14. June 2014  
Baku, Azerbaijan  
EM RG 2014

World Champion Kudryavtseva is also Europe's Gymnastics Queen

Yana Kudryavtseva

With top marks with hoop, clubs and ribbon and a total score of 73.499 points Russia's world champion an top-favorite Yana KUDRYAVTSEVA named in the Mili Gymnastika Arena of Baku as the new sovereign all-around  European Champion. Since her also favored teammate Margarita Mamun was not flawless with hoop and clubs and dropped back to fifth place (69.715), the hour struck the Belarusian Melitina STANIOUTA that was with 72.416 points European silver medalist.
For bronze, the vice-world champion Anna RIZATDINOWA (UKR; 71.649) and was thus the strong  Neta Rivkin of Israel (Worlds tenth, 2013) straight away even a mini-difference of -0.15 points from the podium.
Austria currently the best gymnast Nicole Ruprecht, finished with 65.783 points at the end rank 17th. German gymnasts were not qualified at these championships. Eligible were in this field of the continental Olympic all-around only the best 20 gymnasts of the previous year's European Championships in Vienna.

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* ELITE - Individual Olympic all-around

1. KUDRYAVTSEVA, Yana        (RUS) - 73,499
   2. STANIOUTA, Melitina          (BLR) - 72,416
      3. RIZATDINOVA, Anna    (UKR)  - 71,649

4. RIVKIN, Neta                 (ISR)  - 71,599
5. MAMUN, Margarita       (RUS)  - 69,715
6. DURUNDA, Marina        (AZE)  - 69,674
  >> Detailed Results

At the European Championships in even years, the 20 best gymnasts from competition I of the previous year present their routines;
          >> START LIST
AUT : Nicol RUPRECHT & Natascha WEGSCHEIDER
AZE : Marina DURUNDA & Gulsum SHAFIZADA
BLR : Melitina STANIOUTA & Katsiaryna HALKINA
BUL : Neviana VLADINOVA & Silviya MITEVA
ESP : Carolina RODRIGUEZ BALLESTEROS
FRA : Kseniya MOUSTAFAEVA
GEO : Salome PAZHAVA
GRE : Varvara FILIOU
HUN : Dora Vass 
ISR : Neta RIVKIN & Victoria Adar VEINBERG FILANOVSKY
ROU : Alexandra PISCUPESCU
RUS : Yana KUDRYAVTSEVA & Margarita MAMUN
UKR : Anna RIZATDINOVA & Viktoriia MAZUR

Carolina Rodriguez (ESP)

Elite's  European Star Parade in Baku
- reported by Esther Teijeira, Baku
______________________________

In the elite individual all-around competition competed the best 20 gymnasts qualified at the last year’s European championships in Vienna. In group B, gymnasts placed from 11 to 20, took the provisional lead Katsaryna Halkina from Belarus ahead of Kseniya Moustafayeva from France, Salome Pazhava from Georgia and Carolina Rodríguez from Spain. Carolina, with 27 years, is the oldest gymnast in this year’s competitor’s field and placed on an excellent 10th place in the final ranking.

Melitina Staniouta (BLR)

Expected was that the Russian seniors Yana Kudryavtseva and Margarita Mamun would dominate the all-around final, but both of them had mistakes directly in their first exercise. Yana lost one difficulty, a jump with a catch of the ball, but could avoid a drop. All other three exercises went without mayor problems, especially the exercise with clubs and hoop were faultless, while there could be doubts about the last catch in ribbon for the spectators.
Melitina Staniouta from Belarus, the third placed at the 2013 Worlds in Kiev, did a clean competition with four routines full of emotions that gave her the silver medal, and beat her old rival, Ganna Rizatdinova as the reigning vice world champion.
Margarita Mamun had a nightmare of a hoop exercise with two big mistakes and a drop outside the floor – even it was not seen by the line judge – she scored only 16.00 points. Ball and clubs went well for her, but with ribbon she seemed to have lost balance in two balances. She finally placed 5th - that can be somehow incomprehensible to the spectators, but rhythmic gymnastics is hard to understand without knowing the code of points and seeing the difficulty sheets that have to be handed in for every exercise before the competition.

After Mamun’s problems, the battle for the bronze medal was opened and it became a real drama between Ganna Rizatdinova from the Ukraine and Neta Rivkin from Israel. After finishing both their exercises, Neta Rivkin lay only 0.050 points behind the Ukrainian and the Israeli team put an inquiry about Rivkin’s score. Minute after minute passed and there was no decision about the rankings… But finally nothing was changed and Ganna Rizatdinova stepped on the podium, to the big deception of the Israelis.

Marina Durunda (AZE)

Marina Durunda and Gulsum Shafizada from the host country Azerbaijan placed 6th and 15th.
Durunda did a nice first routine with ball, but then she seemed to become a little bit nervous with clubs and ribbon - with the hall arena screaming to her support. After a beautiful hoop routine she spread some tears in relief.
Gulsum Shafizada, still very young an inexpert, did a string competition, even if she had to repeat her ribbon routine, due to a problem with the music.

With this all-around, the senior gymnasts ended their performances in Baku and look forward to the European Games next year in this incredible city.

* Esther Teijeira for GYMmedia INTERNATIONAL


* Special UEG Service:
Tue complete ECh All-around Final:
►► A-Group:  VIDEO on DEMAND
►► B-Group: VIDEO on DEMAND