Finally, the US managed to take the podium in Gymnastics away from the Chinese. I have nothing against China, in fact, I would just love to visit there some day, it has some of the oldest historical sites in the entire world, and an amazingly rich history. But we have some amazing gymnasts, and they completely deserved to win the Gold, and Silver medals.
Nastia Liukin won the Gold medal. Nastia was born in Russia, and is the daughter of Valeri Liukin who won Gold in the 1988 Olympics in Men’s Gymnastics, and Silver in the 1988 Olympic Men’s All-around. Natsia’s mother was a world champion in Rhythmic Gymnastics, a sport that is more artistic and graceful than athletic, and Nastia’s lines and her style shows the influence of both parents strongly. Shawn Johnson, whose coach was born and raised in Beijing, won the Silver medal. Well done, both!
(Semi-biased rant below, stop reading if you want to think everything is peaches and cream, all roses and birdies singing at the Olympics.)
However, there were constant questions with scoring. How, for instance, could Nastia’s vault, which had no visible flaws, a completely stuck landing, perfect position in the air, perfect pre-flight, get nearly a full point taken for execution? Where did they get nine tenths of a point in deductions. Watch it in slow motion, there is not a single thing you could even deduct for. And yet, there it is, her score was far too low, and the announcers, and Bela Karolyi agreed. At first, it was just chalked up to a fluke. But then it continued. While the Chinese athlete bobbled and wobbled through her beam routine, making visible errors, balance checks, arms swinging wildly to stay on the beam, she scored an amazing number, with minimal deductions in execution. And yet, Nastia, whose performance was again flawless, with a stuck landing, gorgeous acrobatics throughout, no visible balance checks, gets nearly another full point removed. From what???
And when her score on Uneven Bars was again, much lower than she’d seen, even though the only error was a small step on the landing, it occurred to me that there may be a trend here.
From the beginning of these games, it has seemed that the press, the on-site reporters, the IOC, and pretty much anyone involved in the Olympics, was going out of their way to turn a blind eye to anything negative, and waxing rhapsodic about everything with regards China as host. Some of the more vocal blogs out there have mentioned the odd “slant” with regards to the news reporting since the games began. The severe air pollution, which can actually damage these athletes’ lungs, is nearly completely ignored, the political issues are absolutely taboo, and even the lip syncing issue has not gotten the press you’d expect.
Why? Because everyone seems to be utterly terrified of “offending” China. God forbid someone speak the truth. How does this relate to the judging? I’m getting there. 
Historically, the host city had the most judges, and the host team nearly always got higher marks than anyone else. It was always an issue, and when they re-vamped the scoring system, they put in place a system to combat this. There are multiple judges for artistry, technical execution, and other areas, and they come from all countries. Judges are not allowed to be from the country of the competing Athlete. Therefore, for example, there are no US judges for the US gymnasts, just as there are no Chinese judges for any Chinese gymnast. But this brings up other problems. The judges often come from countries who have no elite level gymnastics program, and have very little clue how to judge elite athletes. Sometimes you will end up with 6 out of 8 judges from countries who have never even once had an Olympic medal in gymnastics. How can they possible know what to look for, what to deduct for, and what to reward when they don’t even fully understand the sport? Finally, there is a “head judge” who is called with any questions, and no score can be posted without their approval. (Interestingly, for the All-Around competition, this was Nelli Kim, who is quite famous if you know much about Gymnastics.) The current scoring system may have fixed some issues, but it most certainly created a huge amount of new major flaws, and really needs to be scrutinized and revamped.
Anyway, it almost seems to me as if, regardless of what nation the judges were from, they were all again, afraid of “offending” China. The Chinese gymnasts got far higher scores than they would have in any other competition, and deductions were blatantly overlooked. For example, one Chinese gymnast did not “connect” two moves on the beam (meaning you go from one move to the next, without a visible pause – she paused for at least 2-3 seconds, because of an arm-waving balance check) and yet her start value was not deducted, nor was the technical score affected. That’s just wrong. When something happens once, you chalk it up to a mistake, a fluke, a glitch. If it happens twice, you raise your eyebrows, and wonder if the judges are blind. When it happens 3, and 4 times in a row, something else is at work here.
Now, of course, we’ll never know what really went on, where they got all the massive deductions they were taking from the American athletes, how they turned a blind eye to major mistakes by the Chinese, but it sure does make you wonder how “fair” this sport is, even with these major changes in the scoring.
But you know, I still cannot get over the age issue. Google “Gymnastics age”, and you will come up with thousands of results, documenting the ages as reported over the last year or two of these girls, and all showing that at least 3, if not 4, of the Chinese athletes are not 16. And yet, suddenly in March, they are issued new passports, and POOF! They qualify. What a crock.
I’m sorry, I don’t care if you are the host country, it doesn’t give you the right to cheat. And yes, I have no doubt after watching the Team finals, and the All-around finals, that these kids are not 16 years old. There is just no way. Yes, body types vary, yes, Asians are typically built slighter than we are, but no, there’s no way that these little children are 16.
And I think what bothers me the most about this is if there was any suspicion at all of drug use on the part of a gymnast, it would be scrutinized, and double, triple, quadruple checked by the IOC. And yet, falsifying ages, having athletes that are 2, 3 years from legitimate competitive age, is okay?
The IOC accepts these “passports” from a country that has never hid the fact that it controls information. They control what is reported in their “government newspapers”, what is said on TV, what is printed in magazines, heck they even control what their people can see on the Internet, so of course they can fake a passport. Good grief. How is it that the IOC, or the Gymnastics Federation is not completely outraged by this? This is absolutely cheating, just as bad as, if not worse than, doping. Most of the reporters all agree that there is no way these kids are 16. Marta Karolyi doesn’t think they are 16, and even calls them “the little babies”. Most of the former gymnasts interviewed don’t think they are 16.
And yet, nothing will be done. Nothing. This is just wrong. And worse, it just feels… icky, watching these little kids (some of whom don’t even have their adult teeth yet!), in skimpy leotards. It makes my skin crawl, knowing all the pedophiles out there are basically getting their kicks off watching this. It is just sick.
It is really too bad that the major accomplishment put forth by Nastia and Shawn (never before has the United States had a Gold, and Silver medal in Women’s Gymnastics All-Around in the Olympics), has been eclipsed by this age issue. But perhaps it will take something like this, to make some changes in the way either ages are verified, or in the way the age limit is set.
The individual apparatus medals are still to come, in both Men’s, and Women’s Gymnastics. I just hope that the scoring is done fairly, giving credit where credit is due, and deducting where obvious, visible errors occur. Let’s hope the US athletes can up the medal tally!
