Let's Talk About Tamara Lazakovich

Tamara Lazakovich was a beautiful Soviet gymnast of the early 70's who was overshadowed by her more successful and crowd-pleasing teammates Ludmilla Tourischeva and Olga Korbut. She made four individual finals in Munich and won bronze in the all around and on floor and silver on the beam. Her compulsory score was 38.25 and the highest of any individual compulsory all around score. At the 1971 European Championships, she won gold in the all around and on bars and beam and silver on vault and floor. Unfortunately, Tamara struggled with alcoholism later in life and died in 1992 at the age of 38.

This is a beautiful montage of Tamara. It's the only footage of her bars I've been able to find.

These were her Olympic vaults. A perfect Yamashita is beautiful!

Tamara qualified first into the balance beam final. After Karin Janz won the bars final, the crowd was at the judges' throats and there was very high pressure for Olga to win. Olga received the 9.90 score she needed to beat Tamara for the gold with her own spectacular routine. Tamara's routine is exemplary of all that was wonderful in early 70's beam. She has perfect control, beautiful balance on her hands, and beautiful artistic presentation.

Tamara's floor is my favorite routine of hers. She was in third going into the final but was the only gymnast of the top three not to have a noticeable error. She received the bronze behind Olga Korbut and Ludmilla Tourischeva and fell into tears. Her floor is classical and elegant yet avante-garde. It has wonderful tension and intensity. She combines staccato and legato movements expertly and creates a building energy all the way to her final movement.

40 Reasons to Love the Queen on Her 40th

It's Oksana Chusovitina's fortieth birthday! Yes, I realize her birthday is already pretty much over in Uzbekistan, but it's just getting started here, and I'm not going to post it a day early. Here's a birthday tribute to a living legend and our queen.

1. She doesn't compete Yurckenko vaults

2. Front pike beam mount

3. For the longest time she only wore sleeveless leos and was the only one who wouldn't get called out for it by the gymternet

source: zimbio.com

4. She has since started wearing sparkly meshy leotards meant for teenagers and been ROCKING THEM (she and Vasiliki need to start a club for that)

source: indianexpress.com

5. Queen Chuso and Svetlana Boginskaya are always a riot

6. Her floor music has included the theme from The Godfather and Pirates of the Caribbean

7. Split-leg double layout-punch front

8. As of today, she is officially twice the age of Vika, Jordyn, Gabby, and co.
9. She has 2016 in her IG username, just like a junior
10. Four eponymous skills
11. Including two on bars

12. She competed on the Soviet team with Valeri and competed against Nastia
13. And is still competing while Nastia has long since retired
14. Ninth in the all around in Beijing
15. She won a complete gold, silver, and bronze set of World/Olympic/Euros/Asian Games vault medals competing for both Germany and Uzebekistan
16. Even her competitors break out in cheers when her name is announced

source: masters-gymnastics.com

17. She gave birth in 1999. And competed at the Sydney Olympics.
18. Her son is as old as this year's new WAG seniors
19. She was the 2007 German national all around champion
20. Her husband is a fellow Olympian- and a wrestler, no less
21. Her two Olympic medals are over fifteen years apart
22. She competes at a bunch of smaller meets, including World Cups and a bunch of open meets

23. She has competed for longer under the 10 system than under the D+E system
24. And competed on a vault horse for ten years before the table
25. She was on the Uzbekistan coaching staff at the 2010 Asian Games while still competing for Germany

source: Getty images

26. Competing gymnastics literally saved her son's life
27. She doesn't use grips
28. And she spits in her hands instead of using a spray bottle
29. The number of times she's stated she'll retire only to come back
30. German giants

31. The NBC trio totally fangirl over her
32. Her international competitive career has spanned more than half her life
33. Her two World Championship titles were twelve years apart
34. She's been known to wear leg warmers

source: flickr

35. She's won three World and Olympic medals on vault in the second half of her career
36. She's the last gymnast still competing from the Soviet team
37. And she's the total opposite of the stereotypical Soviet gymnast
38. She's competed for three nations plus multiple variations of the Unified Team in 1992
39. Have you watched her compulsories? They're pretty awesome.

40. She was the last Soviet gymnast to win a World Championship title on floor. With the William Tell Overture. And a back-to-back tumbling pass.

An Ode to Svetlana Grozdova

Svetlana Grozdova is one of my favorite Soviets and would probably be my favorite if more footage of her existed. She was renowned for her flexibility and balance and a commentator discussing how she was left off the 1980 Olympic team referred to her as a "true beam artist." Her work was absolutely captivating. After competing in artistic gymnastics, Svetlana became and acrobatic gymnast for many years. So here's a post to appreciate an incredibly under appreciated gymnast!

This is an absolutely awesome bar routine from Svetlana which enjoyed a ton of popularity on Tumblr for a while. Sadly, only 14 seconds exist, but it's mind-blowing!

The best ending ever. Everyone else can go home. I also really love how she incorporated so many elements into her choreography. Proof you can use a ton of gymnastics skills and still be artistic.

These are both exhibition routines, the first from 1979 and the second from 1987. This is the essence of Svetlana's glory. So incredibly beautiful, smooth, fluid, leisurely, playful, just wonderful!

Here she is strutting her stuff as an acro gymnast.

Old Events on YouTube

I've found a great collection of old meets on YouTube I thought I'd share with you guys. There may end up being a part two of this, I've recently been finding a bunch more too! The channels are all great resources, so you should go subscribe.

1966 Worlds EF (Tribute2the80s)

Such a gem! Not only does it have the gymnasts (check out the pre-1968 drama Vera Caz and Natalia Kuchinskaya showdown), it's got COMMENTARY! Such an exciting find! Only a few gymnasts per event and there's a big glitch in one of them, but good quality and it's only about half an hour, so it's great if you don't have too much time.

1972 Olympics EF (dudnik and chocdave)

The first two have all the EF routines, and the second two have CBS coverage of the UB and FX final. Check out the crowd reaction to Olga Korbut's placement! Also, have to love Tamara Lazakovich's floor. I'm sure I found the beam final once, but I can't find it again...

1977 Euros EF (thelegendofNeshka)

All routines, absolutely fabulous! Not the greatest sound quality (TONS of background white noise), but still all routines from the 1977 Euros. Nadia, Nellie Kim, Emilia Eberle, Elena Mukhina, and one of my favorite Soviets who is totally underrated, Maria Filatova. Lots of good East Germans too. And so many Korbut-style skills on bars!

1977 World Cup

This one has at least ten parts, so I'll only post the first one. Filatova and Mukhina on display again, and Shaposhnikova joins them too. All right, I lied a little, this channel isn't as good for videos, but still a great competition here!

1978 Worlds EF (thelegendofNeshka, again)

This one's especially great because it cuts straight to the routines, so you get to watch all the gymnastics without it lasting forever. All the same Soviets, Nadia, Steffi Kraker Vera Cerna, and some great early Americans- Marcia Frederick wins the USA's first Worlds gold and Kathy Johnson has her beautiful balletic floor here.

1979 Euros EF (Fallen Star)

The same crowd again, Mukhina wowing with her bars, Nadia surprising with her medals- but what is really exciting about this one is it has Eberle's acid-trip routine with her music! The only instance of it I've been able to find. Easily the highlight of this one for me.

Routine of the Week

I found this gem last night on YouTube. It's Ilienko from the 1980 Coca Cola Invite/International (there were lots of other big names, including Mostepanova doing a routine to "Flight of the Bumblebee," it's worth a search on YouTube). I personally much prefer this routine to her famous one from 1981 (though, of course, I, like everyone else with a heart and any grain of taste, thoroughly enjoy that one as well). As the commentator says, "she flows like water." There are points in this routine where it almost looks as if she has no bones, incredibly supple, to use Christine Still's favorite word. It's one of the most fluid and flowing routines I've ever seen. I really love the variation in this routine, she has some more staccato movements as well and some moves which seem really designed to engage a crowd. Natalia also seems to be a bit inspired by flamenco movements in the middle of her routine, really a nice touch. The beginning is immediately engaging and I also love when she appears to moving in slow motion after the first tumble. Her cartwheel onto the ground also is a lovely flourish. It's not as traditional and standard as her 1981 music, and Natalia really uses that to her advantage to create an incredibly cohesive and memorable routine.