Yesterday, in Amsterdam, the first Dutch qualification for the European Games in Baku took place.
The following five gymnast are in the running for one of the three spots on the Dutch European Games team;
– Celine van Gerner
– Vera van Pol
– Maartje Ruikes
– Lisa Top
– Lieke Wevers
Besides the first qualification today, a second qualification will be held next Thursday, April 30, 2015 in Beekbergen. After those two qualification meet the team will be announced May 1st, 2015. One spot is for the best AA-gymnast out of the two qualifications, the other two spots will be selected by the federation.
Lieke Wevers was the best gymnast today. On bars she started a really nice dynamic routine packed with combinations, but unfortunately she ended her routine with a point deduction after over rotating her front double tuck dismount. She missed a lot of connections on beam, but since she just stopped them without wobbles and improvised a new connection to fulfill a requirement , she still scored a nice 13.800. Her floor with lovely pirouetting skills and clean acrobatic series with (almost) stuck landings, was combined with beautiful choreography a real joy to watch. She vaulted a simple but clean layout Yourchenko and took first place with an AA-score of 54.883.
Lisa Top took the silver just on top of Celine van Gerner and Maartje Ruikes with an AA-score of 53.133. Floor is normally her best event. But today she sat down her double piked twist and landed her front handspring – double tuck with one feet outside the line. On vault she placed first with a clean front handspring tucked salto with 1/1 twist. Bars and beam are more difficult events for her, and getting through her routines without any major mistakes resulted in a 13.133 on bars and a 13.000 on beam.
Celine van Gerner showed somewhat watered down routines due to a recent back injury. Nice to see her relaxed and smiling the whole time during the competition. She started with a clean bars and then had a rough time on beam where she came off twice. She then had a good floor and ended her competition great with an E-score of 9.350 for her stuck Yourchenko 1/1. With her AA-total of 53.034 she placed third in Amsterdam.
Maartje Ruikes placed fourth with 52.950. Today was the first real competition of 2015 for Maartje. She worked on new skills after she came back from Worlds last year. On bars she added a 3/2 turn before her Jaeger which looked great in the warm ups, but she missed in the competition. On beam her gainer-layout stepout combination was new and she now vaults a Yurchenko 1.5. A bit wobbly on beam and too much power left when landing her Yurchenko, but besides that Maartje had a steady competition.
Vera van Pol was with 50.233 the weakest gymnast today. She started with a nice Van Leeuwen on bars, but then fell with her Jeager to Pak combination and also sat down her dismount which now is a hop 1/1 to double twist. On beam it looks like she missed her back handspring 1/1 – back handspring 1/1 to sit combination when she fell after the first skill. On floor she stepped outside the line after a high double twist tucked and also landed her last series not really well. Besides those two mistakes she really showed nice leaps. She has good 180 degrees on all of them, where normally powergymnasts like her lacks those flexibility. She ended her competition with a nice layout tsukahara 1/1. I really hope she has a better competition next Thursday, because she has the D-scores, but misses some clean execution and consistency.
I think, after seeing the competition today, there are no locks for the team yet and also all of them still has the chance to make the team. I think it just depends on who will hit next Thursday.
The full results of the competition can be found HERE (page 5)
Article by: Eef van Leeuwen
Photo Cover: Nadia Boyce