Nina Derwael has been dealing with a sore ankle for a while now and opted to miss the European Championships and not to defend her uneven bars title. She unveiled a new routine with a 6.6 difficulty at the FIT Challenge and came to the European Games to test it. Derwael decided to compete only on bars and beam here in order to protect her ankle and she made event finals on both events – leading beam with 13.600 and in the second place on bars (after a mistake at the end of the routine) with 14.433.
Derwael talked about preparing for Worlds and potential upgrades:
“Not competing in the all-around here was a little bit of precaution. That’s because I still have a little bit of pain in my foot, so we just wanted to save it for Worlds. The ankle pain has always been a struggle for me. Then it got better, but then it hurt again, so… There are some ups and downs, but now we just decided to give a go at bars and beam, and focus on Worlds to do the all-around there. We are trying to get some upgrades in there and we are going to see if they are ready for Worlds. On vault, we are working on one and a half or a double twist. It’s not consistent yet, one day is good, another day is bad, so we don’t know yet, we are still working on this one. And then on floor, I also have some upgrades planned but we’ll see.”
She wanted to have a bit more time to work on the new bars routine and it wouldn’t be ready in time for Euros, so she decided that going to European Games instead would be better:
“We just wanted to choose one competition – either Euros or European Games. Then also I took the time to get my new exercise on bars ready. If I went to Euros, I would have to do the old routine, same as at Worlds and we wanted to really upgrade. So, I was able to do a more difficult routine here.
I think this will be the one for Worlds, and after Worlds, we’ll see what we put in.”
Known for her crazy difficulty on bars, Derwael feels like she needs to go even further:
“I think there are so many great gymnasts on bars. I mean, Becky Downie – she has an amazing routine. Also, Georgia and the Russian girls are always stand out for me on bars, so there are still a lot of competitors that really put pressure on me.”
At the qualifications, she had a mistake in the routine, as it’s still a new one, but she feels she can do better in the final:
“The beginning of the routine felt very well, and then at the end just before my dismount, it was not quite enough for my full turn, so I did what I had to do to not fall. I’m glad I still made the final because it was the most important thing today. And I am really happy that I managed to pull through.”
European Games are quite different from a normal gymnastics competition, bringing a lot of different sports together, and Derwael enjoys it a lot:
“I really like it because I am also a very social person. I am really happy that we are in a village, and there are different sports because for me it is always very fun to interact with other athletes. So, I am really happy that we are here with the whole Belgian delegation, it’s really fun.”
You can watch Nina Derwael compete in the uneven bars and balance beam finals at the European Games on Sunday (schedule and streams).
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