(Thanks to Stoddard Reynolds of Oregon)
2. WAG squads announced.
SENIOR NATIONAL SQUAD
GEORGIA BONORA (VIC)
SOPHIE BUDACK (NT) *
ALEX BYERS-ARMSTRONG (VIC) **
FIONA COLEY (VIC)
EMMA DENNIS (VIC)
BRITT GREELEY (VIC)
EMILY LITTLE (WA) *
ZOE LORENZIN (VIC) *
LARRISSA MILLER (QLD)
LAUREN MITCHELL (WA)
MARY-ANNE MONCKTON (NSW) *
SHONA MORGAN (VIC)
GEORGIA SIMPSON (WA) *
GEORGIA WHEELER (VIC) *
* Denotes Athletes elevated from Junior to Senior National Squad
** Denotes New Senior National Squad Member
SENIOR - AIS/GA OLYMPIC SQUAD
GEORGIA BONORA (VIC)
FIONA COLEY (VIC)
BRITT GREELEY (VIC)
EMILY LITTLE (WA)
ZOE LORENZIN (VIC)
LARRISSA MILLER (QLD)
LAUREN MITCHELL (WA)
MARYANNE MONCKTON (NSW)
SHONA MORGAN (VIC)
GEORGIA WHEELER (VIC)
JUNIOR NATIONAL SQUAD
GEORGIA-ROSE BROWN (VIC)
NIKKI CHUNG (WA) *
GRACE CLARINGBOLD (VIC) *
SHAR-LEE CLARK (QLD) *
EMMA COLLISTER (VIC)
RACHEL COLLISTER (VIC)
ASHLEY COONEY (WA)
ANGELA DONALD (VIC)
TIERRA EXUM (VIC)
LAURA HINGSTON (VIC) *
NATALIA JOURA (WA)
AMAYA KING KOI (QLD)
NAOMI LEE (NSW) *
AMELIA MCGRATH (VIC) *
EMMA NEDOV (NSW) *
SVETLANA SANDERS (VIC)
KATIE WURTH (QLD) *
* Denotes New Junior National Squad Member
JUNIOR - AIS/GA OLYMPIC SQUAD
GEORGIA-ROSE BROWN (VIC)
NIKKI CHUNG (WA)
EMMA COLLISTER (VIC)
RACHEL COLLISTER (VIC)
ASHLEY COONEY (WA)
ANGELA DONALD (VIC)
NAOMI LEE (NSW)
AMELIA MCGRATH (VIC)
EMMA NEDOV (NSW)
KATIE WURTH (QLD)
I am personally quite pleased with these. The junior lists are particularly promising.
A happy birthday to our Waverley twins.
ReplyDeleteA rather hot day for gymnastic's newest 15 year olds.
Hope they had a fabulous day.
Thanks for the reminder.
ReplyDeleteA red alert day indeed!
how can they shaft emma dennis from the senior olympic squad but include people like mary anne and zoe who have been injured for the majority of 2009. wtf has emma done?!
ReplyDeleteZoe I don't know but it makes sense to include Maryanne because the costs are lower- she is on an AIS scholarship anyway so having her on that particular squad incurs no extra cost.
ReplyDeleteNot sure what Emma has done but there are always politics in this sport
ooh and I just noticed Amber is gone from the Senior Squad. That's a real shame. You would have to assume she's done with gym wouldn't you?
ReplyDeleteEmma is on the National Squad so maybe her injury is at a stage where they don't think she will be ready for a few more months yet. The AIS squad is only until July so maybe she will make it then.
ReplyDeletethanks, i really dont get how these squads work so i appreciate you explaining it a bit!
ReplyDeleteThe National Squads are supposed to be those deemed to be good enough to be considered to represent Australia at International Events. The GA/AIS Olympic squad get their camps paid for (travel/accommodation/meals etc) by the AIS which is tax-payer funded. The National squads are usually in place for a year whereas the GA/AIS Olympics are for 6 months. The GA/AIS squad is capped at 10 gymnasts per squad whereas I think the National Squad is limit-less. That's why from a management point of view its smart to have the AIS athletes on the AIS squad (eg. Maryanne and Naomi Lee) because they are under scholarship anyway.
ReplyDeleteHope that helps :)
News piece from peggy
ReplyDeletehttp://www.gymnastics.org.au/default.asp?Page=15063
News piece totally lacklustre. Typical filler story with nothing to say. Don't know why they bothered wrting it.
ReplyDeleteThere is no pleasing some people is there! It seems that no matter what GA post on their site - some people complain all the time. Squad lists come out and people complain it took too long - even though the squads were only announced to gymnasts late December and the GA office was closed over December and just reopend. A news piece goes up and someone has whined about that as well. it was not long ago that we hardly got any information from TPTB. What sort of information do people expect them to give - a day by run down of each gymnasts. if you're expecting detailed information on what each girl is training then that would be highly unlikely
ReplyDeletethanks nik!
ReplyDeleteThe selection criteria for squads is posted on the GA website under technical information. AIS residential scholarship holders are subject to the same criteria as all gymnasts otherwise it would be discrimanatory for them to be included on squads on the basis of that criteria alone. Sophie Budack is an AIS residential and on the National squad but not on the AIS/GA Olympic squad
ReplyDeleteWell said Anon 3:34. I love this blog, and I admit I visit almost every day, however I (and I'm sure some others) dislike the constant digs at GA who are after all providing a completely different service to the gymnastics community, where posting news items is only a small part of what they do. Does it really matter in the overall scheme of things where you hear things first? Or how long it takes for an official announcement to come out. What do we have riding on this information? Besides curiosity? All the people involved have known for a few weeks which squads they are on (because it involves them). What would have been different if the squads had been announced earlier? I just don't get it.
ReplyDeleteAs the person who commented on the dullness of the news item, I have actually praised GA in the past.
ReplyDeleteI think some of the expectations here about timing and the like are unrealistic, given their budget and relatively low emphasis on comms.
What I don't like are fluff pieces for the sake of it. They are a waste of time and effort. But it's no big deal.
Overall,particularly when compared to other sports around the same size, they do a pretty good job.
Unfortunately when you loosely operate in the media/communications space there is an expectation of instant reportage from some.
Gymnastics is one of the many sports with minimal funding from Government and commercial sources resulting in massive costs to families and also contributing to premature drop out rates.
ReplyDeleteThis is for a variety of reasons including the age of the elite athlete, competition with 'traditionally Australian' sports suck as football and, I believe, is contributed to by a lack of profile of the sport.
Many years ago, football and cricket were popular but not as commercially viable for the players (most had 'real jobs' as well as playing.
These sports were made professional and the athletes were able to focus on their sport rather than a second job through the support of funding and commercial interest.
Gymnastics could, in time, work towards further commercial support but only if sufficient interest is shown by the general public.
GA could play a crucial part by releasing as much information as quickly as possible to the public to maintain the interest of the fan.
The growing fan base would then attract the interest of commercial ventures who would see the benefit of sponsorship and advertising etc which would then further raise the profile, attract more fans, attract further funding.....the cycle goes on.
Unfortunately, GA is not sufficiently funded or staffed to maintain meaningful information and release it in a timely manner meaning that some fans will 'tune out'. This includes total silence during the 'off season' or over Christmas.
Don't know if you noticed but this doesn't happen with football or cricket. The papers have stories about the players, team moves, injuries, new skills etc all year round keeping the fans interested until the new season comes around and advertising can be sold for funding etc.
Whilst the die hard gymnastic fans will hang in there during the long silences, their numbers are not sufficient to attract cash.
A vicious cycle really.
I know that these sports have a large number of staff who are able to work all year round at media but even with a small budget, it seems amazing that any organisation deems it appropriate to close an entire office for 3 weeks over Christmas. I would love to see further funding provided for a larger staff at GA or for them to stagger leave to ensure a skeleton staff to ensure that the media keeps running.
This could have been as simple as a 'how the gymnasts spend their Christmas, media on training continuing over the break etc etc.
Clearly anon at 6.37 was fortunate in finding out about the squads early and I do agree that the gymnasts need to know first (and congratulations if one of these girls was your daughter) but I disagree that the timing for fans makes no difference.
The girls names were honoured for the hard work they have completed as well as being recognised as our next olympians, commonwealth games athletes, world champions etc.
Far better to have the fans be provided with the information accurately and early so they can celebrate with the girls.
No media will be interested in a story this old now.
GA need to learn to strike while the iron is hot.
With any luck, the girls will get more recognition, the sport more funding and you (as I assume you are a parent) will not have to bear such huge costs for your daughter to fulfil there dream.
*steps off soap box*
Rant complete (hope it makes sense, Victorians are sleep deprived from last night!
On the contrary, Anon 2:50, I find some interesting points in the Liddick article.
ReplyDelete"Each athlete has in hand a "strongly requested" list of skills that Liddick is keen to see progressed by next week's camp." I don't know if such an approach has been taken before but I think it will start to sort the wheat from the chaff in terms of consistency and contributions to the team score. It also gives girls an incentive to really get certain skills happening.
"Liddick is adamant that the first six months of 2010 will be spent keeping athletes at home and fine tuning their "international program" rather than travelling to international events". Ok, it's good to get this news out now so it doesn't get to March and we're all going, "Why haven't the girls been sent to anything yet?"
"Liddick will also invite a handful of "others" who are not currently members of the national squad and may have been carrying injuries or otherwise overlooked". I think that's a good way of 'touching base' with a broader spectrum of girls across the national program so you don't have some girls lagging slightly behind others once they've recovered.
"Keep an eye out for new floor routines from he Collister sisters (VIC), Lorenzin (VIC) and a handful of others who have been put through their paces by team choreographer Stacey-Umeh-Lees. Liddick has confirmed that Mitchell will retain 90% of her 2009 program with some new combinations and a couple of tweaks made to her existing beam and floor routine."
Two words: WOO HOO!
I also thought the article made good reading Mez. Did every one miss the comment that Dasha is a regular visitor to the gym? Do we dare to hope? Thanks for your Comments Shelley, you made some good points. I can see the benefit of getting the information out early if it is for raising the profile of the sport, but not if it is just to give people an early shot at complaining about the selections. How do we get this information to translate into the difference we want to see?
ReplyDeleteI believe fiona coley recently got a new floor routine too
ReplyDeletedoes anybody have any new on dasha?
ReplyDeleteI live in the usa
I am 99% sure that Dasha is NOT coming back to training (and I know her personally).
ReplyDeleteCan you explain why she is regularly in the gym? Just keeping in shape?
ReplyDeleteGA could have released the squad lists within seconds of finalising them and it would have made very little difference as to whether it got a run or not in the media.
ReplyDeleteThe issue with the squad list for the media, would not have been its timeliness but ts "newsworthiness" i.e very little.
Same goes for GA media release, which whilst it may be interesting for hardcore fans would have had no news value for mainstream/sporting media.
That said, they capitalised well on Mitchell's success this year.
To build a media profile without a siginificant supporter base, you need put the human interest/personality element into your sportspeople and achieve good results internationally.
You then need a concerted and clever editorial media campaign to identify and get the news stories out on a regular basis in major metro centres.
Extremely hard work and costly, if done well.
Even then there's a limit to what can be achieved given the column space and air time already allocated for traditional sports.
And if you think GA doesn't provide timely information for its fans, I suggest you look at equivalent web sites such as diving, which make GA looking positively reactionary!
Is it really all over for Dasha?? What a shame - kind of just assumed she'd do the rehab. on her ankle and come back.....she must have done some serious damage to that ankle. Soooo disappointing - absolutely an emormous talent and even though she experienced some success......if this is it for her - she so didn't fulfill her potential!! No fault of her own, ofcourse!!
ReplyDeleteIn response to an earlier poster... I do believe Amber has since moved on from gymnatics. I heard she left the QAS. I could be wrong but that is what I have heard through the rumormill up here in QLD.
ReplyDeleteAmber did moved to Morton Bay Gymnastics and has since decided to finish gymnastics and move on with her life. Shame she was such a talent :)
ReplyDeleteJust on the Amber thing, I heard she was back in the gym at QAS trying to get back in now that the new coaches have arrived there.
ReplyDeleteShouldn't Peggy have thought about 'international programs' maybe a year ago? They really should be out now competing their planned routines for consistency now like every other country's top girls, not cramming in skills and hoping for the best when it comes to the big meets.
ReplyDeleteThe excuse that we need to stay home and not attend anything was used last year too. I noticed that they had registered girls for both WOGA Classic and Gymnix this year but TPTB must have realized their programs weren't good enough at national clubs. A bit late now.
considering half the top girls didn't compete National Clubs because of injury - it's more likely they are trying to get them to 100% before the major competitions start such as Pac Rim and then Comm Games and Worlds
ReplyDeleteI just wanted to say re: the article/coverage - I think GA are defiintely trying hard and that is great.
ReplyDeleteThere are lots of things I hope they do to expand on their early efforts- follow up on the original story with some camp info - skills, photos, quotes, maybe a video clip or two of new skills in training.
They really should embrace video reportage more, since they can easily host on youtube, and every compact camera has a video mode. They made a good start with the IDP clinic dance video.
In regards to Peggy not competing the girls for 6 months, so they are ready for commonwelths etc.....it's a bit like you're dammed if you do and you're dammed if you don't. I remember Holly was pushed through quite a few comps to get her competitive/name out there and she ended up with a few back problems.....Zeena entered a lot of competitions during 98/99 & didn't end up making the olympic team.....but on the other hand the girls were kept home to train prior to 2007 worlds & what an underperforming team that ended up being!! Sooo.....I guess you have to trust Peggy has weighed everything up & has decided for this particular year with this particular group of gymnasts the best option is to have them train and train and hopefully perform well in the later half of the year.
ReplyDeleteI thought it was interesting that in the article Peggy singled out Georgia W, Mary-Anne and Zoe but not Emily.
ReplyDeleteNot really. I think the implication was that we were going to see progress from girls we haven't seen a lot of.
ReplyDelete