Solidarity beats Friendship in Tokyo

The long-awaited Friendship and Solidarity competition took place in Tokyo this morning. If you missed the competition, opting to sleep instead, the FIG has the full broadcast on their YouTube channel.

The competition was more about getting out there and trying things – the gymnasts trying to compete again and the organizers trying to host a competition during the pandemic. The organizers tested a number of safety measures that could potentially be used at the Olympics, with some examples of these measures described below.

All the delegation members had to isolate at their training centers for two weeks prior to the flight and take three COVID-19 PCR tests. Upon arrival in Tokyo, they were tested again right at the airport and let to go to the hotel only after receiving negative results. While in Tokyo, delegation members are not allowed to leave their hotel floor except for meals, training, and competing. They were also tested daily throughout their stay in Japan. Hopefully, all the measures will ensure that no one gets infected.

Gymnasts could compete on however many events they wanted and only three routines on each event were counted for the team. At the end, team Solidarity led by Nikita Nagornyy and Kohei Uchimura beat team Friendship that included Artur Dalaloyan, Angelina Melnikova, and Asuka Teramoto. All gymnasts on both teams got the same medals, though. Full results can be found here.

For many of the gymnasts, the first international competition since the beginning of the pandemic did not go so well, which is absolutely understandable. However, Angelina Melnikova and Nikita Nagornyy had great days. Melnikova probably had the best all-around result of the whole quad, getting 56.700 AA score and posting the best scores of the meet on bars and floor.

Of course, if you thought Valentina Rodionenko would still find a way to criticize Melnikova’s results, you were absolutely right. She told TASS:

“It can be seen that not all gymnasts were in their best shape, neither Russians nor foreign ones. The very Melnikova and Nagornyy had not a small number of mistakes. But, despite not their best shape, they didn’t downgrade their routines, didn’t take anything out. That’s worth a lot. Because the athletes haven’t competed in a very long time, they were really nervous, which also negatively affected their performance. I was upset by Artur Dalaloyan’s performance, I didn’t recognize him today at all. I guess the injuries he’s been recovering from from for a long time had an effect. But, generally, everything’s fine. I think that by the first international competition which will be in April everything will be fine with our athletes”.

Of course, as usual, Rodionenko complained about the long flight and how other teams’ trips were easier than that of the Russian team. Russian gymnasts took a private plane from Moscow to Tokyo but it had a stopover in Irkutsk for refuelling, which made the journey longer:

“It was especially hard to compete on the third day after arriving. It’s not such a big time difference between China and Japan and the Americans had a shorter flight than us. But still, it was very important for us to participate in this competition. Today, representatives of the four strongest gymnastics countries met”.