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Simone Biles and his 'double-double' should make you think

2019-10-22T19:37:39.832Z


Breaking even more barriers at the World Championship in Stuttgart, Germany, Simone Biles makes - with 24 medals so far in the championship (and after winning the general competition with e ...


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Editor's Note: Ella Donald is a journalist and scholar from Brisbane, Australia. The opinions expressed in this comment are those of the author.

(CNN) - For now, the news that Simone Biles triumphed in another championship and, in addition, two original gymnastics movements now bear his name, are almost as surprising as the news that a competition occurred.

Breaking even more barriers at the World Championship in Stuttgart, Germany, Simone Biles makes - with 24 medals so far in the championship (and after winning the general competition with the greatest margin in history) - become the most decorated gymnast from history it seems something already expected.

What a privilege it is, for all of us who find Biles' performances so exciting, to be able to talk about such genius so informally.

But even for an athlete who has reached an unusual level of public attention (gymnastics is generally ignored unless it is an Olympic year), his appearance in Stuttgart encountered a rare amount of excitement. You see, while Biles was preparing to make history once again by writing down his two new movements in the record books when making those movements in an international competition, the controversy was brewing. The governing body of gymnastics issued a ruling on the difficulty of Biles's eponymous movements that authoritatively weakens the power of representation that elite athletes have over themselves. This ruling turns a blind eye to the changes in sport that a new generation of gymnasts - led by Biles - has introduced as to what women can do.

The triple double of Biles (double backflip with three turns, also known as Biles II) on the floor was undoubtedly approved by the governing body of world gymnastics as a J-value movement, the greatest degree of difficulty, but double double (two turns, two laps) beam landing was quickly reduced to an H value.

Out of context, the values ​​of the two letters seem small: the J is worth a point of complete difficulty, while the H carries a value of 0.8 but, in fact, symbolizes a chasm of difficulty: on Twitter, a fan pointed out that the Biles' new move was only worth 0.1 points more than the commonly-made full-in (double fold with a full turn). In a sport in which the margin of victory is often very narrow, the designation of difficulty has an enormous weight. In 2017, when Morgan Hurd, the non-favorite as a recent competitor at the top level, won the full title in the World Championship, her victory was only 0.1 against Canada's Ellie Black.

The women's technical committee of the International Gymnastics Federation (FIG), the governing body of the sport, said that reducing the difficulty is to prevent gymnasts, mainly from countries seeking to make their way on the world stage, try the risky movement to improve your score. "When assigning values ​​to the new elements, the women's technical committee (WTC) takes into account many different aspects: the risk, the safety of the gymnasts and the technical direction of the discipline," they said in a statement. This is commonly seen in performances in which the Produnova vault movement is performed (a front handspring on the beam and two forward somersaults), the toughest in gymnastics, known for its deadly potential: a slightly deflected run and launch can mean a landing directly on the neck. "I'm not trying to die," Biles told the New Yorker when asked if he was going to try.

In fact, gymnastics in 2019 is a sport that has continually been driven to reach new heights, a sport that experiences and is freed from previous rigid ideas. Not adequately rewarding someone's work like Biles, blatantly rejecting the greatest innovation and enthusiasm that currently defines it, is to contradict the system as a whole. "They keep asking us to make it more difficult and to give more art, to provide more difficult movements," Biles told NBC after the triple double decision was adopted. "Then we do it, and then they don't prove it, and I don't think it's fair."

LOOK: Simone Biles is better than ever and is redefining her sport

Objections on the double double may seem minor, after all, it is an individual movement. However, apart from the debates about the power an athlete has over his own body, the measure on the new Biles movement reaches the bottom of the sport. In 2006, the award of points was modified, moving from the “perfect 10” system, personified by the legendary Romanian gymnast Nadia Comaneci (the first to obtain that score), to an open system.

Under the most recent method, gymnasts receive a “D” (difficulty) and “E” (execution) score, which respectively comprise the assigned values ​​of what they do and the accuracy with which they do it. The result is unlimited potential for scores and, as a result, for what can be achieved: internationally, the highest score awarded under this system went to Nastia Liukin (USA) and He Kexin (China) in the Game Olympic of 2008, where both obtained scores of 16,725 in asymmetric bars. Since both obtained the same score from panels A and B, the judges observed the duo's E scores throughout the panel and, Liukin, with 0.033 more deductions, finally received the silver medal.

Introduced after jury errors in the 2004 Olympic Game, the open system has come to symbolize a change in gymnastics; Now, it is a game of difficulty and experimentation, pressing the gymnasts to make movements that can raise the scores a few tenths more. Athletes are making more impressive moves, be it a double-back design with a double turn on the floor (also known as Moors, named for the Canadian Olympic competitor withdrawal Victoria Moors) or Amanar in the jump. The domain is now reserved for university gymnastics, the only form of sport that, at a higher level, retains the “10” system (the enduring enthusiasm for that system was in sight recently when the gymnastic floor routine Katelyn Ohashi , from the University of California at Los Angeles, which scored a perfect 10, went viral). On the international stage, less is not more.

LOOK: The record that puts Simone Biles in history

It is fortuitous that Biles appeared at such a time in this sport. An athlete apparently made for the inconclusive design of the unlimited system, who is able to balance the demands of greater difficulty with those of safety. The prolonged fascination with her exploits has helped her catapult gymnastics to a higher level of attractiveness and awareness, which had not been seen since the seventies and eighties with the perfect scores of Nadia Comaneci and Mary Lou Retton.

It is an exciting time to witness gymnastics, a reminder of genius and possibility in the face of the continuing problems of the US sports federation for gymnastics. Each appearance in competition and each new movement encounters a burst of amazement and media attention, incredulous before the imagined limits that Biles continues to ignore. The pure physical power of Biles - it has so much energy that it sometimes bounces even after a long pass - projects a sense of limitless possibilities for spectators around the world.

For someone who in a few obtained a domain that pushes the limits, Biles is also prudent and considerate when it comes to taking risks, because it only adds difficulty when he trusts in a safe performance. On Twitter, for example, the bronze medalist of the 2017 British and World Olympic team, Ruby Harrold, said FIG should allow warm-ups immediately before the end of the event. However, at a deeper level, the treatment of Biles' initiatives by FIG raises a more existential question for the future of gymnastics and women's sports. If the best in the world is not rewarded for its innovation in sports, then who will be?

Simone Biles

Source: cnnespanol

All news articles on 2019-10-22

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