OLYMPICS/ Team china
Chinese gymnasts get yips on final day
(China Daily)
Updated: 2007-09-11 10:23
STUTTGART: Chinese gymnasts faltered at the last hurdle of the Stuttgart World Gymnastic Championships on Sunday, seizing just one silver medal on the last day of the meet.
With five golds already in their pockets, the Chinese team was widely considered favorite for the three events - men's parallel bars and women's floor and balance beam - especially after the team won eight golds at last year's Aarhus championships.
Yang Wei of China leaves the apparatus in dejection after competing on the parallel bars in the men's final of the 40th World Artistic Gymnastics Championships on Sunday in Stuttgart, Germany. Chinese gymnasts faltered at the last hurdle of the Stuttgart World Gymnastic Championships on Sunday, seizing just one silver medal on the last day of the meet. [Xinhua] |
But all except one of five Chinese gymnasts from China made major errors during their routines.
Defending parallel bars champion Yang Wei, who was exhausted by a busy competition schedule, made early errors to drop to sixth place with 15.900 points.
Yang, who finished first during the qualifying round, failed to grasp the bar with his right forefinger and, although he didn't fall, the slip restricted him to a low score.
Yang's mistake helped 2005 world champion Slovenian Mitja Petkovsek share gold with South Korean Kim Dae-eun.
"I did not hurt myself," said Yang, who had already defended his titles in the men's all-round and team competition.
"Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose - that's the competition," he added.
In the final of the floor exercise, women's veteran Cheng Fei staged a marvelous performance with the highest A-score of 6.50 points.
But a poorly executed final movement saw her score plummet.
After finishing fifth, Cheng said she felt more nervous an inexplicably weaker during her routine than in her previous competitions.
"I felt there was some problem with my strength," she explained.
"If I had chosen an action with low difficulty degree, I would have won the title," she added.
Chinese gymnasts are instructed to attempt tougher routines in a bid to earn the highest A-scores in the team, all-round and individual events.
Head coach Huang Yubin is convinced that mastering harder tricks has put Chinese gymnasts in good stead.
But many argue that this strategy has gambled too much on difficult routines ever since the International Gymnastics Federation reformed the scoring system by abolishing degree-of-difficulty limits shortly after the 2004 Olympics.
"Our gymnasts are all favored to win gold medals on floor, beam and parallel bars due to their high A-scores," Huang argued.
"Once they give a normal play, they can win the gold medals.
"But this is gymnastics - any accident could happen."
Xiao Qin, Chen Yibing and Cheng Fei convincingly won their events - pommel horse, rings and women's vault respectively - in Stuttgart after successfully executing fraught routines.
But greater degrees of difficulty cost Yang and Cheng on parallel bars and floor, in particular Cheng who prepared an easier routine before the floor final.
"I just wanted to give a try because I wanted to win the floor so much and I knew I had such ability," Cheng said.
The Chinese approach was undermined on Sunday when 15-year-old Li Shanshan won China's only medal for the day, a silver on the beam.
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