The return of Dalaloyan and the possible repetition of Latynina's record: what is interesting about artistic gymnastics at the Tokyo Games

Five years ago, at the Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Russian gymnasts won two silver medals in the team all-around. The masculine looked especially valuable. It's not even that the Russian guys managed to win the award after 16 non-mediocre Olympic years, and in the quality of work - 18 error-free approaches out of 18. The girls were less fortunate: the margin of safety in comparison with the leaders - the American team - turned out to be small, and the gap between the US team made more than eight points.

The trend continued at the 2018 world championship in Qatar: the Russian men's team lost only 0.049 points to the winners, the Chinese, while the women lagged behind the US team by 8.766.

In the same place, in Qatar, Arthur Dalaloyan became the absolute world champion, who returned the title to the country, which Russian gymnastics had not had for 19 years.

A year later, Nikita Nagorny became the winner (ahead of Dalaloyan) at the pre-Olympic world championship in Stuttgart.

There he won another personal discipline - vault, and the team gold became the main award.

The first since the triumph of the USSR national team in 1991.

In other words, everything went to the fact that in Tokyo the Russian men's team will make a splash.

But a pandemic struck, due to which the 2020 Games were postponed for a year.

And the injuries began.

One of the most tangible blows for the Russian team was the loss of Ivan Stretovich. He had long had problems with his wrist, and when he realized that he would have to wait another year for the Olympic performance, he honestly admitted to the coaches that he could no longer endure the pain - he would be operated on. Before the European Championship this season, Dalaloyan was out of action with a very serious damage to the Achilles, and after a while the world champion, seven-time European champion and winner of two medals Rio David Belyavsky injured his ankle.

An absolutely unexpected surprise, rather even a miracle, was that Dalaloyan was able to return to duty just three months after the operation. And so confidently that it was decided to entrust the athlete to perform on four Olympic shells out of six. What was the reason for such a quick recovery - a successful operation or the persistence of a patient who began working on Achilles almost the next day after surgery, the coaches did not understand, but the head of the men's team Valery Alfosov confirmed: there were no such precedents in national gymnastics.

Veteran of the men's team Denis Ablyazin is also a story of difficult injuries and long recovery.

However, by this summer, the athlete has completely restored the rings, jump, floor exercises and was selected for the national team.

The main Russian all-rounder remains the absolute world champion-2019, eight-time European champion and the only performer in the world on the carpet of a triple bend over Nagorny.

Did the extra year of waiting for the Olympics go to the minus for the team?

“If the Games were postponed for a month or two, we would have found an opportunity to keep the already formed form. But when it became known that the competition would take place in a year at best, I immediately said that many countries might have completely different teams. As, in fact, it happened. After all, the same Stretovich simply did not have time to recover. But we, I hope, will remain among those who will fight very seriously in Tokyo, ”Alfosov replied.

Games-2021, not yet started, have lost one of the main shows - participation on the crossbar of the legendary "Flying Dutchman" Epke Sonderland, Olympic champion in London and three-time world champion on this apparatus. At the Games in Rio, the athlete did not get on the podium, and this season he did not manage to qualify at all. So that the final program of the gymnastic tournament, the crossbar may well become the farewell triumph of the three-time Olympic champion Kohei Uchimura. The Japanese, who won twice in the all-around, received a personal license for his fourth Games on the only and most powerful apparatus for himself, and we can already say that the whole world will cheer for the legendary gymnast in Tokyo.

Oksana Chusovitina is to become an equally legendary newsmaker in the women's tournament.

The 46-year-old 1992 Olympic gold medalist will represent Uzbekistan.

She confirmed that she plans to climb the pedestal.

"I am preparing a vault very seriously, its difficulty is no different from the difficulty of the jumps of those girls who performed in the finals of the World Championships in Stuttgart and are performing now, so I think that it is quite possible to fight for a medal," said the athlete shortly before the Olympic games.

Although the main character, of course, remains the American Simone Biles.

If in Tokyo the four-time Olympic champion and 19-time world champion repeats the result shown at the last world championship (where Biles won five gold medals out of six possible), she will repeat Larisa Latynina's unique Olympic record.

Can this happen in practice?

Quite.

The same Chusovitina noted that she categorically does not support the conversations walking in the sports environment that Biles is winning largely due to the fact that he has a therapeutic permission to use quite powerful psychotropic drugs.

“I saw how Simone trains.

She spends eight hours a day in the gym.

It plows on shells the way we once plowed in the USSR national team.

After that, I would definitely not say that Simona wins dishonestly, ”said the titled gymnast.

As for the Russian national team and its leader Angelina Melnikova, it is definitely not worth guessing here. After the April European Championship, where Russian girls won gold and silver in the all-around (Victoria Listunova and Melnikova), on the uneven bars (Melnikova and Vladislav Urazova), and Angelina also won bronze in the vault and silver in floor exercises, the same Chusovitina said that, in her opinion, the Russian national team is quite capable of fighting in Tokyo with the Americans. It sounds fantastic, of course, but the Olympic Games are a tournament where sensations and miracles happen more often than in any other competition. Why shouldn't the Russian women smile at their sports destiny this time?