ICYMI

Artur Dalaloyan is training a triple twisting double tuck and a front full to triple. 

In RG, an extract of Margarita Mamun's new hoop routine has been leaked. Viner says eight girls are officially in the running for the two Olympic berths allocated to the AA. (x)

Continuing with RG, Yana Kudryavtseva is back in Germany to continue rehab and is feeling much better. Her ankle is almost fully healed and by next week she will begin harder training. While in Germany, she has met many famous athletes including Mario Gotze, a footballer on the German national team (who shot the winning goal for his country against Argentina in the World Cup last year). 

The competitive season continues for our Russian juniors. Top Gym begins on the 28th and will feature Anastasia Iliankova and one my favorite's for next quad, Uliana Perebinosova. Due to recent events in Belgium, the organization has faced withdrawals from Canada and USA and will no longer be streamed by FloGymnastics. This may be a blessing in disguise because the meet was streamed for free last year so those of us who didn't have subscriptions to FloGymnastics wouldn't have been able to watch it anyways. Let's hope that the organizers are not too discouraged and give us a free livestream in the absence of FloGymnastcs. Saturday will see the AA competition serve as qualifications for team finals and event finals. Finals will commence the following day. 

Vika, Afan, Spiri, and Paseka will be competing at the Tokyo Cup on Dec. 12-13th. Afan and Masha will do VT/FX and Vika and Dasha will do UB/BB. (x) (x)

It is with great regret that I convey the news of the passing of Soviet gymnast, Valentin Mogilny. He was a 10 time European champion and a 5 time World champion, known best for his stunning work on pommel horse. His later life saw medical problems prevail, and this past Sunday (the 22nd) saw him pass of a heart attack in France, where he has resided for 20 years. Perhaps the RFG website is just getting better at telling us news but it seems so many Soviet gymnasts have passed away this year, and at such "young" ages! R.I.P Valentin Mogilny. (x) (x)

In a campaign aimed at recruiting more international gymnasts to swell its ranks, the Azerbaijan Federation has released this video promoting the country's luxurious city, and will soon release a second video showing its world class training facilities. Many Russian and Ukrainian gymnasts have been "lured" to Azerbaijan's RG and AG program (while AFG builds its own native team from scratch) because of the great financial support and training resources they are given. We may sneer at Azerbaijan's tactless way of going about this, but at the heart of this matter I see gymnasts saying that they need a living income, and most aren't achieving that. At this moment, Spanish gymnast Filipa Martins is on gofundme.com asking for 70 thousand euros to buy a home. For his successful medal haul at the European Games, Oleg Stepko (AZE) was given more than half a million euros...