Info On Obscure Romanians

I've been looking up some stuff on past team alternates and was wondering, does anyone know the birthdates of 1980s gymnasts Mariana Tudor, Mirela/Aurelia Sidon, and Dana Dumitru? Or know anthing else anout them? Thanks in advance.

Info On Obscure Romanians

What elite will have the best elite career?

How do you think they'll do? Who will have immediate impact and who will have the best career overall? Lol Obviously meant NCAA

What elite will have the best elite career?

1999 Onesti Gymnasts Info

In Jan 1999, there was a wonderful article in IG about the Onesti Jr. Training Center and the soxteen girls training there at the time. Five of them I remember later: Alexandra Barac, Sabina Cojocar, Silvia Stroescu, Carmen Ionescu, & Monica Sabou. But does anyone know what happened to the other eleven?

1. Melina Druta
2. Cristina Sabou
3. Oana Bucerzau
4. Melinda Jurjan
5. Anca Suciu
6. Alina Toma
7. Andreea Ciubotaru
8. Ramona Zaharuk
9. Gabriela Mitroi
10. Roxana Mihai
11. Olga Varzaru

Also does anyone know their DOBs or any other bio info about them? I'm curious to know when they would have turned senior. Thanks in advance.

1999 Onesti Gymnasts Info

What was the controversy over Siliva's loss to Boginskaya at the 89 Europeans AA on?

I am just curious since I havent seen this event in its entirity. It is interesting Boginskaya was outscored by Silivas on vault (unexpected) and still came back on the other events, the same 3 events Silivas would win gold at both the 88 Olympics and 89 worlds, to win. Is there a specific score or reason for the controversy though?

What was the controversy over Siliva's loss to Boginskaya at the 89 Europeans AA on?

What Went Wrong After 1996?

Part of me thinks that the decline in the height of the popularity in gymnastics, especially outside the olympics, can be pinpointed to a lot that happened post 1996.

1992-1996 just seems like this golden age with so many world championships, so much interest in broadcast, so many American, Chinese, Russian and former Soviet, and Romanian gymnasts competing in international competitions against other top competitors year round.

Then 1996 happened and something seems to change. Part of it was the incredibly convoluted rule changes in age which touched the careers of so many gymnasts. Then there was the weird decision not to hold a 1998 worlds (weirdly smack dab in the middle of a quad).

A conversation about Vanessa Atler arose this week on the forum and it got me looking back at the quad. I was reminded of something I had completely forgotten and that is the bevy of "professional" tournaments that happened specifically for American gymnasts and some of the stars of the 1996 games (Lilia, Bogi, and a few others). They were clearly money making schemes and did not at ALL feel like real gymnastics. In my opinion this could have contributed to a lack of knowledge about and respect for the sport. It took the drama and pressure away from real competitions between real competitors and made it fun and silly, even when the competitions were set up to look completely real (world professional championships 1997?). The weirdest part of these competitions is they were on broadcast tv networks. These days we can barely get NBC to air our BIGGEST competitions and even when they do its constant commercial breaks.

Its hard to know what happened from the height in the 90s in popularity and visibility worldwide to now where the sport seems to have a 3 month shelf life with the American public.

What are your thoughts?

What Went Wrong After 1996?

Would Atler have helped the U.S team in Sydney?

OK I know her gymnastics was declining, mentally she seemed to be a mess, and everything else but seeing the U.S team in Sydney could she still have helped them? I imagine she could have. Her vault, beam, and floor scores still could easily have contributed and boosted the U.S total on those events, none of which was great. And if she was encouraged and given confidence by Bela and the others this may have helped to get her somewhat back together. I get the sense there was alot of political things against her that year, and that probably led to some of her depression and decline. The Rybackis were also starting to become pretty powerful within U.S gymnastics and I believe Steve was one of the head coaches in Sydney, so this was bad news for Vanessa's chances to make the team as from what I have heard the Rybackis held a huge grudge for her leaving them.

Would Atler have helped the U.S team in Sydney?

1988 Olympic Trials

I have only closely followed gymnastics since the 92 games and recently found the 88 trials. Couple of questions. Watching Kristi Phillips it didn't appear that she had a terrible trials, was her Nationals performance poor or was her placing more based on politics? Also what was the issues between Bela and the Olympic coach (sorry, I forgot his name). During the broadcast they said Bela had stated that he "would not be going to Seoul". Thank you.

1988 Olympic Trials