FIG World Challenge Cup Serie in the Olympic Year 2024

In terms of format, the FIG World Challenge Cups of the series in the 2024 Olympic year do not differ from the first four WELTCUPS with Olympic qualifying chances, except that they have no significance for the current Olympic qualification. Even before the fourth and final Olympic qualification with World Cup status in Doha (April 17-20), the so-called World Challenge Cup circuits begun at the end of March in Antalya (TUR), closely followed by Challenge Cup no. 2 in Osijek (CRO; April 04-07), then the third Challenge in Varna (Bulgaria; May 23-26), followed by Koper (SLO; 30 May 30 - June 01) and concluding in Szombathely (Hungary) from October 03-06.
It is difficult for the observer to recognise the meaningfulness of this strange structure of the still overloaded world gymnastics calendar and to keep an overview!

* ... powered by:

+ + +
.

→ c u r r e n t :

(2) FIG WORLD CHALLENGE CUP "DOBRO World Cup", Osijek (CRO)
- FINALS: 2024, April 2024, 06 / 07

* I n f o - : The Croatian Gymnastics Federation and the deserving local organiser of the DOBRO World Cup, the Osijek Žito Gymnastics Club, are hosting the World Cup for the 15th time in Osijek.
♦ MEN's FINALS:
The winners of the first final day are Illia KOVTUN (UKR) on floor exercise. Kazakhstan's Ilyas AZIZOV relegates the two local heroes Filip Ude and Marko Sambolec to the medal ranks, and parallel bars world champion Lukas DAUSER (GER) shines with the highest E-score and defeats Ilia Kovtun on parallel bars despite his highest D-score of 6.9 !!
The Bulgarian Kevin PENEW was the best ring gymnast on the 2nd day of the final. On the vault table, the hosts were able to celebrate the victory of their Aurel BENOVIC and were sad that their former world champion Tin Srbic was defeated on high bar by the Asian TANG, Chia-Hung (TPE)!
► FLOOR EX. ► POMMEL H. ► STILL RINGS
► PARALLEL B. ► VAULT ► HIGH BAR.
* Men's Qualification -:
Leading on floor after day 1 is Croatia's Aurel Benovic (with the highest difficult score of 6.3 and 14,150 points, followed by Hungary's Krisztofer Meeszaros (6.3)=14,050. Benivic leads also on Vault...! Pommel horse best was Ilyas Azizov (KAZ; 14,650). With the same difficulty (5.9) Croatioa's pommel specialist Filip UDE was not flawless and only just qualified for the final in eighth place...!
On parallel bars, world champion Lukas Dauser (6.6)=14.600 finished third behind Krisztofer Meszaros (HUN;14.700) and Ilja Kovtun (UKR; 14.65) in the final.
TANG Chia-Hung (TPE) leads on high bar, Taha Serhani (SUI) qualified on third in the preliminaries ...
* Qualification results (complete):
►Floor ex.; ►Pommel h. ► S.Rings; ► P. bars; ► Vault; ► High bar
.
♦ WOMEN's FINALS:
The French women celebrated two victories on day 1 of the finals: Coline DEVILLARD won on floor and Melanie DE JESUS DOS SANTOS excelled on parallel bars, and the latter added the 3^rd French victory on the floor on the 2nd day of the final after being defeated on the balance beam by Anna LASHCHEVSKA from Ukraine.
► VAULT ► UNEVEN BARS ► BALANCE BEAM ► FLOOR EXERCISE.
* Women's qualification:
►Vault ► Uneven bars; ► Balance beam; ► Floor ex.
+ + +
.

→ ... l a s t :

(1) FIG WORLD CHALLENGE CUP - Antalya / TUR (2024, March 29-31)

* INFO: A small but very attractive field of participants had announced themselves for this first challenge: among the starters from 28 nations are the two Olympic champions Andrade (BRA) and Wevers (NED), even if Rebecca Andrade is only competing on uneven bars for the first time in the Olympic year: This will be exciting, as she will face the current parallel bars world champion Kaylia Nemour from Algeria. Andrade's no less powerful compatriot Flavia Saraiva has planned for beam and floor. As the current European champion, Sanne Wevers is naturally also the favourite on beam.
Melanie De Jesus dos Santos (FRA), who secured France's last World Championships team bronze medal, has entered for uneven bars, balance beam and floor exercise, while team-mate Morgane Osyssek-Reimer will compete on all apparatus.
In any case, the Turkish hosts will capitalise on the competition with the performances of their best people, such as the world champions in ring gymnastics, Adem Asil and Ibrahim Colak, as well as the all-around strong Ahmet Onder.

* We will inform you about the results after the end of the daily competitions...! (?)
"At least that was our intention! But despite desperate efforts, neither the complete qualification results nor the final results of the World Challenge Cup in Antalya could be found on the Internet. Only rudiments of some preliminary results could be found on Facebook ... or were people in Turkey busy with more important things due to the local elections ...? This is where even the most committed journalists give up!
If the World Gymnastics Federation can't even manage to enforce reliable and up-to-date (!!) result standards at its own competitions, we should at least stop accusing the media of "underexposure" of the gymnastics scene.
First, we should do the simplest homework of documenting international events on a daily basis ourselves.
Unfortunately, the situation has been sad for a long time and repeatedly, not only in Antalya and not only at gymnastics events! And links to paid livestreams may be a special service for hardcore fans, but they do not fundamentally solve the problem of insufficient media presence.
Overall, this situation feels like a call to remove these competitions from the portfolio of journalistic endeavours altogether in future!
The "scene" seems to prefer to keep to itself!
Eckhard Herholz
- Chief Editor of GYMmedia INTERNATIONAL
   + + +
♦♦ WCha-ERGEBNISSE (Addendum on April 01)
   ♦ MEN: ► FINALS;   > Qualifikationen
   ♦ WOMEN: ► FINALS;   > Qualifikationen
.