Valentina Rodionenko told TASS that the preliminary Olympic training squads had been decided for both WAG and MAG. The squads will be preparing at Round Lake but the final decision regarding the Olympic teams will be made at the Russian Cup in June.
According to Rodionenko, for WAG, the list includes Anastasia Agafonova, Lilia Akhaimova, Yana Vorona, Elena Gerasimova, Angelina Melnikova, Vladislava Urazova, Aleksandra Shchekoldina, and Uliana Perebinosova. Notably absent are Elena Eremina who has been struggling to come back after surgery, Aliya Mustafina, who has been taking a break, and Angelina Simakova. Simakova was originally supposed to go to the Tokyo World Cup, so her absence is even more confusing. In addition, Rodionenko said that Maria Paseka, Daria Spiridonova, and Anastasia Ilyankova are not on the list because they are not all-arounders and will not be able to try out for a four-person team. Russian WAG gymnasts were not able to get enough points through the Apparatus World Cup series to qualify a nominative spot. Since the All-Around World Cup Series and the European Championships were canceled, it is not clear whether Russia will be able to get an additional non-nominative spot, as we do not yet know for sure how the spots will be redistributed.
Interestingly, Rodionenko said that Denis Abliazin who is also not an all-arounder is on the Olympic training squad for MAG. It seems that Abliazin should be in the same boat as Paseka, Spiridonova, and Ilyankova, as Russia currently does not have extra non-nominative spots for MAG either and Abliazin does not fit a four-person team.
According to Rodionenko, besides Abliazin, the following gymnasts are on the training squad for MAG: David Belyavskiy, Artur Dalaloyan, Nikita Nagornyy, Nikita Ignatyev, Ivan Stretovich, Vladislav Poliashov, Dmitri Lankin, Aleksey Rostov, Aleksandr Chicherov, Denis Yurov, Maksim Sinichkin, and Kirill Prokopev.
For some reason, the list for MAG includes 13 gymnasts while only 8 were announced for WAG. Vladislav Poliashov can potentially get a nominative spot through the Apparatus World Cup Series but the rest of the MAG gymnasts are competing for only four spots, same as WAG, so the discrepancy in numbers is unclear.
