I believe xtisme was referring to what he said in post #98.
Yes.
I won’t say I don’t care about them being underage, but it’s not my own main issue. It just adds to it if they are. My main issue, assuming you don’t want to go back and look at my earlier post, is with the Chinese taking those little girls from their families at such young ages…really, at ANY age is bad enough for the state to do something like that, but at 3 or 4? If I believed in God I would fervently wish for burning pits and devils with sharp, red hot rusty pokers with lots of spiky things sticking out of them to jam up the asses of those responsible for such things in the name of winning a few bits of shiny metal for their nation. Repeatedly. Forever. And a day…
-XT
You know, that actually sounds like a decent idea. I wonder though, would weight/height/size divisions shift the way gymnasts are trained/compete, or would the shifting in training have to happen first?
Glad to see that I’m not the only one who was intrigued by the idea. I want weight divisions in gymnastics.
The entirety of evidence for the athlete in question being underage consists of a couple of Google caches of old news reports that were corrected 4 days after their release, with an explanation for the error.
I’d say it definitely is, but I don’t think anyone expects any better from the Americans, so who really cares. These are the same people who believed they were under imminent attack from Iraqi WMDs, after all, anything you find on the internet is obviously always true.
This stuff was under scrutiny before the games started. For obvious reasons it’s gotten more attention lately.
AL: A good effort by Throatwarbler in Gratuitious Country Bashing, but I’d have liked to see something more original that “I don’t think anyone expects better from the Americans.” In this stiff competition, he may be out of the medals race on that one. Elfi?
ELFI: I agree, Al. It’s the snarkiness we’ve come to expect from Throatwarbler, but you’ve got to have originality at this level. Extra points for dragging Iraqi WMDs into a gymnastics thread, though! That should put him in medal contention for Most Tortured Comparison. Provided he passes the age and weight requirements, though. And the drug test.
HA! 
A torture award going to someone not from the United States? Impossible!
The reason I asked about “sour grapes” was that, near the end of the CNN video I linked, a former American Olympian gymnast (Amanda Borden, at about 2:38) said something along the lines of “if the Americans had won the gold, we wouldn’t be as concerned.”
Hard to tell, but it seems that Amanda does not seem as outraged. She did state (earlier in the interview) that smaller (younger) gymnasts definately have an advantage, flexibilty specifically.
I figured since Amanda had been inside the sport/industry, her hint/suggestion might carry some validity.
Hope nobody thought I was deliberately trying to be a putz. 
Out of curiosity (not directed at mlees), why in a thread to Pit China does it have to move back to being about the US? Is it impossible to stay focused on Pitting a nation OTHER than the US…or does everything have to be in terms of what the US has done, is doing, thinking or whatever?
BTW, IIRC the US took gold and silver in womens gymnastics last night…does this mean that there is no longer any controversy about the ages of the Chinese female gymnasts? Was it only US citizens who were concerned about those ages and the possibility that a country so fucked in the head it would take 3 year old children from their parents and force them to be athletes for the state would also stoop to changing their passports or birth certificates so that they could get them in THIS Olympics?
Seems like there SHOULD be plenty of vile things to say about China without needing to involve the US in the discussion…
-XT
Well, exactly. My daughter is 4, and when Tim Daggett made that comment about children being taken out of daycare centers to enter the program, it gave me a cold chill. Faking their ages is the least of it, and one of the reasons people have a problem with it is that it’s just one symptom of a serious disease.
You can say what you want about the US…we have our share of cheaters, and the way gymnastics is run overall is probably not what it should be. But we are talking here about an overall system that involves doing whatever it takes to win gold medals…and I don’t just mean pushing the athletes a little harder than maybe they should.
If the Americans had won the gold, the Chinese would have less reason to continue doing it. There’s little point cheating if it doesn’t help you win.
Err, what? I don’t believe most cheaters think that way. If you’re cheating and you don’t win, the thing done is to cheat more - not quit cheating. If you’ve had to cheat to come in second, you wouldn’t stop cheating because then you would be less likely to finish second.
You’re probably right. I was just thinking that if they were cheating and they couldn’t win even with the home-ground judging advantage, it’s either because they really suck or the cheating was counterproductive.
It sounds good on the surface, but what would end up happening is that the gymnasts would have the added pressure of having to drastically drop weight before competition – because there’s no way they’ll be allowed to compete at their natural bodyweights.
In some of the more extreme national programs, you might have competitors more or less forcibly starved to drop a few pounds from already lean bodies. Water could be simlarly withheld for maybe 36 hours or so to shave off a half-pound or something.
So then you have a starved, dehydrated athlete trying to execute extremely difficult skills on dangerous apparatus. The lack of food and water will affect reflexes and coordination. Not a pretty picture.
bordelond, I am not personally in favor of weight classes in gymnastics, but I don’t think there would be those kinds of problems. The advantage in gymnastics would be the opposite than that in, say, wrestling. That is, it would be to the gymnast’s advantage to be the lightest person in a heavier weight class, not the heaviest person in a lighter weight class. Which is not to say the system wouldn’t be abused…I have no doubt it would be…but I doubt in the way you are saying.
I’m not sure the way we do it is miles better than their way, though. Since I know you’re a reader, take a look at Little Girls In Pretty Boxes (if you haven’t read it yet, it’s been out a while). It’s about the pressure put on girls in competative gymnastics and figure skating in the States. It’s a really interesting and balanced book; it doesn’t bash the sports but it certainly concludes the training regimens are problematic.
But let’s not forget the rigorous standards that the Gold Medal for All Around demands: The Godwin Factor.
By my reckoning, Throat, in a massive oversight that must have his coaches punching walls, neglected to um, factor in the er, Godwin Factor. This is a disaster of major proportions for any serious contender…
I was thinking the same thing. I feel like there’s something wrong with your sport if 16-year-olds consistently perform better than 22-year-olds, despite the fact that 22-year-olds are stronger, faster, and obviously more experienced. I guess it must be the nature of the women’s events, since men’s gymnastics seems to be dominated by athletes in their 20s.