This month, for the first time, men participated in the Junior Russian Rhythmic Gymnastics Championships (you can watch their routines in the video below). Irina Viner has been championing the development of men’s gymnastics and a few years ago boys officially started training in RG gyms in several Russian regions. For Viner, the development of men’s rhythmic gymnastics is likely the way to save RG as an Olympic sport. The IOC is trying to achieve gender parity at the Games and they are unlikely to allow a sport that is available to only one gender to be a part of the Games for much longer.
Rhythmic gymnastics is extremely popular in Russia, much more so than artistic gymnastics, and a big part of this popularity is that rhythmic gymnasts conform to the image of femininity prized in the modern Russian culture – a tall, thin, dainty woman in pretty make-up and sparkles. Of course, rhythmic gymnasts are powerful and have great endurance but spectators do not see the daily hours of training, they see pretty movements and sparkly leotards. Female artistic gymnasts, on the other hand, are considered to be to masculine due to more visible muscles and especially due to their muscular arms.
That rigid view of femininity comes together with toxic masculinity and the news of men entering a sport associated with femininity were not met with enthusiasm. Many celebrities and politicians expressed their [negative] views on the matter to the media and many regular people followed on various social networks.
Aleksandr Buklov, a world champion in men’s rhythmic gymnastics, is currently working as a men RG coach and is part of the effort to develop the sport in Russia. He was interviewed by Russian GQ ahead of the nationals and talked about the difficulties the sport is facing in Russia.
Before you get to the interview, here’s a little crossover of two sports – Aleksandr Buklov is performing with Seda Tutkhalian at the annual Alexey Nemov’s show in 2019.
Q: Why do you think the name “men’s rhythmic gymnastics” will scare people away?
A: Because people have a very interesting flow of associations, they immediately imagine men in leotards doing women’s elements. That is also being done – by the Spanish school. They even wrote to me: “You know, it’s us who’s doing rhythmic gymnastics, while you’re doing something else”. I think that from the physiological point of view, men can’t compete against women. It would be like watching a boxing match between a man and a woman – you know who’s going to win, right? Girls are more flexible but men are stronger and have more endurance. They can’t compete against each other and judging of that can’t be objective. But there is another school [of men’s rhythmic gymnastics] – the Japanese one. That’s where men’s rhythmic gymnastics originated.
Q: How did rhythmic gymnastics divide into Spanish and Japanese schools?
A: In 2005, after the World Championships in Japan, there was an international men’s competition and the media started talking about it. There were athletes from different countries and this pushed the Spanish to start doing men’s rhythmic gymnastics while adhering to their own view of the sport. They didn’t come up with new rules for the sport and it started developing fast. Because how does it usually go [in Russia]? For every new sport, you have to come up with codified rules, the judging system, the system of levels, the federal standard in which everything is codified starting from the equipment and ending with requirements to move from level to level – we’re not coaching kids at random. For them to progress, there is a certain system with set amounts of hours a year at each age, with levels and training plans. It’s practically scientific work to create a sport. But the Spanish just copied what the girls had. I won’t say anything that’s not politically correct about this but after the Spanish [started their sport], the attitudes towards rhythmic gymnastics became polarized. Some are saying “actually, that’s really cool that boys are doing the same thing as girls and look like girls”. And some say the opposite: “Ew, it’s gross”. So, there it is. Even in our country, many did not understand that we’re supporting the Japanese initiative because it’s the one that reflects characteristics of men’s physiology – strength, endurance, coordination, and power.
Q: From the esthetic point of view, do you cringe from the Spanish version of rhythmic gymnastics?
A: What kind of questions it is – do I cringe or not? You understand that we live in the 21st century and it all has the right to exist both legally and ethically.
Q: I’m asking because you used the words “not politically correct” when you talked about the Spanish school.
A: See, I’m a very accepting person, I’m not close-minded, I see a bit further than the tip of my nose. I understand that if a person wants to do something, they cannot be prohibited. Right? If it’s legal. How can I say something [about the Spanish]? What they do is difficult. But if we’re judging objectively, their version of rhythmic gymnastics goes against the physical capabilities of boys and men. It’s as if an elephant felt he was a sparrow; this can also seem not politically correct. But they’re forcing themselves to do things that are natural for female bodies. Perhaps, it’s sexism and someone will accuse me of it but I think that in every sport – and you can even see it in the Olympic rules – men should not compete with women.
Q: When did the management of the Russian national rhythmic gymnastic federation start thinking about including men?
A: In 2005. But, perhaps, Irina Alexandrovna thought about it before as well because she and the girls flew to Japan all the time and the sport exists and develops there since the 1980s. Like in the US every college has a baseball team and a cheerleading team, in Japan, there’s baseball and rhythmic gymnastics. You’d think Japan is a small country, they don’t have much space, but every college has a rhythmic gymnastics gym with a permanent gymnastics floor, it’s not rolled and unrolled constantly like here. In Russia, there are still difficulties for our sport, there aren’t enough gyms. Irina Aleksandrovna is working hard, attracting all sorts of investors for building new facilities. But since there aren’t that many boys in the sport yet, they can’t build a gym just for us. But we’ll start slowly, with a floor at some gym, with recruiting kids to some classes. The Japanese are doing a great job, though, they’ve had the facilities for a long time.
Q: How did rhythmic gymnastics enter your life?
A: I was a Master of Sports in artistic gymnastics when Irina Alexandrovna started asking around in Russian regions because Japan planned a big international competition. And it was necessary to prepare someone extremely quickly. There was no point in recruiting little kids, she needed a ready athlete with a certain level of flexibility and a number of acrobatic skills. I checked all the boxes. She first gave the task to the federation president in Samara region and they turned to my coach. He was generally not against it and neither was I. At first, I was surprised because, like everyone else, I didn’t know such a sport existed. But I agreed to the experiment – at the same time, I wanted to move away from Samara.
Q: And you came to the training center in Novogorsk? [ the national RG training center]
A: No, I came to the pre-Olympic training center in Moscow.
Q: Who worked with you in Moscow?
A: I worked with a Japanese coach who was invited from Tokyo. Irina Aleksandrovna invited him. At the same time, rhythmic gymnastics classes for boys started in Petrozavodsk and Moscow.
Q: How many programs for boys exist now in the country?
A: We have ten regions doing that and a few more are working under the umbrella of “general gymnastics” in order not to scare people away. This is our strategy – we are afraid to scare people away with the name. It’s ok because people need to be prepared for the new sport slowly. But the sport is slowed down not just by people’s attitudes but by the lack of facilities as well. For example, in Petrozavodsk, male rhythmic gymnasts were thrown out of all the gyms because there was no federal standard and they couldn’t officially open a department for boys at the Olympic Reserve school. There are audits everywhere, all the documents should be in top shape, there should be purchases, salaries and so on. Everything is new and unclear and school managers try to wave our sport away. But in practice, our sport is an official part of the national federation now and regional federations are not allowed to ignore it. Basically, those who do not open men’s clubs are breaking the rules and it’s being ignored. I don’t raise this issue for now because many people will be punished. It’s as if regional federation managers only developed women’s artistic gymnastics and not the men’s. Can you imagine?
Q: Do you have an action plan?
A: After getting used to our organizations, I understand that you can’t force people to do something from the top down, just knock on their heads and make everything work. That’s not how it works, we have to start from the ground up. We are capable of it. We have to find volunteers and plant seeds in the regions. Some are eager to work with us and boys from those regions competed at the Russian championships. That was also how the group routines started in our country. At first, people waved it off, there was no time, girls were selected for group routines a week before the competition but the priority was always individual competitions. But the public fell in love with group routines and regional managers got interested, so it started working out. Even I remember how 15 years ago group routines were not as popular.
Q: What is it about Russian culture that causes men in rhythmic gymnastics not to be taken seriously?
A: Rhythmic gymnastics has always been associated with grace, beautiful lines, femininity for us…
Q: But there’s the respected school of Russian ballet, for example.
A: Our people tend to separate it, I don’t know what the reason is – whether the openness of the mind or, on the contrary, the close-mindedness and ignorance. I can’t draw comparisons between Russian ballet, the school and tradition or Russian dance, and what the Spanish do. Because, in ballet, a man expresses the mood, he plays his own role, a manly one. He is doing one thing and a woman is doing something completely different. You need to ask Nikolay Tsiskaridze about it, he will give a good and beautiful answer. What do our people do? What do 90% of the population do? They work and can’t see past the tip of their nose. Well, I’m getting into politics again. But it’s like Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Some don’t know how to feed their kids tomorrow, they don’t care about rhythmic gymnastics and ballet. They don’t have time to think about it, right?
Q: Do you think that men’s rhythmic gymnastics will become part of the European and World Championships under the FIG soon?
A: What was another reason for the Spanish to develop fast? Because Bruno Grandi, may he rest in peace, was the president of the international federation. He did not want to accept the Japanese version and supported the European school. Perhaps it was also because we – Russia – supported the Japanese and Grandi’s relationship with Russia was purely formal. He often said that Russians have a monopoly on the sport, so rules were changed and difficult elements developed by Alina [Kabayeva] and Irina Aleksandrovna were banned, it was said that the elements were dangerous for the body. So, rhythmic gymnastics was made average in order for it to develop in the rest of the world. But then Mr. Morinari Watanabe came into power, a Japanese, and it seemed that he would be supportive of the Japanese school [of rhythmic gymnastics] but for some reason parkour was included into the FIG but men’s rhythmic gymnastics wasn’t. That’s the way it is. Perhaps, he has some personal considerations, or political, or strategic ones, but I think that strategically it would be useful for Russia to develop men’s rhythmic gymnastics. If we will continue developing like the Spanish, it will be easy, you don’t need to invent anything. But it’s the same as developing men’s rhythmic gymnastics in Qatar. First, it’s the Russian culture – here, people just won’t accept it. Second, it’s wrong in terms of the physiology, a guy should grow strong according to his nature and the Spanish version of rhythmic gymnastics won’t allow it.
Q: So, you’re doing the Japanese version which is not very popular internationally because it’s closer to the Russian culture? But what if the Spanish version will be taken as the basis when men’s rhythmic gymnastics will be included in international competitions?
A: If the International Olympic Committee will turn to us, we need to offer something, our alternative, in order not to lose a spot on the international arena. It would be nice if our colleagues from artistic gymnastics and acrobatics helped but everyone’s guarding their sports against the new one jealously. I don’t know why. I guess it’s because the funding is divided between all gymnastics disciplines. It’s really hard but everything will happen in time. I’ve grown up; 15 years ago I was only 16 and now I’m 31, my brain has matured, my mind has formed, I had my share of falls and became more open-minded towards the world. If 10 years ago I had been given a football club to develop, I’d probably have done it well. I can’t say it’s easier but at least you understand where everything is going and big bosses are always pleased to see you. But when the existence of your sport is denied and people aren’t eager to help you – it’s not easy.
Support Gymnovosti on Patreon from only $1 a month and help us bring to you even more awesome gymnastics coverage!
