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27TH APRIL - EUROPEAN CHAMPIONSHIPS
WOMEN’S SENIOR TEAMS QUALIFICATIONS
27TH APRIL 2006
Team- qualification seniors, final ranking - Top 8 Teams qualify for Saturday’s Team Final
1. Russia 176.150
2. Romania 175.950
3. Italy 174.650
4. Ukraine 173.300
5. Spain 171.600
6. France 168.450
7. Great Britain 167.225
8. Netherlands 166.400
9. Greece 165.975
26TH WOMEN’S EUROPEAN CHAMPIONSHIPS ARTISTIC GYMNASTICS
Volos (GRE) 27 - 30 April 2006
LIST OF INDIVIDUAL APPARATUS QUALIFIERS
Women’s Seniors - Apparatus Finals
SUN 30 APR 2006 - 15:00
The European Championships features a total of 32 Medal winners from major Championships, including 3 Olympic, 9 World and 20 European medals and promises some fascinating battles for European Team and Individual Titles this weekend!
Today’s qualifying rounds produced some impressive debuts as well as some surprises with Russia and Romania dominating the Team event qualifiers but only 0.20 separate the leading Teams by 176.150 to 175.90 going into Sunday’s Final, where we start once more from a clean sheet! Italy’s Vanessa Ferrari was excellent and helped her Team qualify in 3rd position with 174. 650, and Romania’s Sandra Isbaza also qualified for 3 Apparatus Finals including 1st places on Floor and Beam plus 7th on Vault! The surprise of the day came from Stefani Bismpikou who produced excellent routines to hit the 3rd highest overall score in front of her delighted home fans.
Great Britain qualified for the Team Final in 7th place but sadly Shavahn Church had to withdraw after injuring her knee in her Floor routine.
Beth Tweddle performed superbly for Great Britain on Uneven bars to qualify for Sunday’s Uneven Bars Final in first place with an incredible 15.850 and the highest individual score of the Competition. Beth now stands a great chance of winning her first European Title, after coming so close last year where she also led in qualifications in Debrecen but had to withdraw due to injury. She has already won 2 European Medals after earning Silver in Amsterdam in 2004 and Bronze in Patras in Greece 2 years earlier. Beth is only competing on Uneven Bars after her ankle injury at World’s and she remains firm favourite to land the Title, and British gym fans will be glued to their television’s on Sunday roaring her on. However Beth must overcome the challenge of Vanessa Ferrari from Italy who performed brilliantly to qualify in 2nd place on 15.625 and was also the highest individual top scorer across all 4 pieces with a total of 60.925 where she also qualified for three apparatus Finals.
Imogen Cairns also produced a good All Round finishing in 10th place out of 115 gymnasts in the unofficial Individual scorers with a total of 55.850 and Imogen also qualified for Sunday’s Vault Final in 8th place, on a piece which Russia’s Anna Grudko led after scoring 14.612 in today’s Qualifiers. Memories of the wonderful European record breaking Svetlana Khorkina came flooding back! Russian Team mate Irina Isayeva also produced a beautiful floor routine which was full of artistry and execution, and of course Romania’s Catalina Ponor who qualified in 3rd place to maintain her dream of 2 Gold Medals in her final competition.
On Beam Romania and Russia once more fought for dominance with every Romanian gymnast scoring over 15.30 but only 2 gymnast’s from each country can qualify for the Individual Apparatus Finals which made this a thrilling battle for places in European Finals. Each Russian gymnast had also scored over 14.600 on Vault, which poses the question, should the top 8 gymnast’s on each piece not qualify for the Individual Apparatus Finals in a European Championship’s?
Nevertheless the beam qualifier’s were dramatic as Yulia Lozcheko from Russia was technically superb with 15.600, but was just beaten into 2nd place by Romania’s Sandra Isbaza with 15.675. Catalina Ponor overcame a slight wobble to qualify in 3rd position and head for Sunday’s Finals where she will defend her European Title. What drama we could see as Catalina bids farewell!
Unfortunately Great Britain’s Shavahn Church injured her knee at the end of her Floor routine and she had to withdraw from the Vault competition where Mel Roberts took her place. Shavahn scored a total of 27.400, and has been a great asset to the GB Team after great performances in Melbourne and also at the British Team Championships where her Bars routine in particular stood out. Shavahn had already scored 14.025 on Beam in Qualifier’s and Team Manager Jo Prescott said “ The Team did really well in the Qualifications. They started on Beam and achieved their highest result on A. Bars (42.600) - well done to the fresh Senior Amy Nunes on this apparatus! Unfortunately, Shavahn Church injured her knee in the end of her Floor routine today and it is unlikely that she will compete in the Finals on Sunday”.
Amy Nunes made an impressive Senior debut with Amy scoring 27.025 with 13.925 on Vault and 13.100 on Bars, and with Mel’s total of 41.1000, which included her top scores of 13.925 on Vault and 13.850 on Floor helped GB make the Team Finals in 7th place out of the 24 teams.
We wish Shavanh and the GB team’s well and fingers crossed for this weekend’s Finals!
Our View
Sadly there is no Senior All Around competition this year which we feel is disappointing, as this is a European Championships and a wonderful spectacle which tests a gymnast’s all around ability on all 4 pieces, however the UEG have decreed that there will be Senior Team and Individual Apparatus Winners only. Significantly only 50 out of the 115 competitors today produced a full All Around with 18 gymnasts competing on just one apparatus. There will be an All Around Champion in tomorrow’s Junior event so we wonder why there will be no Senior All Around competition?
Russia’s new Team had 4 out of their 6 gymnast’s qualify for apparatus Finals winning a total of 6 positions in Apparatus Finals, whilst Romania and Ukraine have 5 places in Apparatus Finals with Italy and Spain 4 each.
Full details of Individual Apparatus Finalist’s appear below:-
VAULT
1st - ANNA GRUDKO - RUSSIA 14.612
2nd - OLGA SHERBATYKH - UKRAINE 14.500
3rd - CARLOTTA GIOVANNINI - ITALY 14.387
4th - ARIELLA KAESLIN - SUI 14.325
5th - JANA KOMRSKOVA - CZE 14.300
6th - KATIA ABEL - GER 14.200
7th - SANDRA IZBASA - ROM 14.125
8th - IMOGEN CAIRNS- GBR 13.937
Reserves
R1 - LARA MARX - LUX 13.837
R2 - ENIKOE KORCSMAROS - HUN 13.825
UNEVEN BARS
1st - ELIZABETH TWEDDLE - GBR 15.850
2nd - VANESSA FERRARI - ITA 15.625
3rd - DARIYA ZGOBA - UKR 15.250
4th - YULIA LOZHECKO - RUS 15.100
5th - LENIKA DE SIMONE ESP 14.950
6th - JANA SIKULOVA - CZE 14.725
7th - ROSE - ELIANDRE BELLEMARE - FRA 14.650
8th - STELIANA THNISTOR - ROM 14.575
Reserves
R1 - LIA PAROLARI - ITA 14.500
R2 - LICHELLE WONG - NED 14.425
BALANCE BEAM
1st - SANDRA IZBASA - ROM 15.675
2nd - YULIA LOZHECKO - RUS 15.600
3rd - STAFANI BISMPIKOU - GRE 15.600
4th - CATALINA PONOR ROM - 15.450
5th - VANESSA FERRARI - ITA 15.225
6th - MARINA PROSKURINA - UKR 15.225
7th - IRINA ISAYEVA - RUS 15.150
8th - LENIKA DE SIMONE - ESP 15.100
Reserves
R1 - LICHELLE WONG - NED 15.000
R2 - MONICA BERGAMELLI - ITA 14.825
FLOOR EXERCISE
1st - SANDRA IZBASA - ROM 15.550
2nd - VANESSA FERRARI - ITA 15.475
3rd - CATALINA PONOR - ROM 3 14.675
4th - IRINA ISAYEVA - RUS 14.575
5th - THAIS ESCOLAR - ESP 14.450
6th - NADRIDA IVANOVA - RUS 14.450
7th - OLGA SHERBATYKH - UKR 14.450
8th - MARYNA KOSTYUSHENKO - UKR 14.450
Reserves
R1 - ROSE - ELIANDRE BELLEMARE - FRA 14.425
R2 - DARIA BIJAK - GER 14.400
The Junior Team and All Around competition takes place tomorrow and we will bring you all the news and results here on Gymnastics Online
RELATED LINKS
- EUROPEAN CHAMPIONSHIPS PREVIEW
- CATALINA PONOR TO RETIRE AFTER EUROPEAN CHAMPIONSHIPS BUT AIMS FOR 2 MORE GOLDS!
- DISSAPOINTMENT FOR ANNA PAVLOVA WHO MISSES OUT ON EURO SELECTION
- BETH TO COMPETE ON BARS ONLY
- GB TEAMS NAMED FOR EUROPEANS
- PHOTOS AND RESULTS FROM 2005 EUROPEAN CHAMPIONSHIPS
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