Well, it's all done and dusted. I'm thrilled for China, surprised but content for the USA (I mean, some disasters there, but still coming out with a medal and behind the home-crowd favourites no less!) and sh*tted off about Romania. Enough said. I'm making my peace with it all.
The Age put a pre-prelims 'audio gallery' up with photos and soundbites from Dasha and P-Liddy.
There is an article here talking about the final standings with a heartbreaking picture of Dasha's bars error at the top of the page. Gut-wrenching.
I am disappointed in Channel 7's coverage. Granted, I should be grateful that they showed the final at all. But they put it on half an hour early, and cut out routines - we saw Anna Pavlova getting ready for floor and they didn't even show the routine, they cut to something else. They showed Sandra Izbasa's floor score when we didn't even see her routine. They compressed the whole lot into less than an hour and it was more than frustrating. The poor editing was quite noticeable. I could hear Australia's floor music in the background, and could glimpse Olivia prepping for bars and found myself yelling "Go there! Go there after this routine, come on!" but of course they didn't. We saw two Australian routines in total and they were two that we'd seen during preliminaries - Georgia's vault and Lauren's beam. They were two phenomenal efforts of course, but it hurt when you'd heard the commentators remarking on their teammates who'd gone before them that we never got to see.
But again - it's done, we can't change it. A big "well done" to the Aussie girls who bettered their Sydney and Athens efforts. Olivia achieved what I'm sure was a PB score on bars, the Waverley girls have come into their own, Lauren overcame her beam troubles... it was an up and down day but for the bulk of it, the girls have every right to be proud of themselves. Bring on the all-around final!
8 comments:
Well done girlies! :) You should all be so very proud of yourself. 6th place at the OLYMPIC GAMES is such an achievement.
Best of luck to Shona and Georgia for two days time in the womens all-aroun d final! :)
Becka
was the photo of Dasha on bars from prelims or from team finals....if its from team finals what did she fall on?
It would have been finals, as she hit her routine in prelims.
I can't tell what the move is. She might have got tangled up doing a pirouette, she might have caught a release wrong. Until I see footage of it, I won't know.
6th place is alright. Not fabulous though.
Not that I've seen the routine, but there are a series of photos on Beijing now website that show Dasha reaching for her geinger release, her missing her hands initially and then just clinging on. She did her face because the afterwards photos show her icing her face and you can see her blood nose. :(
I don't know how but she DIDN'T fall, she just managed to hang on but obviously took quite a deduction in staying on despite the mistake.
Becka
It must have been from today because she is wearing the team finals leo.
Also, they showed some more coverage tonight which included Anna's floor. thats all im up to in watching my dvd but hopefully there were a few other different routines.
Again here in the USA we have internet viewing of every routine. I have to work today but its possible tonight I can go through and find the Aussie routines and give you a run down if you like? They may end up briefly on youtube but nbc is pretty dilligent about getting them removed- fast!
On tv they only showed USA and China (everything) and Semenyova's bars. Actually they cut to Michael Phelps during He Kexin's bars (I was like nooooooooooooo) but then replayed it.
Quick round-up of some Russian and Romanian routines as shown by the BBC:
Steliana Nistor did well on bars. She had two minor leg form issues (split legs on Pak and handstand pirouette), but hit all her handstands, did high releases, the works. She got a high score and deserved it. On beam, she had a big wobble on her full turn. She also didn't hold the arabesque on her front somi, but then I'm not sure she intended to, as she immediately launched into another forward movement. Maybe she has changed her routine since the Europeans? It was a pretty decent routine, anyway -- not too graceful but well paced and solid. She didn't quite make her triple turn on floor, but hit all her tumbling, and seemed a bit disappointed with her score.
Sandra Izbasa had a big wobble on a free handspring on beam but was otherwise clean. She had slightly tentative landings on her first and fourth tumbling series on floor (she's been having ankle problems, and it shows), but had lovely presentation (third-best smile of the competition, after Jiang Yuyuan and Daiane dos Santos'). She took a big step backwards on her double-twisting Yurchenko vault, but seemed very happy with the effort. The Romanians seemed quite pleased with their bronze.
As for the Russians, they scored well on bars, where Semyonova was brilliant as ever. Ezhova lost valuable points on beam by falling on a piked back somersault, while Pavlova had two errors: a slight dip on her half-twisting dive to handstand and a fall on a layout to two feet. She seemed quite mortified afterwards.
The BBC didn't show any Russian floor exercises, but judging from the score (43.350), they were bad. I suspect the main culprit was Ksenia Afanasyeva, who is notoriously error-prone on floor. She completely crashed and burned on floor at the Europeans. My guess is that she did the same thing in Beijing, but I don't know for sure.
I, too, would have preferred to see the Russians beat the Romanians for the sake of artistry, but the Romanians were their usual solid selves and their form wasn't too atrocious.
I'm miffed Ukraine didn't make the team final. The final wasn't quite the same without them.
The BBC only showed one Australian routine: Lauren Mitchell's beam. Great stuff.
Post a Comment