So, after eleven hours of watching women’s gymnastics and yelling at livestreams, the qualifying round has ended. The performances ranged all over the emotional spectrum, and I’m going to talk about them.
However, to minimize the volume of posts on my blog that aren’t about skating, I’m going to combine the recap with a preview for the event finals.
Vault
-Qualifiers: Biles, Hong, Steingruber, Paseka, Chusovitina, Olsen, Wang, Kamakar.
-This is my least favorite apparatus, so I really don’t have much to say on anyone else. I did like Andrade’s amanar, though.
-Biles is probably going to win due to the cleanliness and airiness of her vaults. However, since the past two vault title favorites fell in the final, I’m going to allow for the possibility of her screwing up.
-If Biles doesn’t win, I’d probably be happiest with Steingruber winning. Or Olsen, although that’s primarily because I like her.
-Why did Paseka use her Cheng for counting towards the team final score?
-Also, I really hope Kamakar doesn’t get injured on her Produnova. I’m not sure if it scares me as much as Yamilet Pena’s did in 2012, though.
-I also hope Chusovitina’s Produnova isn’t scary. I kind of want her to win a medal, just because that’d be awesome.
-It’d be cool if Hong and Steingruber debuted their TTY and front double twist in the final.
-Prediction: Biles/Hong/Steingruber
Bars
-Qualifiers: Kocian, Mustafina, Douglas, Spiridonova, Seitz, Scheder, Lopez, Shang.
-So, this was one of the two events I made predictions for. I thought that my fantasy UB podium was more realistic than my fantasy FX podium, since all three of the medalists would get into the final. I was wrong, since my predicted gold and silver medalists ended up as alternate 1 and alternate 2.
-I didn’t see Downie, but I saw Fan. I thought she was a bit slow, but I didn’t think she made any major mistakes. As for the other alternate, Derwael had a nice routine, and I think it was the first routine I saw that I liked.
-Shang’s release combinations are cool. I want more people to do release-heavy UB.
-Mustafina was awesome and I loved her routine. Spiridonova was very precise as well.
-I wasn’t expected Germany to qualify two people into this final, but congratulations on doing so. I didn’t see Scheder, but I saw Seitz. I liked her, but I wish she did her eponymous skill.
-As for the Americans, I thought Kocian did a fabrichnova and Douglas bored me. I was also trying to will them to bomb so Fan and Downie could get into the final. That didn’t work.
-Prediction: Mustafina/Kocian/Spiridonova
-Hope: Mustafina/Shang/Seitz
-Irrational Hope: Downie/Fan/Mustafina, after 2 people withdraw.
Beam
-Qualifiers: Biles, Hernandez, Saraiva, Wevers, Ponor, Fan, Boyer, Onyshko.
-Is it bad that I thought everyone’s leaps and ring leaps were ugly?
-Also, no one should be doing sit-spins in gymnastics. They’re all ugly.
-On another note, is it bad that I’ve never watched Boyer or Onyshko? (I’m mostly a casual gymfan…)
-And for non-finalists, Tutya Yilmaz’s beam was a nice surprise. I wanted her in the final, but third alternate isn’t that bad. (I also find it funny that all of the alternates have the same score.)
-I also liked Houry Gebeshian. She’s very confident. (I also like that she’s a registered nurse.)
-I also wonder what’d happen if only one American finished above Raisman and Douglas, since they were tied and had the same D and E scores. (How do tiebreakers work? Toss lowest E score and average?)
-I also really wanted to see Thorsdottir’s beam.
-Anyways, back to the beam finalists. Wevers’ routine was awesome, and I love how spinny it is. I also want her to do the Li Li. (Maybe with the Yurchenko loop. Or Danushia Francis’ sideways side aerial?)
-I missed Saraiva, but I liked her beam routine when I last saw it. I want her to medal at home.
-All of the Americans were really confident on beam. I liked that.
-Prediction: Biles/Hernandez/Wevers
-Hope: Wevers/Saraiva/Biles
Floor
-Qualifiers: Biles, Raisman, Ferrari, Steingruber, Wang, Tinkler, Murakami, Fasana.
-Is it bad that I thought the vast majority of floor routines were really boring?
-Also, I hope Catalina Escobar’s better and Ellie Downie isn’t severely injured…
-I really wish the stream I was using showed the Dutch floor routines instead of random people standing around doing nothing. I wanted to see Wevers and Thorsdottir (even though she fell…)
-Elisa Meneghini has a lot of energy. So do Laurie Hernandez and Flavia Saraiva.
-Andrade’s Beyonce routine was also enjoyable and I hope she gets the double tuck 1.5 named after her. And I want to see her do a Silivas.
-I feel like I should like Mustafina’s floor more than I do.
-Since I couldn’t find a stream for subdivision 5, I was stuck with a liveblog. Said liveblog mistakenly said that Olsen got a 14.533, and was in the final.
-As for the finalists, yay to Murakami for qualifying! I want her to be awesome.
-Wang is also really adorable and I liked her tumbling.
-Tinkler has nice tumbling, but she bores me to death. So does Raisman.
-Prediction: Biles/Raisman/Steingruber
-Hope: Murakami/Biles/Wang
Ramblings On Figure Skating 