Random Gymnastics Talk
I feel for Komova. This was supposed to be HER Olympics and it's been big ball of suck for her. Yes, she earned a silver (you don't win medals at the Olympics, you earn them). But, in her mind, she fell short. Just didn't measure up. On her other events she fell out of the medals and today on beam she came in dead last. Yes, it's a huge honor just to make it to event finals. But she demands so much better of herself. Some have called her a "brat" and "unsportsmanlike" for her reactions. Those people need to lay off. She's a teenager for crying out loud.
For this same reason I feel for Weiber. She's been playing the part of supportive team player well, but this wasn't the event where she expected to do so. Being immediately thrust into that role on an international stage is a lot to ask a 17 year old. She's done a damned fine job of it.
I'm happy for Mustafina, Douglas and Raisman. OMG Raisman! I'm so looking forward to floor ex tonight and beam tonight! After a disappointing finish outside of the medals, girl came back and shoved those routines in everyone's faces. Amazing. And I'm happy Mustafina is finally getting the recognition she deserves. She gets a lot of grief for her smile-less game-face. But under that the woman's a rock. While Komova melted Mustafina stepped into the limelight and shined brightest. Gymnastics isn't fair. It's difficult. And it takes no prisoners. Let that get to you and there's no one to drag you back. Mustafina did that herself after coming back from injury. She earned this. And Douglas is just awesome. She also earned this. Good for her! :-)
The men have been doing very well in spite of all this "disappointment" talk. I think that perhaps going into the team finals in first place bolstered expectations WAY too much. Some of the big players on the other teams had awful nights while the US men stuck routines. When those scores were dropped and the others were given a do-over things evened out. The US men are there. Leyva earned a bronze with an amazing AA showing. Orozco has not been having a good meet and, as with Komova and Wieber, I feel for him. It's that much worse when there's a billion people watching. BUT the US men did make event finals and, excluding pommel horse, had a darned good showing. Their scores are good, even if they're not on the podium.
And about the hair talk: I don't have a twitter account so I didn't see what was said over there. I do follow gymnastics blogs and news sites. Over in the gym-sites people were talking about all of the women's gymnasts' hair. Not just Douglas. Specifically they were calling the half-bun messy and unkempt.
For example, we've got Nastia Liukin at Olympic Trials (on the right - that's Martha Karolyi on the left). Her hair really did look like this during the entire course of multi-day competition (she had a horrible meet, didn't qualify for the Olympic Team and was justifiably upset):
New York Mag even made a slideshow of the hair styles from the Olympics in their style section.
The reason people are reacting to this, specifically gymnasts, is that there is something called an appearance deduction. The rules state all gymnasts must have a "neat and proper athletic appearance" [I'm not sure how to link a pdf from my laptop to here]. The idea that any elite level gymnast would risk the duduction at The Olympics is astounding to those who are familiar with the sport. If you notice they go through a lot of effort with makeup, clothing selections (each team dresses in the same clothes - even when they're not competing) and even leotard selection. They know they're being watched by a billion people. The notion that they prepped for the biggest meet of their lives and deliberately did so in a sloppy or careless manner is shocking. If anyone called Douglas, specifically, out on this without including the others, that's unacceptable. The slideshow above shows that she's hardly alone in this.
And while some might say that the women are being unfairly targeted, you should read what's being said about the Chilean men's gymnast. And his mustache (the link contains a "spoiler" and lots of ads). There's the men's gymnast for Great Britain that's gotten press over his tattoos and unusual choice in hair style. The US Men's Gymnastics team is being called the "hottest team on the planet", at the same time people are unfairly calling them "disappointments" for not achieving more medals.
The point is that there are a lot of "different" people on twitter. Spanny reports that a lot of them are talking about gymnastics as well. She only covers women's gymnastics, but I've been seeing reports of similar weirdness about the men too. Olympic athletes are on a worldwide stage so people will talk about every last little detail. Why? Because they aren't training for an Olympics themselves and have the time and boredom to do it. The hair was trending because it was the most obvious thing and applied to a number of very high profile athletes. The good news is that everyone will forget about this in a month. And the athletes involved will still be super-human, comic-book-hero-style bad asses who made history.