so sick and tired of gymnastics Olympics coverage

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:100% agree OP. Also, why does Simone Biles always get the vast majority of coverage? There are hundreds of other athletes with interesting and inspiring stories.

Because, simply. she is the GOAT. No ifs, why, but about it.

She’s really good, but she lacks the ethereal grace and softness of classical gymnasts.

You mean the waif-like under 16 year old from the Karoly era?

You are putting words in the poster's mouth.

The gymnastics of today is artless and imprecise.

You can:
-call me a terrible person
-say well since I am an athlete what do I know
-call me stupid

And I still stand by what I said.

I take the power and athleticism of today’s gymnasts over the anorexic era.

Why does it have to be power and athleticism with more grace and fluidity. No one is missing anorexia. Stop projecting your BS onto other posters.

There is no doubt that in one sense, Simone is the most athletic and acrobatic of the group. She does the most difficult moves on many of the apparatuses. However, she also is imprecise and artless. It is all power and no finesse.

It's actually for that reason I would love to see Suni Lee win the gold in the individual all around. At these games she seems more fluid and graceful than Simone.

Read “Little Girls in Tiny Boxes” to see what was done to them to make them quiet, obedient, and sick. They were sick and most of them abused in some or all ways. Bela and Marta Karolyi and other coaches were monsters. They were given temp guardianship over these kids, lived at the compound, and every minute of their life was controlled. Please do not support this. Look at the feed of Keri Strug. Read her face, listen to what Bella says to her and his body language. Here her agonizing screams when she crawls off the mat. You know what will make a little girl do a complicated vault on an injury like what she had. Fear. I like the healthy, aware, non- abused Olympians we have today.

And the Karolyis looked the other way while Larry Nassar molested the girls.

It is a miracle that the US program has recovered from that and thrives with the strong women at these Olympics.

[Anonymous]

Hi former ballet dancer here. One thing those of you complaining about how today's gymnasts are not as "elegant" as you'd don't understand is that you are partly responding to body type.

I'm 5'5" tall. This is considered a fairly ideal height for ballet -- short enough to easily partner with a male dancer but tall enough to create long lines and fluid movement. I have a long neck and long limbs proportional to my body. I was very strong and muscular at the peak of my dance career but I naturally develop long and lean muscles -- I am actually currently trying to bulk up for health reasons and it's genuinely hard for me to develop large muscles even while lifting heavy. It is partially to do with how my joints are structured.

Top gymnasts are mostly right around 5' or shorter. Simone Biles is 4'8". Suni Lee is 5'. Rebecca Andrade is 5'1". Smaller bodies are more conducive to flipping and twisting in the air or swinging and leaping between bars or doing tricks on 4" beam. Having less distance between your center of gravity to your head and feet helps create tighter rotation (even in a laid out position) and makes it easier for a gymnast to pull their legs under them to land cleanly. I did some gymnastics when I was young and I was okay but especially when I hit puberty and shot up in height it didn't feel great in my body. I don't have a gymnastics body.

Also in order to creat the power necessary to do the tricks they do on vault and floor these athletes have to develop major strength in their shoulders. This is so different from dance -- even in modern dance you just do not spend so much time inverted or using your upper body to propel you into powerful moves.

A shorter body with very well developed musculature in the shoulders and upper back is never going to look as fluid and graceful as a taller body with more evenly distributed muscle strength. It's just not. And why should it -- they are not dancers they are gymnasts. They do actually master a lot of dance skills and all the top gymnasts (including Biles) create great leg lines in their leaps with pointed goes and perfectly straight legs. They do not have the upper body posture of dancers because (1) they clearly haven't been trained into it and (2) I suspect it would be hard to hold ballet postures while doing the small amount of "dance" required of gymnastics which generally comes right before or right after tumbling or major balance challenges (on beam) -- they often have "bad" lines in their arms because they are using them to maintain balance on the beam or in a landing from a skill. That straight or hyperextended arm with the outstretched fingers would get you yelled at in ballet class but might honestly be necessary to keep you on the beam or prevent you from taking a big step on a landing.

All of this is why I don't care that gymnasts aren't as graceful as dancers. They aren't dancers! Basketball players are also not as graceful as dancers. Neither are skiers or sumo wrestlers or swimmers. This is not upsetting. Why do people expect female gymnasts (and ONLY female gymnasts -- this demand does not exist for the men) to move like ballet dancers. It doesn't make sense.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Hi former ballet dancer here. One thing those of you complaining about how today's gymnasts are not as "elegant" as you'd don't understand is that you are partly responding to body type.

I'm 5'5" tall. This is considered a fairly ideal height for ballet -- short enough to easily partner with a male dancer but tall enough to create long lines and fluid movement. I have a long neck and long limbs proportional to my body. I was very strong and muscular at the peak of my dance career but I naturally develop long and lean muscles -- I am actually currently trying to bulk up for health reasons and it's genuinely hard for me to develop large muscles even while lifting heavy. It is partially to do with how my joints are structured.

Top gymnasts are mostly right around 5' or shorter. Simone Biles is 4'8". Suni Lee is 5'. Rebecca Andrade is 5'1". Smaller bodies are more conducive to flipping and twisting in the air or swinging and leaping between bars or doing tricks on 4" beam. Having less distance between your center of gravity to your head and feet helps create tighter rotation (even in a laid out position) and makes it easier for a gymnast to pull their legs under them to land cleanly. I did some gymnastics when I was young and I was okay but especially when I hit puberty and shot up in height it didn't feel great in my body. I don't have a gymnastics body.

Also in order to creat the power necessary to do the tricks they do on vault and floor these athletes have to develop major strength in their shoulders. This is so different from dance -- even in modern dance you just do not spend so much time inverted or using your upper body to propel you into powerful moves.

A shorter body with very well developed musculature in the shoulders and upper back is never going to look as fluid and graceful as a taller body with more evenly distributed muscle strength. It's just not. And why should it -- they are not dancers they are gymnasts. They do actually master a lot of dance skills and all the top gymnasts (including Biles) create great leg lines in their leaps with pointed goes and perfectly straight legs. They do not have the upper body posture of dancers because (1) they clearly haven't been trained into it and (2) I suspect it would be hard to hold ballet postures while doing the small amount of "dance" required of gymnastics which generally comes right before or right after tumbling or major balance challenges (on beam) -- they often have "bad" lines in their arms because they are using them to maintain balance on the beam or in a landing from a skill. That straight or hyperextended arm with the outstretched fingers would get you yelled at in ballet class but might honestly be necessary to keep you on the beam or prevent you from taking a big step on a landing.

All of this is why I don't care that gymnasts aren't as graceful as dancers. They aren't dancers! Basketball players are also not as graceful as dancers. Neither are skiers or sumo wrestlers or swimmers. This is not upsetting. Why do people expect female gymnasts (and ONLY female gymnasts -- this demand does not exist for the men) to move like ballet dancers. It doesn't make sense.

That’s a brilliant observation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Hi former ballet dancer here. One thing those of you complaining about how today's gymnasts are not as "elegant" as you'd don't understand is that you are partly responding to body type.

I'm 5'5" tall. This is considered a fairly ideal height for ballet -- short enough to easily partner with a male dancer but tall enough to create long lines and fluid movement. I have a long neck and long limbs proportional to my body. I was very strong and muscular at the peak of my dance career but I naturally develop long and lean muscles -- I am actually currently trying to bulk up for health reasons and it's genuinely hard for me to develop large muscles even while lifting heavy. It is partially to do with how my joints are structured.

Top gymnasts are mostly right around 5' or shorter. Simone Biles is 4'8". Suni Lee is 5'. Rebecca Andrade is 5'1". Smaller bodies are more conducive to flipping and twisting in the air or swinging and leaping between bars or doing tricks on 4" beam. Having less distance between your center of gravity to your head and feet helps create tighter rotation (even in a laid out position) and makes it easier for a gymnast to pull their legs under them to land cleanly. I did some gymnastics when I was young and I was okay but especially when I hit puberty and shot up in height it didn't feel great in my body. I don't have a gymnastics body.

Also in order to creat the power necessary to do the tricks they do on vault and floor these athletes have to develop major strength in their shoulders. This is so different from dance -- even in modern dance you just do not spend so much time inverted or using your upper body to propel you into powerful moves.

A shorter body with very well developed musculature in the shoulders and upper back is never going to look as fluid and graceful as a taller body with more evenly distributed muscle strength. It's just not. And why should it -- they are not dancers they are gymnasts. They do actually master a lot of dance skills and all the top gymnasts (including Biles) create great leg lines in their leaps with pointed goes and perfectly straight legs. They do not have the upper body posture of dancers because (1) they clearly haven't been trained into it and (2) I suspect it would be hard to hold ballet postures while doing the small amount of "dance" required of gymnastics which generally comes right before or right after tumbling or major balance challenges (on beam) -- they often have "bad" lines in their arms because they are using them to maintain balance on the beam or in a landing from a skill. That straight or hyperextended arm with the outstretched fingers would get you yelled at in ballet class but might honestly be necessary to keep you on the beam or prevent you from taking a big step on a landing.

All of this is why I don't care that gymnasts aren't as graceful as dancers. They aren't dancers! Basketball players are also not as graceful as dancers. Neither are skiers or sumo wrestlers or swimmers. This is not upsetting. Why do people expect female gymnasts (and ONLY female gymnasts -- this demand does not exist for the men) to move like ballet dancers. It doesn't make sense.

Thank you + 100

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Hi former ballet dancer here. One thing those of you complaining about how today's gymnasts are not as "elegant" as you'd don't understand is that you are partly responding to body type.

I'm 5'5" tall. This is considered a fairly ideal height for ballet -- short enough to easily partner with a male dancer but tall enough to create long lines and fluid movement. I have a long neck and long limbs proportional to my body. I was very strong and muscular at the peak of my dance career but I naturally develop long and lean muscles -- I am actually currently trying to bulk up for health reasons and it's genuinely hard for me to develop large muscles even while lifting heavy. It is partially to do with how my joints are structured.

Top gymnasts are mostly right around 5' or shorter. Simone Biles is 4'8". Suni Lee is 5'. Rebecca Andrade is 5'1". Smaller bodies are more conducive to flipping and twisting in the air or swinging and leaping between bars or doing tricks on 4" beam. Having less distance between your center of gravity to your head and feet helps create tighter rotation (even in a laid out position) and makes it easier for a gymnast to pull their legs under them to land cleanly. I did some gymnastics when I was young and I was okay but especially when I hit puberty and shot up in height it didn't feel great in my body. I don't have a gymnastics body.

Also in order to creat the power necessary to do the tricks they do on vault and floor these athletes have to develop major strength in their shoulders. This is so different from dance -- even in modern dance you just do not spend so much time inverted or using your upper body to propel you into powerful moves.

A shorter body with very well developed musculature in the shoulders and upper back is never going to look as fluid and graceful as a taller body with more evenly distributed muscle strength. It's just not. And why should it -- they are not dancers they are gymnasts. They do actually master a lot of dance skills and all the top gymnasts (including Biles) create great leg lines in their leaps with pointed goes and perfectly straight legs. They do not have the upper body posture of dancers because (1) they clearly haven't been trained into it and (2) I suspect it would be hard to hold ballet postures while doing the small amount of "dance" required of gymnastics which generally comes right before or right after tumbling or major balance challenges (on beam) -- they often have "bad" lines in their arms because they are using them to maintain balance on the beam or in a landing from a skill. That straight or hyperextended arm with the outstretched fingers would get you yelled at in ballet class but might honestly be necessary to keep you on the beam or prevent you from taking a big step on a landing.

All of this is why I don't care that gymnasts aren't as graceful as dancers. They aren't dancers! Basketball players are also not as graceful as dancers. Neither are skiers or sumo wrestlers or swimmers. This is not upsetting. Why do people expect female gymnasts (and ONLY female gymnasts -- this demand does not exist for the men) to move like ballet dancers. It doesn't make sense.

They also expect it from figure skaters, lest you forget Surya Bonaly, Nicole Bobek, Tonya Harding and Wakaba Higuchi…

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Hi former ballet dancer here. One thing those of you complaining about how today's gymnasts are not as "elegant" as you'd don't understand is that you are partly responding to body type.

I'm 5'5" tall. This is considered a fairly ideal height for ballet -- short enough to easily partner with a male dancer but tall enough to create long lines and fluid movement. I have a long neck and long limbs proportional to my body. I was very strong and muscular at the peak of my dance career but I naturally develop long and lean muscles -- I am actually currently trying to bulk up for health reasons and it's genuinely hard for me to develop large muscles even while lifting heavy. It is partially to do with how my joints are structured.

Top gymnasts are mostly right around 5' or shorter. Simone Biles is 4'8". Suni Lee is 5'. Rebecca Andrade is 5'1". Smaller bodies are more conducive to flipping and twisting in the air or swinging and leaping between bars or doing tricks on 4" beam. Having less distance between your center of gravity to your head and feet helps create tighter rotation (even in a laid out position) and makes it easier for a gymnast to pull their legs under them to land cleanly. I did some gymnastics when I was young and I was okay but especially when I hit puberty and shot up in height it didn't feel great in my body. I don't have a gymnastics body.

Also in order to creat the power necessary to do the tricks they do on vault and floor these athletes have to develop major strength in their shoulders. This is so different from dance -- even in modern dance you just do not spend so much time inverted or using your upper body to propel you into powerful moves.

A shorter body with very well developed musculature in the shoulders and upper back is never going to look as fluid and graceful as a taller body with more evenly distributed muscle strength. It's just not. And why should it -- they are not dancers they are gymnasts. They do actually master a lot of dance skills and all the top gymnasts (including Biles) create great leg lines in their leaps with pointed goes and perfectly straight legs. They do not have the upper body posture of dancers because (1) they clearly haven't been trained into it and (2) I suspect it would be hard to hold ballet postures while doing the small amount of "dance" required of gymnastics which generally comes right before or right after tumbling or major balance challenges (on beam) -- they often have "bad" lines in their arms because they are using them to maintain balance on the beam or in a landing from a skill. That straight or hyperextended arm with the outstretched fingers would get you yelled at in ballet class but might honestly be necessary to keep you on the beam or prevent you from taking a big step on a landing.

All of this is why I don't care that gymnasts aren't as graceful as dancers. They aren't dancers! Basketball players are also not as graceful as dancers. Neither are skiers or sumo wrestlers or swimmers. This is not upsetting. Why do people expect female gymnasts (and ONLY female gymnasts -- this demand does not exist for the men) to move like ballet dancers. It doesn't make sense.

Interesting explanation. I guess the question is why do the women gymnasts pretend to dance on the floor exercise anymore at all. The men don't bother to dance and don't have music for floor. There's no music for beam. Quit the music and fluffy hands stuff for women's floor and just judge the skills.

[Anonymous]

I love to see all of the camaraderie between the gymnasts. Although competitors, they all seem genuinely happy for one another after hitting a good routine. Back in the day, they barely seemed to acknowledge one another, even teammates from their own country. They also seem better at shaking off mistakes. Sure, they appear disappointed, but the girls in the past looked devastated/frightened when leaving the mat after a fall. I assume it’s all a byproduct of coaching from yesteryear.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hi former ballet dancer here. One thing those of you complaining about how today's gymnasts are not as "elegant" as you'd don't understand is that you are partly responding to body type.

I'm 5'5" tall. This is considered a fairly ideal height for ballet -- short enough to easily partner with a male dancer but tall enough to create long lines and fluid movement. I have a long neck and long limbs proportional to my body. I was very strong and muscular at the peak of my dance career but I naturally develop long and lean muscles -- I am actually currently trying to bulk up for health reasons and it's genuinely hard for me to develop large muscles even while lifting heavy. It is partially to do with how my joints are structured.

Top gymnasts are mostly right around 5' or shorter. Simone Biles is 4'8". Suni Lee is 5'. Rebecca Andrade is 5'1". Smaller bodies are more conducive to flipping and twisting in the air or swinging and leaping between bars or doing tricks on 4" beam. Having less distance between your center of gravity to your head and feet helps create tighter rotation (even in a laid out position) and makes it easier for a gymnast to pull their legs under them to land cleanly. I did some gymnastics when I was young and I was okay but especially when I hit puberty and shot up in height it didn't feel great in my body. I don't have a gymnastics body.

Also in order to creat the power necessary to do the tricks they do on vault and floor these athletes have to develop major strength in their shoulders. This is so different from dance -- even in modern dance you just do not spend so much time inverted or using your upper body to propel you into powerful moves.

A shorter body with very well developed musculature in the shoulders and upper back is never going to look as fluid and graceful as a taller body with more evenly distributed muscle strength. It's just not. And why should it -- they are not dancers they are gymnasts. They do actually master a lot of dance skills and all the top gymnasts (including Biles) create great leg lines in their leaps with pointed goes and perfectly straight legs. They do not have the upper body posture of dancers because (1) they clearly haven't been trained into it and (2) I suspect it would be hard to hold ballet postures while doing the small amount of "dance" required of gymnastics which generally comes right before or right after tumbling or major balance challenges (on beam) -- they often have "bad" lines in their arms because they are using them to maintain balance on the beam or in a landing from a skill. That straight or hyperextended arm with the outstretched fingers would get you yelled at in ballet class but might honestly be necessary to keep you on the beam or prevent you from taking a big step on a landing.

All of this is why I don't care that gymnasts aren't as graceful as dancers. They aren't dancers! Basketball players are also not as graceful as dancers. Neither are skiers or sumo wrestlers or swimmers. This is not upsetting. Why do people expect female gymnasts (and ONLY female gymnasts -- this demand does not exist for the men) to move like ballet dancers. It doesn't make sense.

Interesting explanation. I guess the question is why do the women gymnasts pretend to dance on the floor exercise anymore at all. The men don't bother to dance and don't have music for floor. There's no music for beam. Quit the music and fluffy hands stuff for women's floor and just judge the skills.

When I watch women’s beam routines I honestly wish they’d let them stop the silly dance moves on beam. They clearly put them in because they have to, but they just look odd when they wave their arms around and take a few steps backwards and do a little hip jutt. Like they aren’t fooling anyone with their “dancing” and the athletes clearly can do amazing things on the beam. Making them wiggle around during their rest time between moves , or wiggle their hips as they transition to another part of the beam for their next move, is demeaning.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why do we pretend to care about gymnastics events at the Olympics when we don't care 99% of the other times between Olympics? Gymnastics sucks anyway because it requires subjective judging. Any sport that requires judging is lame.

There needs to be far more coverage of things like archery, shooting, and heck, even skateboarding if we are going to watch sports with judges. Gymnastics is so boring and lame.

Pay $8 for peacock and stop complaining. I've seen lots of archery and equestrian and anything I want.

Why are you saying stop complaining? Why can't we complain about corporations?

Because there is an incredibly cheap, quick and easy to access solution to this "problem." The only reason someone would complain about this is if they really, really wanted to be unhappy about something.

Great trick by NBC, make the free coverage unbearable so we have to pay to use Peacock to see quality coverage. They will make millions if not billions by this rude. But you call this a "solution", it actually sounds intentional.

You're going to pay one way or another - either via a subscription fee or losing hours of your time to ads. Do you go to the movies or concert for free? Of course NBC wants to make money to cover the millions they have paid for the rights to cover the Olympics.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:100% agree OP. Also, why does Simone Biles always get the vast majority of coverage? There are hundreds of other athletes with interesting and inspiring stories.

Because, simply. she is the GOAT. No ifs, why, but about it.

She’s really good, but she lacks the ethereal grace and softness of classical gymnasts.

You mean the waif-like under 16 year old from the Karoly era?

You are putting words in the poster's mouth.

The gymnastics of today is artless and imprecise.

You can:
-call me a terrible person
-say well since I am an athlete what do I know
-call me stupid

And I still stand by what I said.

I take the power and athleticism of today’s gymnasts over the anorexic era.

Why does it have to be power and athleticism with more grace and fluidity. No one is missing anorexia. Stop projecting your BS onto other posters.

There is no doubt that in one sense, Simone is the most athletic and acrobatic of the group. She does the most difficult moves on many of the apparatuses. However, she also is imprecise and artless. It is all power and no finesse.

It's actually for that reason I would love to see Suni Lee win the gold in the individual all around. At these games she seems more fluid and graceful than Simone.

Sorry, meant to say why does it have to be power and athleticism without also having grace and fluidity. Biles does amazing tumbles, but she is herky jerky and misses a lot of her landings. One part of gymnastics is also control. Anyway, not saying she is not great, but for some of us she is not as enjoyable to watch.

Every time I see comments like this I know they’re from someone completely ignorant of the sport. Nobody talks like this about snowboard tricks. You want them to be athletes but on your terms, not the terms of the actual sport. There is so much more to a vault than the stuck landing, but average viewers know so little about preflight, post flight, the block, form in the air, etc that they can’t even assess those things and just focus on a .1-.3 landing step. You sound ridiculous to anyone who knows even a little bit about the sport. Like saying Tom Brady (or trout if you want to do baseball) lacks the flair of Mahomes (or Harper) and isn’t fun to watch.

This. Not understanding that when a gymnast for instance adds a half twist to a vault that results in a blind landing everything about the vault becomes more difficult including the landing. The may need more speed and a better block off the vault in order to get enough height and velocity to complete their rotation. They will not be able to spot the floor before landing so must be able to go by feel and aerial awareness in knowing where the floor is and getting their body in position for impact. They must be tighter in the air in order to complete the extra half twist but also know when to adjust their tightness to safely land and cushion their landing using their knees and hips while also maintaining balance. And also landing coming out of a twist results in horizontal torque as you land which is more destabilizing than the rotation created by a flip which can pull you off balance if you over or under rotate but otherwise directs your energy into the ground and is therefore more conducive to a "stuck" landing. I guess if you don't understand all of that then you might watch someone do an insanely difficult and rarely done vault or tumbling pass and yawn at the speed and height and rotation of the skill but then throw a tiny fit in your living room because the gymnast took a small step or hop upon landing.

Apply to be a gymnastics judge at even the lowest level competition with that approach and let us all know how it goes. Even baby gymnasts understand how silly this is.

Both of you are being unnecessarily harsh and aggressive in your responses. Many of us understand perfectly what you are talking about and guess what...we still think Biles is lacking in artistry. You are the ones who aren't getting what people are saying. No one is questioning Biles athleticism and that she has changed the sport. But some of us can simultaneously gasp at some of her skills and still bemoan the fact that her artistry is less than. She emphasizes the power part and doesn't have the same grace as some others.

Just because you find her stuff the most fun to watch doesn't mean others can't disagree. Jeez. its the Biles-hive.

I was responding in large part to the “herky jerky missing landings” piece of the critique. There’s a weird focus on it in many of the comments I see about biles (especially when performing the biles ii vault). It’s like the landing is the only deduction people are aware of, and then they have the gall to put down these amazing athletes.

And she stuck a heck of a lot of landings today! That first floor pass is just mind blowing every time.

This drove me nuts in the men's competition - it was literally the only thing the commentators talked about. In the women's coverage, the commentators have at least explained what to look for, why a particular skill is considered difficult, etc. Otherwise, I do think many viewers only know about "sticking the landing" because it's an easy thing to see, even if you know nothing about the sport.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hi former ballet dancer here. One thing those of you complaining about how today's gymnasts are not as "elegant" as you'd don't understand is that you are partly responding to body type.

I'm 5'5" tall. This is considered a fairly ideal height for ballet -- short enough to easily partner with a male dancer but tall enough to create long lines and fluid movement. I have a long neck and long limbs proportional to my body. I was very strong and muscular at the peak of my dance career but I naturally develop long and lean muscles -- I am actually currently trying to bulk up for health reasons and it's genuinely hard for me to develop large muscles even while lifting heavy. It is partially to do with how my joints are structured.

Top gymnasts are mostly right around 5' or shorter. Simone Biles is 4'8". Suni Lee is 5'. Rebecca Andrade is 5'1". Smaller bodies are more conducive to flipping and twisting in the air or swinging and leaping between bars or doing tricks on 4" beam. Having less distance between your center of gravity to your head and feet helps create tighter rotation (even in a laid out position) and makes it easier for a gymnast to pull their legs under them to land cleanly. I did some gymnastics when I was young and I was okay but especially when I hit puberty and shot up in height it didn't feel great in my body. I don't have a gymnastics body.

Also in order to creat the power necessary to do the tricks they do on vault and floor these athletes have to develop major strength in their shoulders. This is so different from dance -- even in modern dance you just do not spend so much time inverted or using your upper body to propel you into powerful moves.

A shorter body with very well developed musculature in the shoulders and upper back is never going to look as fluid and graceful as a taller body with more evenly distributed muscle strength. It's just not. And why should it -- they are not dancers they are gymnasts. They do actually master a lot of dance skills and all the top gymnasts (including Biles) create great leg lines in their leaps with pointed goes and perfectly straight legs. They do not have the upper body posture of dancers because (1) they clearly haven't been trained into it and (2) I suspect it would be hard to hold ballet postures while doing the small amount of "dance" required of gymnastics which generally comes right before or right after tumbling or major balance challenges (on beam) -- they often have "bad" lines in their arms because they are using them to maintain balance on the beam or in a landing from a skill. That straight or hyperextended arm with the outstretched fingers would get you yelled at in ballet class but might honestly be necessary to keep you on the beam or prevent you from taking a big step on a landing.

All of this is why I don't care that gymnasts aren't as graceful as dancers. They aren't dancers! Basketball players are also not as graceful as dancers. Neither are skiers or sumo wrestlers or swimmers. This is not upsetting. Why do people expect female gymnasts (and ONLY female gymnasts -- this demand does not exist for the men) to move like ballet dancers. It doesn't make sense.

Interesting explanation. I guess the question is why do the women gymnasts pretend to dance on the floor exercise anymore at all. The men don't bother to dance and don't have music for floor. There's no music for beam. Quit the music and fluffy hands stuff for women's floor and just judge the skills.

When I watch women’s beam routines I honestly wish they’d let them stop the silly dance moves on beam. They clearly put them in because they have to, but they just look odd when they wave their arms around and take a few steps backwards and do a little hip jutt. Like they aren’t fooling anyone with their “dancing” and the athletes clearly can do amazing things on the beam. Making them wiggle around during their rest time between moves , or wiggle their hips as they transition to another part of the beam for their next move, is demeaning.

The Code of Points requires at least three dance elements (I believe), so they have to include them in their routines. The code also requires a level of artistry in the routines and permits deductions when the athlete is lacking.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hi former ballet dancer here. One thing those of you complaining about how today's gymnasts are not as "elegant" as you'd don't understand is that you are partly responding to body type.

I'm 5'5" tall. This is considered a fairly ideal height for ballet -- short enough to easily partner with a male dancer but tall enough to create long lines and fluid movement. I have a long neck and long limbs proportional to my body. I was very strong and muscular at the peak of my dance career but I naturally develop long and lean muscles -- I am actually currently trying to bulk up for health reasons and it's genuinely hard for me to develop large muscles even while lifting heavy. It is partially to do with how my joints are structured.

Top gymnasts are mostly right around 5' or shorter. Simone Biles is 4'8". Suni Lee is 5'. Rebecca Andrade is 5'1". Smaller bodies are more conducive to flipping and twisting in the air or swinging and leaping between bars or doing tricks on 4" beam. Having less distance between your center of gravity to your head and feet helps create tighter rotation (even in a laid out position) and makes it easier for a gymnast to pull their legs under them to land cleanly. I did some gymnastics when I was young and I was okay but especially when I hit puberty and shot up in height it didn't feel great in my body. I don't have a gymnastics body.

Also in order to creat the power necessary to do the tricks they do on vault and floor these athletes have to develop major strength in their shoulders. This is so different from dance -- even in modern dance you just do not spend so much time inverted or using your upper body to propel you into powerful moves.

A shorter body with very well developed musculature in the shoulders and upper back is never going to look as fluid and graceful as a taller body with more evenly distributed muscle strength. It's just not. And why should it -- they are not dancers they are gymnasts. They do actually master a lot of dance skills and all the top gymnasts (including Biles) create great leg lines in their leaps with pointed goes and perfectly straight legs. They do not have the upper body posture of dancers because (1) they clearly haven't been trained into it and (2) I suspect it would be hard to hold ballet postures while doing the small amount of "dance" required of gymnastics which generally comes right before or right after tumbling or major balance challenges (on beam) -- they often have "bad" lines in their arms because they are using them to maintain balance on the beam or in a landing from a skill. That straight or hyperextended arm with the outstretched fingers would get you yelled at in ballet class but might honestly be necessary to keep you on the beam or prevent you from taking a big step on a landing.

All of this is why I don't care that gymnasts aren't as graceful as dancers. They aren't dancers! Basketball players are also not as graceful as dancers. Neither are skiers or sumo wrestlers or swimmers. This is not upsetting. Why do people expect female gymnasts (and ONLY female gymnasts -- this demand does not exist for the men) to move like ballet dancers. It doesn't make sense.

Interesting explanation. I guess the question is why do the women gymnasts pretend to dance on the floor exercise anymore at all. The men don't bother to dance and don't have music for floor. There's no music for beam. Quit the music and fluffy hands stuff for women's floor and just judge the skills.

When I watch women’s beam routines I honestly wish they’d let them stop the silly dance moves on beam. They clearly put them in because they have to, but they just look odd when they wave their arms around and take a few steps backwards and do a little hip jutt. Like they aren’t fooling anyone with their “dancing” and the athletes clearly can do amazing things on the beam. Making them wiggle around during their rest time between moves , or wiggle their hips as they transition to another part of the beam for their next move, is demeaning.

The Code of Points requires at least three dance elements (I believe), so they have to include them in their routines. The code also requires a level of artistry in the routines and permits deductions when the athlete is lacking.

Maybe they should change the name to technical gymnastics or sports gymnastics or similar. Over on a swimming forum, someone mistook the name "artistic gymnastics" as meaning "rhythmic gymnastics" (with the ribbons and hoops), and it's easy to see why because artistic gymnastics is all power and not much artistry these days. I'm not saying it's bad, just misnamed.

I was a synchro swimmer, which was renamed artistic swimming to the annoyance of many. That has also become very technical with dramatic throws and somersaults into the air. People who like the old ways have formed non competitive retro groups for performances because many people like an entertaining show more than watching overly thin women glaring and pretending to be spiders. https://www.foxsports.com.au/tokyo-olympics-2021/russian-spiders-at-the-olympics-are-absolutely-terrifying/news-story/8f519491b918d79e051d662ec5c8d701

[Anonymous]

If you think that we are all on here arguing about people not liking Simone Biles, you're just creating a straw man argument. Nobody is upset about that.

People are saying she is "not great", and that is OBJECTIVELY WRONG. There is an entire points rubric to explain why you're wrong. We are not debating your opinion with you, your opinion is not how gymnastics is scored. It's like me saying that Patrick Mahomes isn't great because I don't like the way he runs. I can say I don't like watching him, I prefer Tom Brady, he's not my favorite QB - fine. I can't say he's not great, and be correct. He is objectively and obviously a great quarterback.

If you don't like that Biles' style is being rewarded, and also seems to be becoming more widespread among other winning gymnasts, then you just don't like gymnastics as it exists today. Which is fine, nobody is holding you down to watch it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you think that we are all on here arguing about people not liking Simone Biles, you're just creating a straw man argument. Nobody is upset about that.

People are saying she is "not great", and that is OBJECTIVELY WRONG. There is an entire points rubric to explain why you're wrong. We are not debating your opinion with you, your opinion is not how gymnastics is scored. It's like me saying that Patrick Mahomes isn't great because I don't like the way he runs. I can say I don't like watching him, I prefer Tom Brady, he's not my favorite QB - fine. I can't say he's not great, and be correct. He is objectively and obviously a great quarterback.

If you don't like that Biles' style is being rewarded, and also seems to be becoming more widespread among other winning gymnasts, then you just don't like gymnastics as it exists today. Which is fine, nobody is holding you down to watch it.

This. The only opinions on this thread that are driving me bananas are the ones arguing that somehow Biles is screwing up or having a bad Olympics because of steps on certain landings or her "herky jerky" style. There are always opinions about how a gymnast moves. I don't know about the evening NBC coverage because I refuse to watch it (so bad) but the US commentators on the live afternoon feed have talked about how for instance many people prefer Rebecca Andrade's Cheng vault to Simone's because Andrade's is more elegant in the air with a cleaner landing. Andrade gets this incredible block off the vault and get amazing height and distance that allows her to stay straighter in the air and land with less of a pike in her legs. Simone also does a harder vault than the Cheng so she consistently scores higher than Andrade when she can land her vault (even if she takes a step and Andrade sticks the Cheng) but plenty of people have commented that they like the *look* of Andrade's vault more. And when Andrade and Simone both do a Cheng Andrade will score higher because her version is more technically perfect than Simone's.

But only a rube would try to argue that Andrade is a better gymnast overall than Simone because of this. I generally prefer the look and style of Andrade's gymnastics to Simone's but I understand that Simone consistently does skills that Andrade has never even attempted on vault and floor and she does them consistently and without major deductions. I love Rebecca Andrade but I am in awe of Simone Biles and have never thought she didn't deserve to win when she wins. And Andrade thinks so too! She's spent her whole life in this sport and she's never thrown a fit over the fact that Simone outscores her when she does *harder* skills. That's how the sport works.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you think that we are all on here arguing about people not liking Simone Biles, you're just creating a straw man argument. Nobody is upset about that.

People are saying she is "not great", and that is OBJECTIVELY WRONG. There is an entire points rubric to explain why you're wrong. We are not debating your opinion with you, your opinion is not how gymnastics is scored. It's like me saying that Patrick Mahomes isn't great because I don't like the way he runs. I can say I don't like watching him, I prefer Tom Brady, he's not my favorite QB - fine. I can't say he's not great, and be correct. He is objectively and obviously a great quarterback.

If you don't like that Biles' style is being rewarded, and also seems to be becoming more widespread among other winning gymnasts, then you just don't like gymnastics as it exists today. Which is fine, nobody is holding you down to watch it.

This. The only opinions on this thread that are driving me bananas are the ones arguing that somehow Biles is screwing up or having a bad Olympics because of steps on certain landings or her "herky jerky" style. There are always opinions about how a gymnast moves. I don't know about the evening NBC coverage because I refuse to watch it (so bad) but the US commentators on the live afternoon feed have talked about how for instance many people prefer Rebecca Andrade's Cheng vault to Simone's because Andrade's is more elegant in the air with a cleaner landing. Andrade gets this incredible block off the vault and get amazing height and distance that allows her to stay straighter in the air and land with less of a pike in her legs. Simone also does a harder vault than the Cheng so she consistently scores higher than Andrade when she can land her vault (even if she takes a step and Andrade sticks the Cheng) but plenty of people have commented that they like the *look* of Andrade's vault more. And when Andrade and Simone both do a Cheng Andrade will score higher because her version is more technically perfect than Simone's.

But only a rube would try to argue that Andrade is a better gymnast overall than Simone because of this. I generally prefer the look and style of Andrade's gymnastics to Simone's but I understand that Simone consistently does skills that Andrade has never even attempted on vault and floor and she does them consistently and without major deductions. I love Rebecca Andrade but I am in awe of Simone Biles and have never thought she didn't deserve to win when she wins. And Andrade thinks so too! She's spent her whole life in this sport and she's never thrown a fit over the fact that Simone outscores her when she does *harder* skills. That's how the sport works.

No one is debating. I have stated my observation. I am not looking to be convinced by you of anything so all this text you just typed, you are talking to yourself.