European Championships 2017: Podium training non-disaster

The podium training today was extremely short on disasters, I'm not sure how to feel about it. Russia is supposed to be awful in podium training, be generally lazy and sloppy with no full routines and something like 5 falls for each gymnast on every apparatus, but maybe the newbies haven't gotten the memo. Then again, Beefarm didn't feel like looking like shit either, and she's a hardcore veteran.

Maria Paseka pretty much rose from the dead to get Russia a gold medal. I don't know how she keeps doing stuff like this, but thank you, Masha. She looked tired and was taped all over, but that didn't stop her from obliterating the competition. She started with the lowly amateur stuff, a high and easy DTY and a lopez, and then moved onto the real deal, an amanar and a cheng. Her amanar had a very deep landing (like in Rio team finals) and the cheng was lightly spotted, but both were easily around. It's the post-Olympic Euros and everybody kind of sucks (plus Giulia Steingruber isn't back), so she doesn't really need her difficult vaults to win, but whatever.

Elena Eremina did her DTY too, but it wasn't much improved. Still, it was just as good (or bad) as her 1.5, so there's really nothing to lose by getting those extra tenths in difficulty. She looked like she was twisting pretty heavily on her left knee during landing though, so that slightly worries me. Her bars looked excellent, mostly because she has gotten rid of those numerous extra giants and is actually making her connections. Finally. The nabs has seen better days and she went for the layout jeager, but it's not going to get credited like that. Beam actually worries me the most, because she looked really, really steady, the triple is back too. But I just feel like she hit the perfect routine already and now there's nowhere to go but down. Somehow I'd feel safer if she fell a few times. Floor was as usual, they have kept the double tuck as her last pass after the Stuttgart disaster.

Natalia Kapitonova did her low FTY on vault, nothing surprising there. She and Melka were in the same rotation as Larisa Iordache, who kept hitting perfect set after set on bars on bars while Melka and Kapi looked on from the comfortable neutral zone of the chalk bucket. I'd be scared if I was them, it would be embarrassing to lose the UB title to a Romanian, even if said Romanian was Lari at her home Euros. Nina Derwael is also going for that UB gold. Kapi was clean and crisp, hitting a few sets, one of them with the Komova II+pak+chow 1/2 connection. I'm not sure if it's worth it though. On beam she was really hesitant and careful, everything lacked amplitude and finesse. She fell on a side somi, but went again and hit it the second time. And that was it for her on beam, half of a routine with one element twice. Okay then. Remember those five seconds after nationals when I almost liked Kapi on beam? Ha. Meanwhile Cata and Lari were hitting set after set, both were still up on beam when everyone else was sitting around waiting for the next rotation to start. On floor she sat down the 5/2+1/1 and had hands down on her last pass, even though Starkin was spotting her. A typical Russian. She came back though and did several tumbling passes, presumably trying to get the combination line sorted out, but we didn't see any of it. Instead, the camera kept zooming in on Cata laboriously breathing and then showing slow motion of the laborious breathing, paired with some double pikes afterwards.

Angelina Melnikova was low on vault as she has been all season. She was working extra hard on bars though, she kept drilling her jaeger and dismount combos and was one of the last gymnasts to leave. She missed the jaeger on her first full set, but hit it every time after that. She had some of her usual pirouette trouble too, but didn't give up on that either. I really feel for her, she seemed like she was working hard trying to perfect everything and I just want everything good for her. Please, please do good. On beam Melka and Cata were talking to each other during warm ups, I guess Melka speaks some English? She was beautiful and super steady, and didn't have any difficulties save for that cursed layout. There's no hope for that one, I wish they'd just take it out. Maybe switch it to a back tuck like Aliya in 2012. It was ridiculous, but she stayed on. We didn't get to see her go up again, because they showed slow motion replays of Cata's perfect beam routine. Probably better that way. On floor her first spin combo looked gorgeous, but she still can't seem to find the landing on that double arabian, just flying out of bounds as usual. She had a spot for the double layout, but the rest of her tumbling was fine, ending with an overrotated double pike.

So everyone looked pretty much as usual during the podium training, which was weird. As I said in the beginning, I'm not sure how to feel about it. It was a relief, but still underwhelming, because I was prepared for the worst but still hoping for a miracle. And there was neither a disaster nor a miracle. Unless you count that excellent podium training livestream as a miracle, which you could.

I'm going to be at work during the first subdivisions of qualifications, but I think I'll be able to make it back home to see Melka and Kapi embarrass themselves in front of Cata, Lari and an arena full of Romanians cheering for them. See you then.