Anything But Routine
Okay, so last time I made a Top 10 list of my favourite floor routines ever (I kinda forgot the fantastic routine Dominique Dawes did in 1992 and 1993, but luckily RJL commented on that!). I promised that my next post would be a list of the worst floor routines ever, so here goes….
After a lot of deliberating, I decided to narrow it down to just three routines. Unfortunately, there seems to be a theme (a lot of Romanian routines from the late 1970s!).
Honourable Mention: Emilia Eberle (ROM), 1977 USA vs. Romania
I was debating whether or not I should include this floor routine. It’s definitely not my cup of tea, but it is bizarrely whimsical and the choreography matches the music quite well (though the only video I can find has been dubbed!). I don’t think I can watch the slow-mo part from 0:47-0:52 with a straight face.
3. Nadia Comaneci (ROM), 1978 World Championships
Too bad this floor routine comes courtesy of the perfect Nadia Comaneci. She deserves better than this! Was Marta Karolyi behind this floor choreography?
2. Kerri Strug (USA), 1996 American Cup
Something about this routine just rubs me the wrong way, and it ain’t the tumbling. The little move at 1:12 really has no place on an international stage, but the best part of the whole video is when the divine Svetlana Boginskaya stands up at 1:18 and does her best imitation!
1. Gabi Gheorghiu (ROM), 1978 Romanian National Championships
This routine was choreographed by none other than Marta Karolyi, and it’s got to be the worst monstrosity I’ve ever seen. What were they thinking?! I have no idea what’s going on at 1:08.
But hey, at least these routines have choreography! There have been some routines in the past few years that hardly have any due to all the tumbling and leap requirements. Jade Barbosa (BRA), Park Eun Kyung (KOR) and even current World Floor Champion Beth Tweddle (GBR) come to mind. Even if a gymnast isn’t a natural dancer, she should be able to put together a cool and unusual routine like Mari Kosuge (JPN) managed in 1991 and Gina Gogean (ROM) demonstrated in 1992. Often the powerful gymnasts are the ones who lack dance skills, and that’s why I’m so excited that the complete package that is Russian Viktoria Komova has burst on to the scene. Now that the Code of Points requires fewer skills be packed into each routine, I hope that will give the choreographers a chance to shine as they did twenty years ago.
September 20th, 2010 at 5:17 pm
Yikes…! The Romanians probably didn’t have a whole lot of say in their training but someone should’ve said something!! At least they provided plenty of entertainment for the audience. I can’t recall any of Strug’s floor routines being great…the best one of her career was in ’93 (she was training at Dynamo and her routine was quite similar to Shannon Miller’s). This routine could’ve been an Olympic gold medal routine though…she qualified to event finals in first and with tumbling like that and the partisan Atlanta crowd, who knows??
October 24th, 2010 at 12:05 am
i think emile should just be on the list. i get that kerri strug’s doesn’t rub you the right way but i almost feel her choreo is representative of how it is now – questionable. some flapping going on between good tumbling passes. emile’s made me lol though. i’d believe if martha choreographed nadia’s and gabi’s routine – they both look like the funky chicken mixed with crazy spastic moments.
i don’t know why but koko tsurumi’s worlds fx rubbed me the wrong way. the music didn’t fit her nor did it fit the choreography. i felt like i was at a club trying to watch a gymnast do a floor routine that just wanted to stop and take a nap instead of tumble and prance around the floor.
hope everything’s ok since you haven’t updated in a bit!