To my knowledge Cheng Fei of China, the reigning Olympic and World Vault Champion has only competed on Vault, Beam and Floor in the past few years. Why is that? Why isn’t she an All Around gymnast? You would think that it’s because she is significantly sub par on Bars and has therefore been relegated to a position on the Chinese National Team as a specialist. Now, granted she may not be quite up to the Chinese standard on Bars but she’s certainly not bad by any stretch of the imagination. Check out this youtube video of her as a junior in 2003.
As you can see she certainly has the technique and body line to be fantastic on Bars. And supposing she was only so-so on this event she would still be a threat for All Around gold in any competition she entered. Don’t believe me? Check out her Beam performance from the recent Shanghai World Cup earlier this year.
She scored a 16.10 and won the gold for that routine (and rightfully so). So why doesn’t she compete Bars? Anyone know?
October 16th, 2007 at 8:10 pm
getting her to train bars must take up quite alot of time… that wouldn’t give her enough time to focus on her specialty: vault and floor. thus if she trains bars, her performance on vault floor and even beam will be compromised… not to mention the risk of injury,
i’m sure the coach would rather cheng fei have a great shot at winning two individual golds than to try for an all around medal where one mistake would take you of out medal contention…
October 17th, 2007 at 1:49 pm
Thanks for your comment, Titan. You make a valid point. I guess I’m still not sure how I feel about the the advent of the event specialist. It used to be that nothing was as important as the All Around. Individual event medals were icing on the cake but the All Around medal was the ultimate prize and that no longer seems to be the case. Maybe I’ll write a post about it. I’m curious what others think about this shift in our sport.
October 18th, 2007 at 6:37 pm
I don’t get it… I don’t understand what is so special about the chinese and bars? Maybe it’s me, but I do not like the (never had, not even at the 1996 Olympics) work the bar, especially in terms of release moves… it seems like they come a dead hang and I think it looks bad. Yes they’re high flyers but still. I also think their size is part of the problem… I like the longer look that Nastia gives but she is at the top of the range for me (I hated “The Diva, Svetlana). As for her beam, she is Good so all I have to say is the Beinji Olympics should be interesting!
October 19th, 2007 at 3:06 am
i do understand that gymnastics can be subjective but the beauty of the chinese on uneven bars is undeniable…
their impeccable form, their gorgeous body lines, their rhythm, their pirouettes, everything about the chinese on bars is beautiful…
i do acknowledge that they come to a dead hang pretty often but if you watch closely, even nastia comes to a dead hang in her routines. i think the chinese are often tiny and that makes it more obvious whenever they muscle themselves up…
and what is it that you hate about khorkina? she has 6 european titles, 5 world titles and 2 olympic titles on bars. i think that attests to her wonderful bars work.
October 19th, 2007 at 7:31 am
I don’t agree with you Titan. I don’t think they’re bar work is beautiful. I will give them they have the difficulty but something about the way they move on the bars has always gotten to me.
I hate her attitude and I don’t particularly liked her style. The fact that Khorkina acted like she has when people beat her is very annoying and it really turns me off. It’s the same reason I don’t like Michelle Kwan or Johnny Wier in Figure Skating
October 21st, 2007 at 5:48 pm
I hated Khorkina’s bars because I hated her giants. If you can even call them that. I never understood how she was consistently considered this bar worker for the ages if she couldn’t even keep an open shoulder angle on giants. I’m sure her height had something to do with it, but she was often more parallel to the floor than perpendicular at the top of her giant, with bent arms and a hollowed out position that flirted with piked. That wasn’t a giant, that was an entirely different skill. I never understood why there wasn’t a deduction for that.
Aside from that, while her height no doubt worked for her on beam and floor, I think it made her look sloppy on bars. She did have superior skills and innovation though…
October 25th, 2007 at 12:04 pm
I think you make an excellent point. I believe she would be China’s strongest contender for an all-around medal, but it doesn’t seem to be a priority for anyone. The team medal is without question the prize that everyone is gunning for as a first priority, and then I would say there is equal weight given to the all-around medal as well as individual event final medals. I think you can make parallels to other sports. In track there is a medal for the decathlon for men or heptathlon for women, which is one competition with only one medal awarded. I doubt that there is any more weight given to the winner of a decathlon vs. the 100 meters or the pole vault or the 400 meters. In swimming there is the individual medley, which is an event where the swimmer has to do all of the different strokes (butter, back, breast, free), but again this is just one event with one medal given and not necessarily cherished more than just a medal for freestyle or butterfly or backstroke. I think you get the point. Anyway, it does seem that the sport is evolving that way. I had the same thought that you did about Cheng Fei during the US Nationals this year. If you go back and look at Alicia Sacramone’s scores on day 2, if you combine her beam, floor, and vault scores, she is I believe in first place. A bars score in the high 13’s or low 14’s would easily place her second in the all-around.
October 26th, 2007 at 10:22 am
the point that you guys are missing is that if sacramone or cheng become all-around gymnasts, their quality on the other three events (vault, beam and floor) will undoubtedly suffer. and as i have mentioned, the risk of injury is greatly increased too. besides, china and america have no lack of all around gymnasts who do not have an obvious weak event. i still believe that gunning for individual event medals will be a lot more reasonable than to ask cheng and sacramone to train bars and compete in the all around.
October 26th, 2007 at 12:25 pm
So I think the real question becomes what’s the value of the all-around gymnastics medal?
November 5th, 2007 at 4:06 pm
My thought is while Fei might put in an excellent show for the AA. She already trains 7+ hours a day and min 6 days a week. She is pushed (like all the Chinese) very hard… I’m thankful for her sake that they are not trying to make her AA. I think the coaches realise that she can be a huge asset to the team and herself… and pick up 3 golds without having to be an AA and they’d rather let her do that then maybe achieve AA without any individual golds. The Chinese a focussed on winning at Beijing, so 2 golds definitely beats 1.
The head coach recently said that Cheng’s mentality was one thing that kept him from making her the all around prospect. She is apparently very quiet/ withdrawn (something like that) personality, and likes to have things 100% perfect in training before she’ll attempt them in competition (I read this on a Youtube interview translation). He said she is not willing to attempt semi-unstable moves in competition (unlike other gymnasts he’s trained). He also said we may yet see her compete for the AA in Beijing but it will depend on how she goes, they are not forcing her at present, he also in another interview mentions risk of injury. Which I mean look at her current schedule, any more and you might break the kid.
She is my favourite gymnast though and I hope she has a perfect injury-free prep for the games and wins everything she can.
November 30th, 2007 at 7:15 pm
[...] Speaking of Event Specialists, Cheng Fei’s recent announcement that she will no longer train bars. You know my thoughts on this subject. [...]
March 30th, 2008 at 12:53 pm
Cheng Fei has won 5 golds at World championships but has not won any olympic medals yet.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheng_Fei
March 31st, 2008 at 6:32 am
Most people think she should have won a medal for floor in the 2004 olympics. Unless she has a major breakdown, she will be the favorite for floor and vault in 2008.
May 13th, 2008 at 5:36 pm
love her. She is fantastic, but she should not be pushed harder.
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January 27th, 2009 at 3:28 am
Cheng Fei does not train on bars because she suffers from acrophobia.