Kharenkova For Gym Gala 2015

Maria Kharenkova will participate in the Belgium Gym Gala on December 12-13. The gala features all of the disciplines and will be headlined by Belgium's biggest stars, including their women's European & World gold medal acro team. The entire cast of performers can be found here and tickets can still be purchased here. 

Aliya at the Gym Gala in 2013. She incorporated traditional
Russian folk dance in her beam and floor routine.

Speaking of Maria Kharenkova, she was mentioned at the Glasgow press conference as an Olympic reserve athlete by Andrei Rodionenko, because it's recommended by the experts to publicly humiliate your girls eight months before the Games, and several months before anything concrete can be established. Kharenkova is joined by Seda Tutkhalyan, Daria Skrypnik, and Natalia Kapitanova. The "Olympic training team" is Aliya, Vika, Maria (Paseka), Daria (Spiridonova), Ksenia, and Angelina. Ekaterina Sokova was missing from both lists so presumably she's still coming back from injury and won't be a factor in time for Rio. I'm unsure of what Andrei's vision for this team is since he didn't name Komova as an AAer for next year, doesn't think floor is their worst event, and says they'll concentrate on beam specialists. In my opinion, beam is their most inconsistent- rather than their worst- event with the difference being that it takes a fall on BB to get them into the 13's while a hit floor routine scores much the same, for all the girls except Ksenia... and Aliya (when she's 'on'). 

Do you like the Olympic training team? Who out of those six girls will be trained as beam specialists, since Maria and Seda are reserves? Aliya will do AA so that's one down, and Valentina mentioned Melka having a 6.7 BB so that may indicate her filling Kharenkova's void, and I think they'll try to boost Vika's beam if her ankle is willing, lol. They'll probably try to get Afan to a healthy SV but seeing as she didn't want to to take up the apparatus in her comeback, I don't think she'll try anything ambitious enough to get into a beam final. Sadly. 

I know Andrei's intention in naming a team was not to humiliate anyone but regardless of whether these are the players he has on his mind, saying it publicly (in November of all times!) can be a bit demoralizing to some, no? Some girls will bloom while others will stagnate or decline, and injuries can change everything. I'm sure Kharenkova and Seda already realized they had a pit to dig themselves out of after their Worlds performances, but if they felt like the new year would bring a clean slate* and equal consideration, maybe 2016 is the year they step up? Kharenkova in particular should not be discounted, because her career was on an incline before a back injury forced her to downgrade and miss crucial training for months. I would prefer if he hadn't said anything, is all; the head coaches are already known for favoritism (hello, Dementyeva/Grishina controversy) and this isn't inspiring confidence.  

*In gymnastics, asking for a clean slate isn't fair. It's only reasonable that your past results factor into decisions, but a clean slate can also be done psychologically. "Turning the page" and improving on who you are as an individual (or in this case, an athlete) would be beneficial to Seda and Maria. I just hope they kill it with upgrades this winter and impress the right people, because it would be silly to relegate them to reserve status and not even try to send them to some quality competitions.