Rhythmics gymnastics soap opera goes global

Top Ukrainian athlete boycotts world championship



By Steve Gutterman
ASSOCIATED PRESS

KYIV - A mounting conflict within Ukraine's rhythmic
gymnastics establishment has prompted 1996 Olympic
all-around gold medalist Yekaterina Serebryanskaya to
 pull out of the upcoming world championships.
Serebryanskaya said Tuesday Oct. 21 that the conflict,
capped by the selection of her chief rival's mother as the
Ukrainian judge in the world championships, has made her
own mother and coach ill and motivated her decision to skip
the competition, which begins later this week in Berlin.
"Naturally when she asked them to appoint a neutral judge
and they refused, her heart did not hold up,"
Serebryanskaya said of her mother, Lyubov Serebryanskaya.
"And when she went green and slowly slumped against the
wall, I understood that while the world championships are
very important and mean prestige for the nation ... I
couldn't leave her home alone and leave the country not
knowing what would happen to her," she said.
Serebryanskaya expressed doubt that Nina Vitrichenko, the
coach and mother of rival gymnast Yelena Vitrichenko, would
be an objective judge. The Ukrainian State Sport Committee
named the elder Vitrichenko as the Ukrainian judge in
Berlin.
Serebryanskaya claimed that the committee's decision to
decline her mother's request for what she perceived would
be a neutral judge was made under pressure from the
national Federation of Rhythmic Gymnastics and its head,
former champion gymnast Irina Deryugina.
Lyubov Serebryanskaya, who also has served as a judge,
heads the Ukrainian Federation of Gymnastics, which has
been locked in a struggle with Deryugina's group for
several years.
Yekaterina Serebryanskaya blamed Deryugina for spoiling her
relationship with gymnast Vitrichenko.
"We were very good friends. I had no closer friend than
Lena. We talked about boys and shared things we bought. We
shared everything," Serebryanskaya said. "By driving a
wedge between us, Deryugina is taking the heat off
herself."
Serebryanskaya and Vitrichenko competed in the 1996
Olympics, where Serebryanskaya won the gold medal after
dropping her ribbon in her final routine. The Atlanta crowd
jeered when Vitrichenko earned a lower score with a routine
free of obvious errors and won the bronze medal.
The two camps have traded accusations of unfairness and
have begun battling in the Ukrainian press, with Deryugina
accusing Serebryanskaya of "treason" against Ukraine in an
article published Tuesday.

---! Now, my comments !---

-In this article shows the great problem concerning rhythmic gymnastics: the judges. And it's not only a problem of the international gymnasts, but also of normal gymnatsts as me, who compete for example at regional competitions. In my opinion, however, Serebryanskaya wasn't exagerating when she said that the decision to select Deryougina as Ukranian judge has caused her mother's heart not to hold up. I think it's obvious: how can a mother who has been training hardly her daughter for 15 years react, when she suddenly learns that she wouldn't win the World Championships due to an inequity? But, in the same way, what kind of "neutral judgment" could have received Elena, who also had trained hardly, at the Olympics, when she got a bronze medal for what seemed to be a perfect exercise, when Ekaterina arrived first although she dropped the ribbon? It doesn't matter if it was due to the conditioned air of the palasport, this is another question. An objective judgement was mathematically impossible, from both Irina Deryougina and Lyubov Serebryanskaya; So, WHOSE FAULT IS IT? Well, I accuse nor Elena or Ekaterina, Deryougina or Serebryanskaya, but the Ukranian State Sport Committee: is it possible that in a nation, as big as Ukraine, there couldn't be a neutral judge? But now there hasn't been only (ONLY?) a World Championships title at stake,there is also a human life... I think it's simply shameful-

Laura Vigna <3

This article has been taken from "The Ukraine Newspaper"