London 2012 Test Event

The Olympic year is finally here and this week all gymnastics disciplines will have a final chance to qualify teams or athletes to the olympic games.


Katie from Full Twist and other bloggers will beat the O2 to report on the event. Here is her great preview on the event.

The main event will be the team qualifications for artistic gymnastics, with the teams ranked 9th-16th at the Tokyo worlds competing for the final 4 team spots to London. The teams are:

MAG

1. Belarus
2. Brazil
3. Great Britain
4. Canada
5. Spain
6. France
7. Italy
8. Puerto Rico

WAG

1. Belgium
2. Canada
3. Brazil
4. France
5. Spain
6. Italy
7. Korea
8. Netherlands

As well as the team competition, for many of the lower ranked gymnastics nations this is their one chance to qualify individual gymnasts to the games, and an opportunity for the nations who have had a disappointing year and failed to qualify teams to the event to regain some pride, particularly Switzerland and Ukraine, countries with a strong medal record on the world stage who due to injuries and retirements had a disappointing 2011.

Being the first major international event of 2012, the test event will also be a chance for us to finally see some of the 'rookie' seniors who were too young to compete in 2011 but will definitely be in contention for a spot on their nation's teams in 2012.

The full list of participants is here, Some of the new or rising names to look out for will be:

Victoria Moors (Canada)
Erika Fasana (Italy)
Rebecca Tunney & Jocelyn Hunt (GB)
Ana Sofia Gomez Porraz (Guatemala)
Anastasia Grishina & Julia Inshina (Russia)
Nadia Muelhauser (Suitzerland)

Along with established names:
Sui Lu & Yao Jinnan (China)
Jessica Lopez (Venezuela)
Giulia Steingruber (Suitzerland)
Jade Barbossa (Brazil)
Kristina Vaculik & Peng Peng Lee (Canada)
Vanessa Ferrari & Carlotta Ferlito (Italy)
Youna Dufournet (France)

The event is sadly not being broadcast on TV but there will be plenty of online coverage from the following bloggers

• Full Twist – Twitter – Facebook
• The All Around - Twitter – Facebook
• Gym Power – Twitter – Facebook
• Gymnastics Examiner – Twitter - Facebook
• Gymnastics Coaching - Twitter – Facebook
• Gym Blog Brazil – Twitter – Facebook
• Grace Chiu will be taking photographs at the event

as well as from British Gymnastics, the FIG event website and youtube channel.