GYMNASTICS 101

As you know by now, from my previous blogs, I will be following gymnastics during the Olympics, as I am a BIG fan! I’m pretty excited to see our Aussie newbies go up against the Russians, Romanians, Americans and Chinese. Before the events start, I thought it’ll be good to give a quick intro on this sport and what to expect during medal tally.

There are 4 apparatus for women’s Gymnastics, which are floor, vault, beam and uneven bars.

For each apparatus there are 1 head judge, 2 judges mark technical content, 6 judges mark execution. The highest and lowerst score of the 6 is discarded and the average taken for the remaining marks which are out of 10. Although there has been discussion about the new scoring system which may be introduced at the Olympics this year. It’s the new perfect score of 17!

Anyway, one preliminary round determines who qualifies for the 3 competitions (medals) - which are 1 team event, 1 all-round event and finals on each apparatus.

1. The top 8 Teams (countries) of 6 gymnasts each, of which only 3 team members competing on each apparatus.

2. The top 24 gymnasts from the preliminary round compete - with a maximum 2 competitors per country.

3. The top 8 gymnasts compete on each apparatus - with a maximum 2 competitors per country.

The floor exercise will consist of 70 secs of speed and agility to produce a sequence of jumps somersaults and twists.

As for the vault, well, just hope that the competitors don’t miss the spring board and run into it – head first. The vault has been replaced during 2001 and it’s now positioned differently to minimise any misses!

1min 30 secs on the balance beam, which is only 10cm wide!

And lastly, between 70 – 90 secs on the uneven bars.

Now that you’ve brushed up your Gymnastics 101, be sure to catch the exciting action!