Alexander Shatilov missed half of the last season because of an injury and decided not to rush his recovery as he just became a father last fall. This year he started slowly returning to competition, first on floor and high bar at Osijek Challenge Cup, then on floor and pommel horse at Koper Challenge Cup where he actually made the final but took 5th place on floor due to mistakes. Shatilov is 31 years old and finally surrounded by a full team with a host of promising juniors and the potential new recruits from other countries. His senior career has been going on for 12 years now and Tokyo Olympics will be his fourth if he makes it there. But Shatilov keeps proving that he’s still the leader of the Israeli team and an invaluable asset.
Shatilov finished his first all-around competition of the year with 81.100 while the second-highest score from an Israeli gymnast was 75.700 from Michael Sorokine. Alexander Myakinin, a recent immigrant from Russia, took third place with 74.950.
The competition actually featured several gymnasts from other countries – Croatia, Cyprus, Lithuania, and USA. The AA medals were awarded separately for the general competition and just for the Israeli nationals. In the international competition, Shatilov remained the winner, while Filip Ude from Croatia won silver with 79.05 and Ilias Georgiou from Cyprus won bronze with 77.50.
Artem Dolgopyat only competed on PB, HB, and PH due to a minor leg injury.
Shatilov also won gold on his best events – floor (13.150) and high bar (13.850). Ilias Georgiou won gold on parallel bars (14.200). Andrey Medvedev predictably won vault with 14.800. The pommel horse was everyone’s undoing on that day with most people falling off. Filip Ude won gold with 14.050 despite a fall. On rings, Eyal Glazer managed to win gold (14.600) over Michael Wilner, last year’s US national champion on that event. Wilner hasn’t been competing this year and it could be that his participation in the Israeli nationals was a way to see if he would be a good fit for the Israeli team.
On the women’s side, the competition was a bit less exciting with several main players out with injuries – Tzuf Feldon, Ofir Kremer, and Gaya Giladi did not participate. Kremer is likely to be back by Euros but Feldon is definitely still recovering and the current status of Giladi is unknown. It was a comfortable win for Ofir Netzer who took gold in AA with 47.55. Meitar Lavy, a new senior, won silver with 43.55 and Shailee Weiss took bronze with 42.7.
Ofir Netzer also won gold medals on each event.
