We may NEVER see these skills in the Code

#gymnastics #flexibility #sports #gymnast #olympics
In the current Code of Points, all dance elements are capped at E and, in addition, there's a maximum number of turns recognized for each shape.
This means when that limit is exceeded, judges will simply not recognize these pirouettes and are forced to downgrade them.
Featured gymnasts: Bai Yawen, Sanne Wevers, Roxana Popa, Angelina Melnikova, Sui Lu, Aliya Mustafina, Rebeca Andrade, Gabriella Douglas, Yuna Hiraiwa, Lieke Wevers, Yui Fujii, Ana Padurariu, Simone Biles, Grace McCallum, Shania Adams.
Patreon: / sporteverywhere
Instagram: / sporteverywheregym
Twitter: / sporteveryw
Facebook: / sporteverywheregym
D-Score
Fails
Falls
Sticks
Spotters
Sporteverywhere
Gymnastics
Simone Biles
2020
Tokyo 2021
Gabby Douglas
Copyright Disclaimer under Section 107 of the copyright act 1976, allowance is made for fair use for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, scholarship, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit, educational or personal use tips the balance in favour of fair use.

[@kiraalldredge48]

I hate the capping of skills, i feel like it stifles innovation.

[@brontiq]

I don't even understand why do they do that?

[@tambam6744]

This isn’t rhythmic gymnastics.

[@mrparts]

@@brontiq do you want to argue that doing 5/6 etc turns on one foot should be worth more than a double layout with multiple twists? This sport is not rhythmic gymnastics.

[@kiraalldredge48]

@@mrparts I would make the tumbling worth more then.

[@pedrojorge1912]

@@mrparts Gomez and Mustafina are more valuable than double twists, double tucks and double pikes and the same value as doubles 1/1 and double Arabians, and, still, which do elite gymnasts use way more? If turns were as easy as you want to make look, gymnasts would already be using them. Instead, except for Michell, E turns are absolutely rare.

[@FranciscoCunha2004]

You’re telling me Andrade did a great quintuple Y turn on floor and then struggled to do a double all throughout the 2022 worlds?

[@mojochrys]

EXACTLY what I was thinking!

[@afonsoaraujo6424]

Abafa

[@aezonodeniaproduction140]

It was on a floor for rhythmic gymnastic, which is better to make a lot of turns

[@pedrojorge1912]

That's why we should never trust social media posts. Lol

[@saraquill]

What are the judges afraid of? A gymnast who can turn for 30 seconds straight?

[@mrparts]

It’s no fear. Unless you want pirouette skills to replace tumbling and turn artistic gymnastics into rhythmic gymnastics.

[@cocoroni1031]

Removing the dance element cap is bad for the sports. Most people are now barely doing acrobatic elements (minimum) and attempting more dance elements. Removing cap will further destroy the balance.

[@I_report_scammers_spammers]

Well, I mean, Whitney Bjerken did a septuple wolf turn...and she didn't even look like an epileptic frog in a blender doing it (I *HATE* wolf turns but at least that one didn't make me wanna claw my eyes out. Most of them do.)

[@myrandapistokache6653]

@@I_report_scammers_spammersI hate the way wolf turns look too! I know they are hard AF and ain’t no way I could do one but they just always look so messy and disrupt the entire flow of the routine

[@adrianops7]

Love all turns but the wolf ones..

[@vangu2918]

I love the wolf turn, because it requires you to stay centered in a position that is easy to fall out of. The balance and core strength required to do it properly is crazy.

[@gabrielmoro3d]

The passé turn on beam looks gorgeous!

[@im_so_rachel]

The most annoying thing ever to me is transition caps on bars. Regardless, there shouldnt be a cap on anything.

[@tadg2003]

​@@hannahwalmer1124yes but limit the transitions is more efficient than capping

[@loganmb7172]

I feel like if the code will recognize a quad turn in one shape, it should recognize quad turns in all shapes. At least make the cap on the number of rotations consistent.

[@murasakino101]

I agree. I also feel like if there HAD to be a cap, at least put it at 5. I get that they may not want to see too many dance elements on floor, but they're SO much harder on beam and gymnasts shouldn't be limited on that event. Difficult turns other than wolf turns are barely competed on beam anyway so idk what harm would come out of a gymnast performing a quad number or higher on the apparatus. Any gymnast that could do a quad y turn or passé on beam, deserves to be credited for it

[@loganmb7172]

@@murasakino101 exactly! And capping any and all dance elements at E doesn’t give anyone incentive to push those limits. Like eventually, we’re going to run out of the number of flips and twists we can do in a tumbling pass, and there won’t be any more opportunities to get an eponymous skill. But the level of difficulty for dance skills has barely even scratched the surface, and there could be a lot more innovation in that front if the code rewarded them for it

[@charitybosua]

But the CoP changes every 4 years so technically they could decide at some point to remove the cap, right?

[@hannahrobbins1017]

Was hating on these caps … until we got to Wolf turns 😂

[@mrparts]

Capping the values is necessary…..If the FIG starts recognizing the 5 turns then someone will do 6, then someone will do 7 etc….then you’ll get that the 7 turns is worth the same as a Biles or even higher 😂😂😂😂😂

[@minimini550]

They shouldn’t allow more turns because even on an Olympic level the gymnasts can barely do the current ones properly. Judges nitpick every single detail of the routines - except pirouettes. Bend and flaring arms and legs, flexed feet and huge steps everywhere. How?!

[@nikko2434]

Originality! ❤ Speaking of dance elements, If Wevers did turn series, I hope someone do a leap series: split leap 1/1 + switch split leap 1/1 + switch split leap half to yang bo E+E+F (if there’s no cap in dance element, switch split half to yang bo would be F) Just for fun!

[@turbojon8117]

Did you all see Pauline Schaeffer's recent video? She did a sextuple turn on floor and it was glorious -- total control and she finished on releve, IIRC

[@ivycai6]

theres a video of whitney bjerken doing 7 wolf turns

[@I_report_scammers_spammers]

Yep...was gonna say the same thing. Also...she doesn't flail around when she does them.

[@GreySox]

Good. Squat turns, wobbly turns, pausing before turns, and falling out of turns make the sport ugly.

[@TracyGooding-xi7dp]

I see so many falling out of turns that it looks like they are out of control or don't care if it happens.

[@charitybosua]

But this video showed some great examples of good execution. You won't see bad ones, bad you won't see good ones either. In the end it's up to the gymnast and coach if they think it's worth the risk

[@ryanisahac2274]

Quad twisting double back? Fine. Quad spin? No thanks

[@tambam6744]

As it should be. This is ARTISTIC GYMNASTICS!

[@live.laugh.love.olivia]

ay the last clip was at my gym

[@NF30]

I know this isn't very related to the video, but I want to ask people if they think the difficulty of each vault (in relation to other vaults) is justified. Here are some questions: (i) In MAG, for vaults with no somersaults, each extra half twist adds 0.2 DV. For vaults with one salto, each half twist is 0.4. Does that mean that for double salto vaults, each half twist should be 0.6 (currently 0.4)? Should this same scheme be applied to WAG? Does it make sense in terms of actual real life difficulty of the vaults? (ii) In the current code, for vaults with one salto, piked vaults are generally 0.2 points more difficult than their tucked counterparts, and stretched vaults 0.4 more difficult than the piked ones. Should this be evened out to piked vaults being 0.3 harder than tucked, and stretched being 0.3 harder than piked? What about for vaults with 0 or 2 saltos? Should the Yurchenko double pike be 0.3 harder than a Yurchenko double tuck? (iii) At the moment, the vaulting groups kind of don't make sense. I think it would make a lot more sense to separate them into six groups, depending on the entry: HS, HS ½, HS 1/1, R/O, R/O ½, R/O 1/1. The question is: how should the difficulty vary between these entries? There are currently vast differences between each entry style depending on the number of saltos. For MAG (2017-2021), using the tucked salto as a baseline, with 0 saltos, the difficulty goes: HS = 1.6 HS ½ = 1.6 R/O = 1.6 R/O ½ = 1.8 R/O 1/1 = 2.2 But for one salto, the order goes: HS = 2.4 HS ½ = 2.2 HS 1/1 = 4.0 R/O = 2.2 R/O ½ = 2.6 R/O 1/1 = 2.8 Finally, for two saltos, it goes: HS = 5.2 HS ½ = 5.2 R/O = 5.2 R/O ½ = 5.4 There isn't a clear pattern as to which entries get higher difficulty than which other entries. What do you think? Also, should a double salto forward to half twist (Dragulescu) be worth more than a double Arabian tucked off the vault? Currently they're rated the same. It could be worth looking at the FX counterparts to see if there are any answers there. Meanwhile, for WAG (2017-2021), we have: 0 saltos: HS = 2.0 HS ½ = 2.0 HS 1/1 = 3.6 R/O = 2.4 R/O ½ = 2.6 R/O 1/1 = 2.8 1 salto: HS = 4.0 HS ½ = 3.5 HS 1/1 = 5.2 R/O = 3.3 R/O ½ = 4.2 R/O 1/1 = 4.0 2 saltos: HS: 6.4 I think it makes sense for HS ½ to be rated 0.5 lower than HS, because, for example, a double-twisting Tsukahara is significantly easier than a Yeo vault-same with DTY vs. Biles. But why isn't that also reflected in the vaults with 0 saltos in the flight phase? Does the entry not have as much impact, even if you do a bunch of twists after it, as long as you don't do a salto? Has anyone even tried to just do 2.5 twists off the table without a salto, and to see what the relative real life difficulty is with each of those six entries? I'd love to see that done as an experiment! Similarly, with R/O ½ vs. R/O entries, R/O ½ is 0.9 higher than R/O with 1 salto, but only 0.2 higher with 0 saltos. And R/O 1/1 is 0.2 higher than R/O ½ with 0 saltos, but 0.2 LOWER with 1 salto! Whyyyy is that the case? Isn't it a much harder entry than R/O ½? There's so much potential on vault to do stuff like 4 or 4.5 twists off the table with no salto. Following the logic of the 2017-2021 COP, a HS on with 4.5 twists off would be worth 6.0, right in between a Chusovitina and a Yeo in terms of difficulty. I've never seen anyone try something like that, and I think it would be so cool! Finally, I also feel like EVERYONE should have to do two vaults with two different entries (provided the groups each correspond to six distinct entries, it would be two different groups as well). It shouldn't just be vault specialists doing two vaults-it should be everyone. That would be hugely beneficial because not only would it give much more variety to the apparatus with the least amount of it, it would also give a better representation of what each gymnast is actually capable of on this apparatus. Finally, it would eliminate the main reason why all the vaults were stupidly devalued in the 2022-2024 Code of Points (at least in WAG-they're the same as they were last quad in MAG). Two skills for each gymnast means double the opportunity for lower E-scores, so I feel like the lowered D-scores wouldn't be necessary. Also, the vault finals would be a lot more exciting too! Maybe people who didn't think they could make the finals would actually be in the running because of performing two clean vaults. Anyway that's all I have to say for now. I'd love to hear what other fans, and maybe even gymnasts, think about this!

[@wozziesgirl]

i) Higher difficulty for twisting with somersaulting makes sense in that the ideal body shape for twisting and the ideal body shape for somersaulting are in opposition. As you add more somersaults with twist the body skews in such a way as to reduce the angle between the two axes of rotation so giving additional points for twisting in multiple somersaults as compared to single somersaults would be perverse. ii) No. The second moment of inertia wrt to the somersault axis is only marginally higher for pike as compared to tuck, but it's a lot higher for a straight body shape.

[@NF30]

@@wozziesgirl Thanks so much for reading! So basically, staying at 0.4 per half twist for single and double saltos is physically accurate, but what about with no salto? Should half twists with no salto in MAG be worth 0.4 instead of 0.2? Even within WAG, where they are worth about 0.4, the vaults without saltos really don't make sense. Again using 2017-2021 COP, with HS entry: 0 twists: 2.0 ½ twist: 2.4 (+0.4) 1/1 twist: 3.0 (+0.6) 1½ twist: 3.6 (+0.6) 2/1 twist: 4.0 (+0.4) 2½ twist: 4.4 (+0.4) HS ½ entry is even weirder: 0 twists: 2.0 ½ twist: 2.8 (+0.8) 1/1 twist: 3.0 (+0.2) 1½ twist: 3.6 (+0.6) 2/1 twist: 4.0 (+0.4) If these were evened out, it would be 0.5 per half twist, which seems a bit much-but I'd be interested to hear your take, because I don't know how these feel in terms of real-life difficulty. HS 1/1 entry: 0 twists: 3.2 ½ twist: Not in code, but I guess it would be 3.4 1/1 twist: 3.6 (+0.4 for a full twist) No consistency at all with how much each half twist is worth. In MAG, with no salto, every half twist is 0.2, so this is only weird for WAG. Would it be more fair to make every half twist 0.2? So that HS on, 2½ twists off would go from a 4.4 to a 3.0? Or just make every half twist in the code +0.4? That same vault would go from 4.4 to 4.0. Or take the middle ground from MAG and WAG and make every half twist +0.3? With single saltos, in both WAG and MAG, you get +0.2 for going from no twist to ½ twist, and then +0.4 for each half twist after that (except in MAG stretched vaults, where every twist is 0.4). Should this be changed so that going from no twist to ½ twist gives you 0.4, just like every other half twist with a single salto? Or maybe the first couple half twists should be 0.3, and then 0.4 each for more than a full twist? And what you said about piked vaults vs. tucked vaults makes sense-for single saltos, +0.2 from tuck to pike and +0.4 from pike to layout is fine then. Although actually, in both the 2017-2021 COP and 2022-2024 COP, it looks like you get an average of +0.5 from pike to layout. For double saltos, in MAG, a pike is worth 0.4 more than a tuck. Should it only be 0.2? What should a Yurchenko double tuck vault be rated in comparison to Simone's double pike? Also, with no salto, Yamashita vaults are 0.4 higher than their repulsion counterparts. Should this be 0.2 or stay 0.4?

[@wozziesgirl]

@@NF30 I'm in no place to answer most of this because I don't have any specific vault knowledge. That's why I only answered the first two points of your question that related to somersault mechanics in the first place. So I can tell you that it is harder to twist in a somersault than in a non-somersaulting skill, but it doesn't get harder as the degree of somersault increases. And I can tell you that somersaulting in pike is not that much harder than in tuck, whereas somersaulting straight is significantly harder. But as to the specifics of how that should be implemented for vaulting difficulty I'm not qualified to comment.

[@janettewong9900]

As they should I have never seen pirouettes done cleanly on beam because they are ALWAYS looking down and falling out of them. The floor ones are slightly better but as a general thing, from a dance and even circus perspective, their hands and exit from the turns are generally ugly. These are dance elements and should be performed as dance and done cleanly, not min/maxed to get the maximum rotations out of them and then accept a minor deduction for exiting a turn clunkily

[@karyon1007]

All difficulty caps need to go.

[@tambam6744]

No. Only the bars transitions and pirouettes need to go. The dance element difficulty cap can stay. If you want to go see those elements, go watch rhythmic gymnastics.

[@ojk46]

@@tambam6744!!

[@ryanokeefe7351]

These skills should be recognized. They open up athletes to try to up the skill while pushing for no deduction. Athletes are training newer, harder skills. The code needs to grow with the skills.

[@pedrojorge1912]

On the leap side, I recall Fragapane, that submitted and attempted the split leap 2/1 in Rio 2016, and Sugihara, that in 2017 had such an over-rotated ring leap 1/1 that could've been evolved to ring leap 1 1/2. We probably won't see any attempts of these due to the leaps cap.

[@lisafink98]

What’s the purpose of the rule, that’s what I want to know, because this cap makes no sense to me.

[@gukaramaspartaku8325]

É muito giro

[@awesomemortercycle1]

What is the music in the video ?

[@piratesswoop725]

Simone’s wolf turns 😭😭😭

[@I_report_scammers_spammers]

Yeah. I ADORE Simone, but I will never forgive her for making the triple wolf turn so popular. (So...instead of 1000 stars on a scale of 1-5, I'd give her like 999.8 stars...)

[@wreckss8223]

​@@I_report_scammers_spammersShe's not the one who popularized it though? She only started doing triples on beam 5 or 6 years into her elite career.

[@I_report_scammers_spammers]

@wreckss8223 who (aside from Lauren Mitchell) was doing it prior to 2017? And how many gymnasts? Simone was a junior in 2012 and did a 2 1/2/Humphrey in Rio, but by 2016 she was absolutely dominant and a LOT of gymnasts were trying to emulate her.

[@wreckss8223]

@@I_report_scammers_spammers She made wolf turns popular, but not necessarily the triple. If anything, what's popular when it comes to wolf turns on beam is the triple + double combo, which she never connected herself. It just became popular because it was a skill that many gymnasts can do and was worth a lot, not necessarily because of Simone.

[@srkpeneloux1025]

I hate Wolf turns!

[@sandracunha120]

A ginástica olímpica feminina tenha habilidades para executar da melhor maneira todos os movimentos com a a delicadeza e graciosidade em cada apresentação individual ou por equipe para que consigam a melhor nota de partida possível e que nas olímpicas de 2024 o público seja presenteado um espetáculo maravilhoso ASSINADO: Sandra Rodrigues da Cunha Viva o esporte!!!!!

[@MrQbenDanny]

I agree with the judges on this. After the triple, it begins to get ugly. I hope Biles gets rid of it on the beam. She's never looked good.

[@captainbryce1]

She’s the only one who does it fast though. It actually looks like a real “skill” when she does it. When everyone does it, it just looks like they’re taking a break from the routine or something.

[@sarahdore7884]

Whitney Bjerken (I realize she isn’t elite) competed a quad wolf in JO this year. She did up to 7 in practice and looked better than Biles. I love Biles too, I’m not one of these that likes to pick her apart for everything. I think her triple looks nice

[@MrQbenDanny]

@captainbryce1 What I see from Biles is that she is trying hard not to fall doing it. I don't see Biles doing an assured, confident, and exciting triple. If it's a requirement, fine, do your best. If it's not, delete it from the program.

[@davidtrinh9467]

I ABSOLUTELY ABHOR CAPS ON DANCE MOVES BC IT TAKES THE ARTISTIC PART OF ARTISTIC GYMNASTICS AWAY

[@WhiteBear2024]

I agree. Under the pressure of competition, gymnasts start doing those crazy spins with a complete lack of balance/control. It's just ugly.

[@breno7049]

I'm ok with that. It's not RG.

[@elisharoberts1029]

I really hate that they are doing such hard skills, and they're being ignored because of arbitrary caps on both difficulty and number of turns per shape.

[@mrparts]

Do you want the 6 turns to be worth higher than a biles?

[@elisharoberts1029]

@@mrparts not necessarily, but a quad or quint should absolutely be wish more than the triple or double version of the same turn.

[@ae2948]

Maybe 6 turns on beam should be higher? I really don't know to compare those skills.

[@mrparts]

@@ae2948 but that's the issue. If you start recognizing 5/6/7/8, etc. turns, they will be valued the same or higher than extremely difficult tumbling skills. Do people want to say that spinning 5/6 times on a foot on the floor is as difficult as a double layout with two or three twists?

[@mrparts]

@@elisharoberts1029 , but that's what would happen. Giving more points for turning more than 4 times puts them in the same area as the most difficult tumbling skills. Is this reasonable? Is this rhythmic gymnastics?

[@susanmastin4798]

Skills should ot be capped! Reward the gymnast for these skills!!

[@CarlitosJS]

Wolf turn 🤮

[@passionsydney]

all the comments on "but it's gymnastics, not dance" - then get rid of dance elements completely then. You can't ask for it to be in there then artifically cap the skills *with an open-ended COP scoring system designed to *cough* encourage innovation *cough*. OR, the COP can simply cap the # of acrobatic vs dance skills, and remove the cap on the skills themselves. Quite frankly, if someone can do a 7+ Y turn on beam they deserve that skill to be worth a decent amount, and the sport might see a whiff of creativity and diversity once again (gasp!) right now the gymnasts are incentivised to max out D value in the time they have and we end up with cookie cutter crap and the audience for WAG and MAG continues to decline with innovation being restricted to a new entry Nabieva or 1/2 twist. Groundbreaking.

[@cocoroni1031]

The WAG floor and beam are always about balance between acro and dance elements. So I'm not sure why you interpret people's comments as "getting rid of dance elements". Recently, many gymnasts choose to do maximum number of dance elements and minimum number of acro elements on floor. The cap removal is disastrous for the sports. The recent trend is not to max out D value, but minimize E deductions. That's why people choose to do more dance elements that avoid those landing deductions.

[@passionsydney]

@@cocoroni1031 first para - not what I said. I'm taking that line of thought to its natural conclusion, to point out the silliness of it. The comments themselves are mixed but the ones I'm referring to are that dance skills should be capped as it's gymnastics. You can see those ones yourself 2nd para - I'd debate that. Everything right now is maximising D with connected skills to milk those 0.2's everywhere. That's not an E focus, that's jam packing as much that can be done and taking advantage of linking them, not making them look pretty. The Code does not penalise (or reward) execution the same way other sports have recently transitioned to (eg figure skating GoE), if they did you wouldn't be seeing wolf turn caps and 1/2 turn starting from the air as such a momentous, rather than an obvious, change. Etc

[@cocoroni1031]

@@passionsydney Then you misinterpreted some people's comment. Artistic gymnastics is obviously not rhythmic gymnastics (RG) and not tumbling sports. Capping dance elements at E doesn't turn gymnastics to tumbling sports. I'd argue that the sports has shifted to focus more on E and less on D, unless your D is Biles level. Connection works well on bars but not other events. Unlike RG and tumbling, artistic gymnastics has both landing deduction (acro) and shape deduction (dance). Landing deduction usually costs more than shape deduction. So obviously dance elements have to be capped to balance out between them.

[@passionsydney]

​@@cocoroni1031 I'm not going to generalise my (or your) ability to interpret the every reply to this thread. That's just silly. You and I have differing opinions on this and that's fine. There *are* comments on this video disparaging dance elements full stop, and my point is that if they aren't meant to be valued, why bother including them at all - especially as MAG doesn't. So if they're in, they're in. Don't just put arbitrary caps on compulsory elements. There's many workable solutions here, but the reality is that *both* styles of skills are currently in the code, and the my point is that artificially capping one of them is a poor workaround to having either style dominate. Dance elements don't "obviously" need to be capped - again this is lazy rule making. Using your own argument, if the issue is that landing versus shape deductions are not equivalent, then the root problem is the value of the deductions for landing versus shape. Fix that, don't just put a cap on someone doing a 7Y turn on beam. Ths kind of frankenstein code making is what has resulted in the Code promoting the cookie cutter routines as per my initial post.

[@cocoroni1031]

@@passionsydney In my opinion, dance elements are essential and great part of AG. People have difficulty to transit from RG / tumbling to AG because they either can't do basic tumbling or dance elements. Some of them simply can't hit their split and lose 0.5 requirement in leap series. However, dance element deduction will never be as high as acro deduction ("out of bound" deductions and risk of falls are additional but I forget to mention). To new gymnasts, if they can chuck 7 spins in wolf turn and claim they have a 7.0D floor in theory, why bother do any F+ tumbling to risk injury then? That totally destroy the essential balance.

[@pedrojorge1912]

The argument that turns would have too higher values comparable to the top acro skills and replace them is completely nonsense. Gomez and Mustafina are E, the same value as a Tsukahara or Double Arabian, if turns were that easier as people makes look, Gomez and Mustafinas wouldn't be so rare in comparison with the equivalent acro. Allow 6, 7, 8 turns, and I'm absolutely sure the acro counterparts would still be way more popular.

[@cocoroni1031]

C dance elements are actually replacing D acro elements now. Most gymnasts currently do 3 acros as minimum. Removing the cap will just make more people do minimal amount of acros and attempt as many turns as possible. Imbalance is bad for the sports.

[@marc6186]

@@cocoroni1031 as much as i want to see these elegant turns more in competition (except for the ugly wolf turns), i also dislike seeing gymnasts only perform bare minimum acros (just making sure to get all compositional requirements), and then fill the routine with dance elements. of course between an E rated turn or dance element, and a full-in double tucked/double arabian/triple twist with the same value, for sure gymansts would prefer the one where they would get the least deductions. in turns/dance you could get deductions usually from lack of balance/precision only, but in acros, you have deductions for hops, feet separation, low chest landing, flexed feet, etc., which will net a lower E score

[@Leader-fq1dq]

I like all turns except the wolf. Don't care if they down grade that one

[@bannockmuncher]

the olympic comity really should just remove gymnastics and put in Artistic roller skating. Gymnastics has had so many scandals that it should be penalized and not allowed to partake in the games for a decade. plenty of time to clean up its sport.