Moscow World Cup by Nora Schuler (30th May, 2006)

International gymnastics returned to Moscow’s Olimpiskiy Sports Complex on May 25-26, 2006. Once the sight of the renowned international meet ‘World Stars’ (and Moscow News tournament before that), the arena welcomed gymnasts from 25 countries for the ‘Stars of Gymnastics’ meet, a World Cup qualifier. The top eight gymnasts per apparatus advanced to the finals with Russia winning three of the ten gold medals with the rest being spread around the globe from Brazil to China.

After not making the Russian team for the 2006 European championships, Anna Pavlova and Yelena Zamolodchikova had something to prove. Zamolodchikova has replaced her double twisting Tsukahara with a RO-1/2 to front pike which she sat down in both qualification and finals. In finals, she also fell on her double twisting Yurchenko and lacked height in all of her tumbles on floor.

Pavlova visibly fought hard to impress but was not back to her earlier standard yet, struggling with some wobbles on beam. On floor, she debuted new music and choreography, tumbling a tucked full-in, whip to triple twist, handspring front full and double pike. ‘A lot of you were very sceptical with my choice for the European team,’ head coach Andrei Rodionenko said addressing the Russian media after qualifications, ‘but today’s competition has strengthened my belief that the selection was based entirely on sporting principles and that it was correct.’

2005 US junior national champion Natasha Kelley had a rough senior international debut, falling on everything but floor in qualifications. She fell on her bars dismount in finals but took the bronze on floor with difficult tumbling. The Chinese trio of Zhang Nan, He Ning and Huang Lu failed to medal with sketchy performances.

On the men’s side, the specialists once again reigned supreme with victories for Alexander Safoshkin on rings, Filip Ude of Croatia on floor and world champion Mitja Petkovsek on parallel bars. Fellow Slovenian Aljaz Pegan was upset by upstart Brian Gladow (layout Tkachev, double twisting double layout dismount), a member of the German junior team that took the gold at the European Championships in Volos. Young Anatoli Lobachov took top honours on vault with a 2 ½ twisting Yurchenko while Xian Hantao of China demonstrated classic Chinese mastery on pommel horse for the title.

In issue 4 of Backflip - there will be Moscow World Stars programmes up for grabs!

2006 World Stars Results

Women's Vault
1. Oksana Chusovitina UZB 15.050
2. Jana Komrskova CZE 14.525
3. Lais Souza BRA 14.475

Uneven Bars
1. Jana Sikulova CZE 15.4
2. Darya Zgoba UKR 15.200
3. Yulia Lozhechko RUS 15.050

Balance Beam
1. Yulia Lozhechko RUS 15.500
2. Anna Pavlova RUS 15.350
3. Oksana Chusovitina UZB 15.200

Women's Floor Exercise
1. Daiane dos Santos BRA 15.300
2. Lais Souza BRA 15.000
3. Natasha Kelley USA 14.800

Men's Floor Exercise
1. Filip Ude CRO 15.250
2. Dmitry Gogotov RUS 15.150
3. David Vyoral CZE 15.100

Pommel Horse
1. Xian Hantao CHN 15.950
2. Krisztian Berki HUN 15.750
3. Nikolai Kuksenkov UKR 15.300

Rings
1. Alexander Safoshkin RUS 16.450
2. Chen Yubin CHN 16.350
3. Yan Mingyong CHN 16.150

Men's Vault
1. Anton Lobachyov RUS 16.125
2. Sean Golden USA 16.050
3. Tomas Gonzales CHI 16.025

Parallel Bars
1. Mitja Petkovsek SLO 16.00
2. Roman Zozulya UKR 15.450
3. Andrei Isayev UKR 15.250

High Bar
1. Brian Gladow GER 15.450
2. Nikolai Kuksenkov UKR 15.400
3. Aljaz Pegan SLO 15.350