a sold coaching job at WOGA, training the littler girls, and occasionally, the elites like Katelyn Ohashi or Maddie Kocian. But mainly the little ones. She then said that she might return and start training for Rio de Janeiro 2016. I love Becca, but I have to admit, she's been an eligible senior for 7 years, and has been competing for longer. Becca might be getting too old for the sport. But then again, Oksana Chusovitina will be 41 in Rio and will probably be competing for Uzbekistan. Bross really struggled at Trials 2012, I dont count that as a takedown, but as a motivation for her return. And also, rumor has it, if she does return, she will train with the coach who trained Gabby Douglas to gold, Liang Chow. If Bross returns, she will start training with Chow, and I would love to see what Chow does with Becca. I cant wait to hear what Bross's official announcement is, but I cant wait to find out. It will be hard, but I think Bross can stick it out.

Gymnasts I Like: Brenna Dowell

 In my last post, I shared Brenna Dowell's beam routine. Did you like what you saw? Well so did I. With Alicia Sacramone being retired, we miss the unique front tuck mount onto the beam that she once did. But, Brenna took it over. She does that mount that we all loved when Sacramone was still involved in gymnastics. Brenna is an artistic, powerful gymnast. The two hardest things you can couple together in gymnastics, artistry and power. Brenna does it though. Her vault is awesome, she isn't too bad on bars either, using the artistry part of her gymnastics to hit the handstands on bars, and nail the transitions. And her release moves are good as well. She is great on beam, starting with a front tuck mount, and ending with a gorgeous DP (Double Pike) On floor, she intros a whole different view of what we know as a standard floor routine, she has exquisite passes, and really molds together the artistry AND the power. She is a phenomenal athlete, despite struggling with consistency sometimes. I say, that she has a good chance if not great, to be a Rio Contender. But then again, as we saw Elizabeth Price retire because of injury, and the fact that she wanted to attend college instead of actually trying to get to the Olympics, instead of being an alternate, anything can happen. Dowell's desires can switch from Olympic Stardom,  to a guaranteed collegiate gymnastics career. Who knows? With Rio De Janeiro only two years away, anything can happen, some greats can fall, some underdogs can rise. And if you ask me, one of those underdogs, will be Brenna.

Favorite Routines: Brenna Dowell's awesome Beam, Nationals 2013

  Brenna Dowell....... One of the old seniors (2012 or earlier), shocked me when she performed a stomach-churning beam routine at Nationals. Up to this point, I had never seen Brenna. She had a good bars routine, but her beam was a great routine, I loved it! Especially on night two, she was right on with the mount, the flip-on, the same mount that Alicia did for most of her career. I don't want you guys to miss out on the routine, so I have copied a link below, Brenna's night two competition, beam. It is a great routine to watch, at least in my opinion. Tim Dagget hates it, but it seems that Tim Dagget hates everything, so time for your opinion! Because, lets face it, its nearly impossible to please that NBC nincompoop.


Brenna Dowell - Balance Beam - 2013 P&G Championships - Sr. Women - Day 2

Elizabeth Price: Not A Good Nationals for promising Athlete, and a stinging retirement.

   Well, I was watching the 2013 Nationals, working my way up to the Worlds (For the 2nd time, maybe even 3rd.) And I was excited to see how my main girl Ebee recovered from her injury, a broken toe (Remind you of anyone? 2012 Gold Medalist (Team) McKayla Maroney? Mac acquired the same injury in London, preventing her from competing floor exercise, her second best event. Anyway, Elizabeth had injured her toe after the City of Jesolo. In addition to the broken toe, or as I like to call it "Mac's London Injury" Ebee had also had a strained hip muscle. Ebee decided to withdraw from the 2013 American Cup, wanting to rest her hip for more important competitions down the road, like the Visas or the Worlds. Ebee was able to get the rest she needed and resumed training in April of 2013, but unfortunately, after she resumed training, she severely injured her other hip, and flared up the other one, giving Ebee two bad hips. Ebee was able to compete at Nationals, only doing vault and bars because of her injury. Ebee was then deemed the stay at home alternate,

   In early 2014, Elizabeth Price retired from elite gymnastics, as well as the National Team, to go to Stanford University, I am sure that the rest of the gymternet, and myself, are wishing Ebee a lucky first year of college, and all are sending her a tearful goodbye. I will never forget how much power Ebee brought to the stage. I loved Ebee, and hope that her dreams of actually being an Olympian, and just not an alternate, drag her back to the Olympic Process, sometime soon.

Awesome News: USA Worlds Success: 2005 Melbourne Championships

So, after typing my Why I Like: Nastia Liukin Post. I got uber bored. I was surfing around on the Gymternet by searching gymnastics at the World Championships, typing in no specific year, I was wondering where it would take me. I found some disturbing footage of a fat guy performing gymnastics, thats right, I am scarred for life because of searching it, anyway, I also scrolled through 2011 World Championship, 2010, 2009, 2007, 2006, and I finally got to 2005. This is one of those championships i didn't watch yet (And yes, there still are competitions I haven't watched. And I realized something cool. We had medalists in all the events, all around, vault, bars, beam, floor. But whats more amazing? In every event except vault, we have gymnasts one, two, a gymnast in the gold medal position, and a gymnast in the silver. Don't believe me? Check this out!!!!

Women
Individual all-around details	Chellsie Memmel	Anastasia Liukin	Monette Russo
Vault details	Cheng Fei	Oksana Chusovitina	Alicia Sacramone
Uneven bars details	Anastasia Liukin	Chellsie Memmel	Beth Tweddle
Balance beam details	Anastasia Liukin	Chellsie Memmel	Catalina Ponor
Floor details	Alicia Sacramone	Anastasia Liukin	Suzanne Harmes

So, in other words, not only was 2003, 2007, 2011 our World Years, 2005 was too. Medaling in every event final, and scoring the gold and silver medals in every single event except vault. It was truly amazing, truly our Worlds

Why I Like: Nastia Liukin

  I love Nastia. She is a great gymnast. Not to mention the all around champion of the Olympic Games. She was always a great gymnast who was humble when she won, and when she lost, she congratulated the gymnasts who won. The 2005 team final came to mind when Nastia congratulated Chellsie Memmel who beat Nastia in the all around battle by one-tenths of a point. Pure disappointment for Nastia Liukin, but she rose above and stood proud on the silver medal podium. But Nastia's redemption came later in the Worlds when she earned titles on the uneven bars and balance beam, beating Chellsie my a comfy margin. And not to mention beating two international legends on the event, on bars, British wonder Beth Tweddle, and on beam, Catalina Ponor who was the Olympic champion only one year before. She is a great gymnast, who was on a rocket ship all the way to the top since she started her career as a wee little three year old, because her father just happened to own a gym, she decided that she wanted to be a gymnast, but both her mother and father, being former gymnasts themselves, Anna, her mother, a well known rhythmic gymnast, and her father, a champion artistic gymnast for the USSR, knew what a big risk being a gymnast was, and decided to prevent her, but after a lot of annoyance from their daughter, she got in. She then rocket shipped to the top, eventually making the team in Beijing, although not winning team gold with her team (I know, devastating in the USA) She then went on to compete in the all around competition with her teammate, Shawn Johnson. She was extremely underscored on a stuck vault and a hit bars routine, neck and neck with Shawn Johnson. But after putting her experience in, and her beautiful lines and artistry into both her beam routine and her floor routine, not to mention her sheer toughness (She gets her lines and artistry from Anna, her mother, and from Valeri, she gets her sheer toughness. I love Nastia because of her achievements, and that she is the 2008 all around champ.

Brazil and France: Comparing their Gymnastics

So, I will be comparing these countries, and their events. As you know, if you watched the qualifiers at the beginning of the gymnastics competition, both of these teams were ousted from the team all around. As I will be evaluating their events, at the end, I will tell you why they got ousted

The Vault

Brazil-  This is a good event for Brazil, they are fairly strong on this event, especially in the London Games because they had a lot of power athletes, who could throw the 1 1/2 twist, or even the double twisting Yurchenko. I liked watching the Brazilian Gymnasts vault, and I hope to see them get some gymnasts in the finals on their home turf in Rio.


France- France was a more artistic team at the London Games, so vault wasn't one of their events. Almost all of the gymnasts did a single twist, which is only a 5.00 difficulty (Which means they can score a max of 15.00) You can't get more weaker in vaulting than that (Unless you do a Yurchenko half, but even level 5's are learning that, imagine if an Olympian did it?) I can blab for paragraphs how weak the vault is that France is performing, but for the sake of your eyes, I'll just stop now.

The Uneven Bars

Brazil- Like I said in the vault section, Brazil was a power squad in London. If you know everything there is to know about gymnastics, you know that uneven bars is not a power apparatus. Like the USA, they often have issues with transitions and handstands, but no problem with releases. But we all know that handstands and transitions are the most important things in a bar routine, aka, the utmost thing that the judges are looking for in a great bars routine. And the Brazilians often don't have that.

France- The French Gymnasts are good on this event, they often execute their handstands well and their transitions are great. But, they don't have the best difficulty like you see from the Russian Gymnasts, or the Chinese Gymnasts. But what they do, they do well, like transitions and handstands

The Beam

Brazil- Brazil is great on the tumbling passes on this event, and since thats pretty much what beam is all about nowadays, they are great on this event, their beam routines average about a 5.8-5.9 in D value (Difficulty) They are pretty good on this event, not phenomenal, but good, maybe even great.  But with the rare amount of artistry thats in there, like spins, they sometimes struggle

France- This is one of those power events for France. Which means, its not artistic. They have low difficulty stunts, so they are depending on something the Gymnastics World calls execution. They execute all their tumbling well, perfect stuck together legs on passes, pointed toes during the pass, and they stay on the beam, most of the time that is. But they are really great on this event. Not with difficulty, but when France does a beam routine, they always get really close to the top execution score, to a near perfect 10 in execution.


Floor Exercise

Brazil- Brazil is great on the tumbling part of floor, getting high air, with the exception of Danielle Matias Hypolito, who fell on her double twist punch layout. But if Brazil struggles with anything on floor, its with dance.


France-  The French Team is great on the dance part of the floor routine, but have low difficulty tumbling passes, with the exception of Sophia Seseri, however, they are excellent at the dance element of the floor routine.



WHAT X-ed them out of the Team Final

Brazil- Hypolito had only one solid routine, and even that wasn't amazing. The rest of Brazil did good, but with Hypolito's damaged routines, plus other huge errors on bars and beam, Brazil missed out on the prized team final.


France- Well, low scores x-ed the French Gymnasts out of the competition, having no other huge scores, they missed the team final.



Well, now you know what x-ed these two teams out, as well how they performed, and I compared their gymnastics, I think this is a great way to say tata to this article, don't you think? Read my other articles!