… where the next three stages are Romanian Nationals (25-27 September), the Novarra Cup (10th of October) and Worlds in Glasgow, this is how Romania’s Coach Lucian Sandu characterized the friendly meet against France that took place in Izvorani last week-end. For Romania, the gymnasts that scored were: Catalina Ponor, Larisa Iordache, Diana Bulimar, Laura Jurca, Anamaria Ocolisan, Silvia Zarzu, while Ioana Nicoara competed “hors concours”.
It was a milestone for Romania, beyond the fact that it was the first meet of the season:
– Catalina Ponor (who is now 28) competed for the first time since the London Olympics. This is the 3rd major come-back for Catalina (she’s had some health problems, doubts and returns in the 2005-2008 quad too). Comparing her readiness to the 2011 pre-Tokio Worlds level she looks far ahead, with a far better fitness level: she’s already doing a DTY on vault, she has all her beam skills back, with some new connections trying to work the post 2013 code changes; already doing 4 acro lines, and difficult, on floor: DLO, whip-whip- full in, triple twist and double pike. Form still needs to improve, there are some bent knees and wild legs here and there; she also declared that she wants to add more difficulty and hopes to add important tenths (even up to a full point on one particular event – floor?). Her scores were: VT 14.85 (5.8), BB 15.1 (6.3), FX 13.95 (5.5).
Vault:
Beam:
Floor:
– Larisa Iordache returned to competition after months of struggling with ankle issues. She’s looked imperfect but strong and confident; there’s no doubt that she will peak at the perfect time this year as well. Sehe vaulted a DTY, (15.00/5.8), presented a reconfigured bars routine (she fell on the Church release but which otherwise looks improved even compared to last year when she received her best scores internationally on this event in the mid and even high 14s) (13.7/6.2). Beam looks the same, with the good – back tuck full, triple twist, great rhythm – and the bad (messy layout, wild legs on flicks). Larisa also presented a new floor routine, on a tango music that is simple yet catchy, (I found it unexpectedly striking). Her tumbling was: double-double, full in, triple twist and double pike (14.350/5.9).
Bars:
Beam:
Floor:
– Diana Bulimar also returned to competition after suffering her third knee surgery in two years, back in June. Fortunately, although she will not reach 100% in terms of readiness by Glasgow, she seems able to recover well enough to help the team on bars and beam, where her simplified but steady routines will be critical in qualifications. She has some form issues and even fell on bars, on a transition, but this seemed rather a fluke due to insufficient numbers of full routines. Her scores were 14.15/5.0 on vault (1/1 Yurchenko), 11.850/4.9 on bars, for her beam she received a 14.25/5.8, while on floor although she did her routine on the tumble track with the acro elements into the pit, her routine was rated at a 5.7 difficulty.
Vault:
Bars:
Beam:
Floor:
– This might be the breakthrough year for Anamaria Ocolisan, who surprised with a new and beautiful bars routine: Van Leeuwen, Pak, Maloney, full in dismount (14.05/5.6) and also threw a good DTY vault (15.00/5.8). On the other two events she was solid too – 14.100/5.7 on beam for a routine with flick – back pike, aerial walkover, Y turn, side somi, double pike dismount; and a 13.7/5.6 on floor for a routine with triple twist, 2 1/2 to punch front, double pike, double tuck. Anamaria also had the second highest AA total (after Larisa), which puts her in a really good position for this year’s World team.
Vault:
Bars:
Beam:
Floor:
– Laura Juca had Romania’s third all around total: 55.450. She hit her DTY, which has been giving her a lot of grief so far this year – 14.6/5.8, she hit a simplified version of her bars routine (without the Hindorff release) – 13.45/5.3, beam seems to also have been solid (couldn’t find her routine to view) – 14.05/5.6; while floor was quite exquisite and scored a but harshly I thought (but I am a long-time fan of this routine so perhaps I am biased) – 13.35/5.7.
Vault:
Bars:
Floor:
– Silvia Zarzu had quite a rough meet (a couple of falls and almost crashed her DTY ) but held it together for her favorite event, floor, where she scored a 13.8/5.6 for a routine with 2 1/2 twist, double pike, double tuck a nice combo of ring leaps.
For France the gymnasts competing at Izvorani were**: Claire Martin, Loan His, Louise Vanhille, Marine Brevet, Camille Bahl, Grace Charpy**. Brevet and Vanhille scored similarly in the all around, with a 55.85 and a 55.80 respectively. Vault was “won” by Bahl, the sole DTY of the team, with a 14.75/5.8, Vanhille had the best bars score of the entire meet (14.5/5.9), while Martin had her team’s top beam score with a 14.65/6.1; on floor Brevet had the cleanest routine of the team 14.05/5.3.
Here are the detailed results, per event:
Note: the last UB score actually belongs to Ioana Nicoara.
Note! this article has been ammended – It previously contained the comment about Catalina Ponor ” she even tested a bars routine (out of 4.0 for which she received a score of 6.1: 4.1 D, 6.0 E and 4 points penalty, not sure under which circumstances this might happen).” – in the meantime it was clarified that the score belonged to Ioana Nicoara and it was a typo.
Article by: Bea Gheorghisor
Photo Cover: from here