Russian Championships 2017: At least it's over now

I think I ended yesterday's post with "Let's hope that tomorrow won't ruin my good mood." so naturally it had to happen. Day 2 of the event finals was another day of falls after falls. It was pretty much what I expected on beam, but I was still hoping that they'd surprise me positively, like they did on bars. But no such luck.
Balance beam was really close with basically everyone getting scores in the low 13s. The group was divided in two, people who had difficult routines and fell, and people who hit their easier routines. The podium represented this divide too, Seda Tutkhalyan (difficult routine and a fall) and Viktoria Trykina (easy, but hit routine) tied for the gold. Angelina Melnikova (difficult routine and a fall) and Anastasia Dmitrieva (easier, but no big mistakes) tied for second. They broke the tie somehow with the bronze medal and Melka was the only one on the podium.

Seda fell on the full again. That's 3/3 times during nationals. The rest of her routine was really steady with no balance checks beyond the new mount and a shaky double wolf turn. She was still overscored though. Trykina had one major break, but was otherwise pretty clean, just lacking confidence. Now that I compare these routines side to side, the maturity that Seda has is obvious. She doesn't question herself, just moves on quickly and is pretty good at hiding her mistakes, like with the mount. If you're wondering about what's the point of these musings, there isn't one. It's just fascinating to see these two routines tie for gold. Nerves of a first year senior vs. mistakes with maturity.

Melka won bronze with a pretty good routine. She fell on the grigoras and her wolf turn was as bad as ever (I don't know why she doesn't just do a double wolf, it's the same value), but the rest of her routine didn't actually have any problems. She just has this aura of someone who's given up. And they really haven't trained landing dismounts, because she's stiff-legging everything. I know they want to avoid injury with soft landings, but this is not the way to go either.

Dmitrieva (who first tied with Melka but then suddenly didn't) wobbled after every skill but didn't fall. Evgenia Shelgunova was as confident as ever and made it through her routine without any major errors until the dismount. She landed with her head near her ankles, but somehow stood it up like nothing happened. Confidence. Daria Spiridonova managed to make it through her routine confidently too, only wobbling on some spins until pretty much hitting her head on the mat on her dismount. Conditioning. Lilia Akhaimova was solid, but Lena came off during her opening series. The rest of her routine was very good and I feel like her jumps have improved a bit, but the triple dismount was low and still slightly underrated.

Balance Beam: 1. Seda Tutkhalyan and Viktoria Trykina 3. Angelina Melnikova

Floor wasn't quite as bad as I thought it would be, which is nice, I think.

Lilia Akhaimova won by default, because she's the only one who can even make it through a floor routine with their lungs intact. Her tumbling is nice and high, but the rest is 'meh'. It's almost insulting to her tumbling, how little effort everything else shows. And it's not Lilia's fault. Firstly, she doesn't really have big enough presence to pull off her music. This can maybe be worked on. She's not a dancer, but most gymnasts aren't dancers and they can still make their floor routines work with proper choreography and style. She was given neither. The style doesn't suit her and the choreography is some leftover bits from other NT routines. I think they should try something like Aly Raisman's routines. Something energetic to show off her tumbling and quicker, more upbeat dance that relies on energy and attitude less than proper movement. I feel like I'm being really, really harsh, but a lot of it is frustration over the fact that she has potential for much more than this. If she's in the A-team now, don't make her do B-Team routines.

Lena was second and managed to hit her third floor routine in a row at this competition (if I didn't forget any disasters), amazing from a Russian. I still don't like this routine as much as her previous one, but it's not bad either. And I love that the team has brought dramatic floor entrances back. Her semenova is good too, but the triple twist at the end kind of lowers the overall impression of the routine.

Seda was the surprise of the day with her bronze medal. After winning gold on beam despite a fall, she picked herself up and performed her best floor routine of the year. That doesn't mean a lot, but I was really shocked. First of all, she actually stuck her double layout. Then she somehow didn't fall on her ass during that second pass after overrotating the 5/2. Her third pass was fine too, and then she actually HIT HER TRIPLE WOLF TURN. That has never, ever happened. I just...no words. And she ended with a nice double pike. Her chest was high enough not to take a huge deduction, just a big bounce back and not even out of bounds. I have no idea what happened. And I think she was actually scored a bit harshly compared to the others. Of course it took her 4 days to finally hit a decent routine, but I'm happy she got there.

Elizaveta Kochetkova unfortunately had something akin to a meltdown. Natalia Kapitonova continued her great streak of hit routines, but had some low landings. And Melka.... She fell twice and saluted out of bounds. Let's leave it at that.

Floor Exercise: 1. Lilia Akhaimova 2. Elena Eremina 3. Seda Tutkhalyan

So it wasn't as good of a day as yesterday. You know beam is bad when 2/3 podium, including a gold medalist fell. And floor has been an issue for quite some time, and it looks like it will continue to be an issue. If we absolutely have to find something positive, their depth on floor is two gymnasts better than last year, Lilia and Lena. One, if you count losing Aliya. (I don't count Lilia to their floor workers last year, because she really wasn't in contention for any teams.)

Something to make you feel a bit better about this meet: The performances at the American Cup weren't any good either. The struggles of a new quad.
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Links:
Full results are HERE.
More videos HERE.