Round Lake Update

Spring is here! It's still occasionally snowing where I live, but whatever. I hate spring so I don't know why I'm excited, but for some reason I'm just ready to leave winter behind for awhile at least.

There hasn't been much going on in the world of Russian gymnastics during the past few weeks, but the next ones should be very busy. A team of Ulyana Perebinosova, Eleonora Afanasyeva, Anastasia Ilyankova, Angelina Melnikova, Daria Belousova, Elena Gerasimova, Vladislava Urazova and Ksenia Klimenko is already in Italy for Trofeo Citta' di Jesolo and Nationals will be held right after they return. We also heard that Aliya Mustafina should compete at the Osijek World Cup at the end of May. All hail the Queen. Both Aliya and Valetina Rodionenko have agreed that she's motivated and in a competitive mindset.

The federation released some promotional training footage and interviews for Nationals, nothing terribly interesting.

Round Lake Update: Rumor has it

This is all from my wild and speculative tumblr dash, the sources range from the gymnasts' instagrams to pure fan speculation, so don't take anything too seriously. But let's go over some recent rumors. The topics include injuries, returns and the Queen's marriage.

The one and only Ksenia Afanasyeva is back at Round Lake. The source is Angelina Melnikova, so I'm pretty sure this is true, but to what extent? Is she BACK back, or just visiting for fun? I have a hard time believing that she's fully training, which she needs to be if she's at Round Lake. I don't have a hard time thinking that she's training, but usually gymnasts come back from injuries (and retirement) by training at home and after awhile and only when they're super serious, they go back to Round Lake for evaluation and begin training there if they're far enough in their recovery. Even the veterans like Afan do it like this. Aliya did it like this and Afan has done it several times in the past. If she's back, she has been super sneaky about it. There's of course the complication that Afan's coach is a part of the staff and has a personal gymnast at Round Lake, so she could be forced to return early. I don't know. But I'm excited.

Round Lake Update: upgrades and injuries on beam

Russian Gymnastics Federation posted some training footage of the gymnasts on their instagram account. Most of it was obviously about their biggest start Aliya Mustafina, but we saw glimpses of Maria Kharenkova, Elena Eremina and Anastasia Ilyankova too. We even saw a few skills form Aliya and Masha, but the rest was only choreography and warm-ups.

Бревно - самый коварный вид женского гимнастического многоборья!🤸🏼‍♀️ ▫️▫️▫️ Уделим ему особое внимание☝🏻😈 вместе с @musaliya135 @heleneremina @nastyailyankova @hariys98 ▫️▫️▫️ Enjoy❤️ #toprusgym

Henkilön Top Russian Gymnastics (@toprusgym) jakama julkaisu Helmi 1, 2018 kello 7.16 PST