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More news for the Olympic gymnast Dong Fangxiao 19 March 2010

Dong Used, perhaps abused and now tossed away. Chinese officials' treatment of Olympic gymnast Dong Fangxiao, found to have been underage when China fielded her at the Sydney Games in 2000, really makes the blood boil.
Despite China's official denials, accumulating evidence that Dong was just 14 when she competed on the team that won Olympic bronze now includes her personal CV, which says she was born Jan. 23, 1986.
That birth date means Dong was two years below the minimum age requirement of 16 at Sydney. The CV further undermines China's position that there is insufficient evidence to prove that Dong competed underage -- as the FIG, the international gymnastics federation, determined last month after a marathon investigation. The FIG annulled Dong's results and recommended that the International Olympic Committee strip China of its bronze medal. The FIG is hoping for an IOC decision in April.
Dong now lives in New Zealand with her husband. A gym club there wants to hire her as a coach and has applied for local government funding. The Waikato District Council published the funding request, including Dong's two-page CV, online to comply with New Zealand public transparency requirements.
Dong's opinions on the FIG ruling are not known. A friend in New Zealand, reached on Dong's mobile phone, said she has returned for a while to China. In China, media reports say she is refusing comment.
But the age ordeal seems to have presented a dilemma to the ex-gymnast whose promising career was abruptly cut short a year after Sydney by a crippling thighbone injury surely not helped by repeated painkilling injections reportedly given to her from 1998 onward when, according to the birth date on her CV, she was just 12.
Perhaps out of patriotic loyalty, to preserve her Olympic bronze or to spare embarrassment for Chinese officials who trained her as a gymnast from childhood, Dong tried with the FIG to hew to the party line that she was born in 1983 and thus was eligible in Sydney even while other documents, including her CV, indicate that is untrue.
At an FIG hearing in December, Dong said she was born in 1983 but produced a passport that gave her birthdate in 1986, federation officials say.
Yet while Dong has seemingly sought to keep up appearances, she is now being left out in the cold in China, where the top gymnastics administrator is trying to wriggle out of FIG and IOC sanction by shifting blame onto Dong.
The state-run newspaper China Youth Daily quoted Luo Chaoyi as saying that Dong was eligible in Sydney but then shaved three years off her age after retirement in 2001, and that "this must have been an act by her and her family."
Such an explanation is barely credible -- unless, of course, Dong is a master forger of official documents, which is even less believable. In China, as elsewhere, passports are government-issued. Coaches -- and not just in China -- have also long falsified ages for girls whose small and supple bodies give them a competitive advantage over larger and older young women. The reverse scenario -- that a retired gymnast would pass herself off as a kid -- makes no sense.
It also beggars belief that Chinese officials could not have known that Dong was underage in 2000. Most of Dong's childhood was spent within the state-run sports system that churns out medalists for China. Her CV shows she joined a sports school at age 4, a provincial team at 7 and the national team at 10. The regimen in such teams can be so tough that wealthier Chinese parents are now steering their children away from organized sports and Chinese media have been increasingly critical of sausage-factory training methods.
"If we did some of the things that they do I would be put in jail, quite literally," the FIG's chief scientific officer, former Canadian national coach Keith Russell, told The Associated Press, speaking of Chinese coaches. They can be "pretty severe," he added.
The repeated use of painkilling injections on Dong from a young age was reported by Chinese sports columnist Li Jun after he visited her at home in the northern city of Tangshan when she was convalescing in 2002 from multiple surgeries for what Chinese media widely identified as thighbone necrosis, or bone death. Starved of blood, the bone goes soft and chalky and, in late stages of the condition, eventually collapses. Overly intense athletic training and steroid use can both be causes.
"With any of these necrosis things, usually the joint has been hammered too much," says Russell.
Li reported on Sina.com, China's largest Internet portal, that Dong got her first injection after thigh pain started as a national squad member in 1998, that she was injected three or four more times in subsequent years and in March 2001 received two injections in three days. Li, speaking by phone to the AP, wasn't sure exactly what drugs were administered. Doctors say that if necrosis was setting in, Dong should simply have been rested.
"I don't know what the injections were but masking pain is always dangerous and especially dangerous in children," says Russell.
In May 2001, Dong got five golds at the East Asian Games in Japan and another two at the University Games three months later. Her last competition of 2001 and, it turned out, her last ever, was China's National Games, where she competed even though she told officials she was in pain.
"I felt pain even during sleep. I woke up because of the pain," Dong told Chinese online video broadcaster ewang.com in 2003. "There were doctors with me all the time ... They just gave me treatment, normally acupuncture, massage and whatnot."
Within the sport, there are those who say it might be wiser if gymnastics simply scrapped its difficult-to-enforce age limits that were introduced to prevent overly young and fragile girls from being thrust too soon into elite competition by impatient, overambitious coaches.

By John Leicester, AP Sports Columnist
John Leicester is an international sports columnist for The Associated Press. Write to him at jleicester(at)ap.org.

Article

Written by: Anis Saoud

Second day Apparatus Final: Junior ART & TRA Asian Championships 2010 16 March 2010

wag_apparatus final_aj2010 Tokyo March 15, 2010: The last day competition give us the following results:
Men's Vault Final
Korea's YANG Hak Seon performed two 7.0 difficulty vaults to win the gold medal. He vaulted YEO II for the first attempt and showed a clean landing. The second vault, Lopez, was not his best, sitting down in his landing but high D scores were enough to give him the gold. Mongolian Erdnebold GANBAT showed the best Roche for the first vault and performd a clean Kasamatsu-full to come to the second. This meda is the first medal for Mongol in the championship history! The biggest moment not only for Mongol but also the championshis. Japan's Makoto Fukuo hit his Driggs for his first vault but missed the landing for the second vault (layout Cuervo) to drop to the third.
Men's Parallel Bars Final
China's ZHOU Shixiong had an awesome set of dificulties; Teng Haibin, Giant Diamidov with 1/4 turn; peach half, peach, peach full; Healy. He dismounted with something dissapointing, simple full twisting back, but the routine deserved the gold. Japan's duo, Sho Yokoyama and Shogo Nonomura, were very solid sticking the landing. Yokyama had a clean execution throughout the routine to enter second.. Nonomura was a little nervous in healy but the rest of the routine was good enough for a bronze.
Men's Horizontal Bar Final
The finalists did not have any Kolman or Kovacs which would be a crowd favorite, so the execution was a key to decide a medal. The first competitor, ZHOU Xaiodong of China, was the most consistent: Adler half to layout Tkachev; Tkachev; stalder full to mixed grip; Endo full to mixed grip; giant full to mixed grip; layout double double dismount. He kept the first place and took his second gold medal. Bae Ga Ram of Korea had excellent el-grip elements such as Rybalko, Endo full to el grip, giant full to el-grip, el-grip Endo and won the silver medal. Shunta Kitagawa missed his Adler-full and had two big steps forward and grabbed only the bronze medal.
Women's Balance Beam Final
Tan Sixin of China showed her excellent execution and difficult routine; ff, two foot ff, layout back, Korbut; switch ring leap; tucked punch front; front aerial to sheep jump; piked side somi; ff, two foot ff, two and a half twist dismount. She missed some connections at the qualification but today she wobbled only in switch ring jump. She absolutely deserved the gold. Japan's Teramoto took her third medal placing second. Her dismount, triple twist, was just amazingly stuck.
The final saw a lot of falls from many gymnasts but Uzbekistan's Abdusalimova had a solid execution except a balance check after layout back to take a bronze, the first medal for Uzbekistan.
Women's Floor Final
Japanese gymnasts came to the final as the first and the last performer respectively, and showed the most difficult routines. The last performer, Risa Konishi had very strong tumbling pass: tucked full-in; double twisting front; Y-scale turn; two and a half twist to layout front; triple twist dismount. She made the most use of her body and the execution was very gorgeous to win the gold with a big margin. Another Japanese and the first performer, Mai Murakami, had the most difficult set; tucked double-double; double twisting punch layout front to punch tucked front (that was supporsed to be layout), piked doube; triple twist dismount. She entered third after all next to China's TAN Sixin, who went out of bounds in her dismount. TAN's choreography was very eye-catching and had a strong body line.
Men's TRA Final
Male Trampoline Final held today. All gymnasts looked like very good condition and they would take good performances.
1st group, AL-HOMADI Abdulla (QAT) and SITKIN Pavel(UZB) interrupted. ZAMANBEKOV Akzhol (KAZ) became 1st and 2nd JONIBEKOVE Husanboy (UZB) at that time.
2nd group, MUNETOMO Ginga (JPN), he took his performance with small moving deductions and marked 37.6. KATO takahiko (JPN), he was moving sometime but he recovered and marked his score 36.8. HE Yuxaing who was 2nd place at qualification showed high jump, very good opening somersaults and keeping. He marked E score 26.1 total 39.8. Next CHENG Heopeng who was 1st place at qualification took very good performances but he was moving sometime.
As a result, 1st HE Yuxaing (CHN), 2nd CHENG Heopeng (CHN), 3rd MUNETOMO Ginga (JPN) and 4th KATO takahiko (JPN).
This competition was first time Asia junior competition for All Federation of Asian Trampoline. We recognized strength of Chinese Trampoline gymnast again. However that important thing is that other countries including Japan are catching up Chinese gymnasts. We believe that is very important thing for step up all Asian Trampoline gymnasts.
Finally, we praise all of gymnasts' good performances. And we appreciate this opportunity to held 2010 Asia Junior competition.

TRA_men final_aj2010

Attachments:
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Written by: Anis Saoud

Apparatus Finals: First day - Juniors ART & TRA Asian Championships 2010 16 March 2010

mag_apparatus final_aj2010 Tokyo March 15, 2010: organised the first part of the Apparatus finals

Men's Floor Final
China's ZHU Xiaodong started today's final with very beautiful execution. He mounted with double twisting layout front and he continued to two combinations: one and a half twisting back to layout front; two and a half twisting back to tucked barani. His highlight was the dismount, triple twist, with stuck landing. He kept the lead till the end and won this event.
The last performer, Nonomura, performed very clean routine but the landing of the dismount of tripe twist kept him away from the gold. Korea's Park Eo Jin showed the highest somersault in each tumbling pass but a little nervous execution did not bring him other than a bronze medal.

Women's Balance Beam Final
Tan Sixin of China showed her excellent execution and difficult routine; ff, two foot ff, layout back, Korbut; switch ring leap; tucked punch front; front aerial to sheep jump; piked side somi; ff, two foot ff, two and a half twist dismount. She missed some connections at the qualification but today she wobbled only in switch ring jump. She absolutely deserved the gold. Japan's Teramoto took her third medal placing second. Her dismount, triple twist, was just amazingly stuck.
The final saw a lot of falls from many gymnasts but Uzbekistan's Abdusalimova had a solid execution except a balance check after layout back to take a bronze, the first medal for Uzbekistan.

Men's Pommel Horse Final
The top qualifier, Japan's Sho Yokoyama, performed his good routine with an excellent execution throughout the routine: scisors half turn with hop, E-flop, D combined elements; Sivado; 5/4 twisting reversed kehre with 3/3 travel. He won this event with 0.6 margin.
Korea's BAE Ga Ram and PARK Eo Jin entered second and third respectively. The minor execution errors cost them to catch up with Yokoyama. China's ZHOU Shixiong fell and missed a medal even though he had a difficult set of elements.

Women's Uneven Bars Final
Tan Sixin of China performed the excellent routine; front giant with one and a half pirouette to Tkachev; front giant with full pirouette on one hand to el grip, el grip Jaeger; Park; El grip giant to tucked double front dismount. She won the second gold medal for China. The last performer, Asuka Teramoto of Japan, performed very clean routine sticking her double front dismount. She had an EXTRA giant between Stalder full to bail to handstand on low bar that cost her a gold medal. (TAN and Teramoto had the same D scores. ) Another Chinese, CHEN Shihua, touched low bar with her foot while giant with blind turn. She might have the biggest chance to win this event but dropped to the third place.

Men's Rings Final
The only gymnast who had Planche (E skill) in his routine, Korea's YANG Hak Seon, was very strong as well as in the qualification. He had kip to Maltese, Azarian, and Matese in the beginning of the routine. The dismount was a little weak tucked full-in but it was enough to give him a gold, which was the first gold medal for Korea. ZHU Xiaodong performed three type of Yamawaki (layout, piked, and tucked) and dismounted with layout full-in to enter second. Japan's Yokoyama had a hop in his landing that cost him a gold or a silver by a small margin but grabbed a bronze medal.

Women's TRA Final

We held female final today.
As same as qualification, we expected the result "China led and Kazakhstan fights over 3rd place against Japan". When 4 gymnast finished their performance, Chisato　DOIHATA (JPN) marked 24.3 at E score (more than 2nd
routine E score at qualification ) and she became 1st at that time.
Next Chinese gymnast took their performances, but LIU Lingling who was 2nd
of qualification interrupted and only counted 6 elements. And Dong Yu, 1st
of qualification, she showed excellent performance as same as qualification
and marked 38.5 of total score.

The result was 1st DONG Yu, 2nd Chisato DOIHATA and 3rd Miyu YOSHIMURA.
YOSHIMURA showed very good performance and she got bronze medal.
A Japanese player who reached the finals demonstrated own in good tension
and was able to finish the women's final of the 1st junior Asian
championship safely.

Result
1-　DONG, Yu（CHN） 38.5
2-　Chisato DOIHATA（JPN）34.4
3-　Miyu YOSHIMURA（JPN）　33.3
4-　YEGIZKARAVE、, Assel（KAZ）　33.3
5-　NOVIKOVA, Yekaterina（KAZ）　32.2
6-　LIU, Lingling（CHN） 18.5

Attachments:
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