The balance beam
The balance beam involves a long wooden beam about 10 centimetres wide. Competitors perform jumps, leaps, running steps, and turns on it and try to use the beam's full length. The best performers also do cartwheels, back handsprings, and somersaults. The routine must last at least 1 minute 10 seconds but not more than 1 minute 30 seconds.
The floor exercise
The floor exercise is performed on a mat that resembles the one used in the men's floor exercise. Women gymnasts perform this event with a musical accompaniment. Each contestant designs her routine to match the tempo and mood of the music she has selected. She must take at least 1 minute 10 seconds and not more than 1 minute 30 seconds to demonstrate her skill in acrobatics, dancing, and tumbling.
All-around competition
All-around competition for women includes all four events. In national and international competitions, every competitor performs a compulsory routine in each event and then an optional routine in each. International competition is open only to all-around gymnasts.
Vocabulary and Speech Exercises
Ex. 1. Look at the pictures and name the events a women's gymnastic ccompetition consists of. Put the pictures in the events performing order.
Ex. 2. Complete the sentences using the pictures as prompts:
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For the majority of gymnasts and spectators, the most exciting event in women's competition is the …
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The only apparatus which is essentially feminine and has no counterpart in the men's competition is the …
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The exercise performed on the same equipment used in men's horse vaulting is the …
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The exercise performed with a musical accompaniment …
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Ex. 3. Find out which English sentence contains Russian equivalent term:
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бревно
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Uneven bars is the only event for women - the only event in which the hands are almost constantly in use, gripping the rails.
Vaulting uniquely involves the element of flight of the four events in women's gymnastics.
A beginner must spend many hours learning to move around on the beam in comfort - walking, running, skipping, leaping.
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разновысокие брусья
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The vaulting runway is sixty to eighty feet long.
The intricate movements prescribed for uneven bars comprise a number of fear - producing elements, as do routines in all the events.
The balance beam adventure begins with the working surface of the beam itself.
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конь
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In gymnastic vaulting there are two pieces of equipment: the horse and takeoff board.
Floor exercises is commonly regarded as the most beautiful event in gymnastics.
Uneven bars is a relatively new event in women's gymnastics having been performed for the first time at the 1952 Olympics.
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“колесо”
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Somersault is a leap or fall in which one turns heels over head before landing on one's feet.
To skip is to jump lightly and quickly.
The best gymnasts perform cartwheels, back handsprings, and somersaults on the beam.
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Ex. 4. Read the text. Insert the missing terms from the list beam, six, four, leaps, somersault, floor exercises, balance, spins, vaulting horse, balances, uneven bars, gymnastics
Success in the ...exercises for men and ... for women at the Olympic Games requires that the gymnast develops a strong physique and all-round ability.
The ... ... are usually the first of the events since they give competitors a chance to warm up with movements not requiring tremendous strength. The sportswoman aims to impress the judges with a sequence of..., ..., and together with the elements of acrobatics. Strength movements should be performed slowly and static position must be held for at least two seconds - ... should be done at shoulder height.
The ... ... is the simplest of all the events. Men vault over the horse lengthways, passing first over the “croup” and then the “neck”. Women vault sideways, putting their hands on the middle of the horse which is not as high as for men.
Women use the ... ... . Emphasis is on the suspension and momentary bracing positions and the female gymnast must change bars by turning or executing elegant movements.
The ... is used only by women in competitions. It was originally envisaged as a method for women to demonstrate ... but in recent years many of the skills of the floor exercises have been introduced. Many female competitors use ballet, which is very close to many of the ... movements.
Ex. 5. Explain the terms used in gymnastics:
* the side horse vault
* the uneven parallel bars
* the balance beam
* cartwheel
* back handspring
* somersault
* running steps
* skips
Ex. 6. Name the
* women's gymnastics competition events
* exercises on the uneven parallel bars
* exercises on the beam
* floor exercises for women.
Ex. 7. Say what you know about:
* the order of performing the events in a women's gymnastics competition
* the exercises on apparatus for women
* all-around competition for women
Ex. 8. Speak on the topic:
* the apparatus for women's gymnastics competitions
* the programme for the women's gymnastic competitions
* gymnast performance on the balance beam (uneven bars, side horse).
Task VII. Read the text about the gymnastics competitions. Find out how the winner is determined
Gymnastics competition
Judging
Judging involves the assessment of a gymnastic performance by someone supposedly well-versed in the detailed and rather complex methods of evaluation.
Gymnastics has matured into a highly technical sport, and the evaluation of routines has become a complicated process.
Judges of gymnastics competitions carefully watch each compulsory routine for such flaws as falls, improper body position, omissions, slowness, and stops. In the optional routines, the judges base their scores on difficulty, form, and the combination of movements.
A perfect score for any event is 10.00. The judges subtract points or tenths of a point for each flaw. In optional routines, the judges may award bonus points for especially difficult or original movement.
In men's competition, five judges, including one called a head or superior judge, score the performance of each gymnast. In most cases, the score of the head judge is not used. Instead, the head judge takes the scores of the other judges and eliminates the highest and lowest ones. The head judge computes an athlete's final score by averaging the two middle scores. If the difference between the two middle scores exceeds a certain range, the head of judge's own score is used as a guide in adjusting the final score. At an international competition, each team's top five individual all-around scores are added together for the team score.
In women's competition, there are seven judges, including a head judge. The highest and lowest scores of the six other judges are dropped and the remaining four are averaged to produce the final score.
Speech Exercises
Ex. 1. Answer the following questions:
1. What does judging involve?
2. What do the judges of gymnastics competitions watch for?
3. What do the judges of gymnastics competitions base their scores on?
4. Which is a perfect score for any gymnastics event?
5. What do the judges subtract points or tenths of a point for?
6. What actions do the judges award bonus points for?
7. How many judges are there in the men's gymnastics competitions?
8. What are the head judge's duties?
9. How does a gymnast get an average mark (score)?
10. When is the head judge's own score used?
11. How is the team score determined at the international competition?
12. How many judges are there in the women's competition?
13. How is the final score in the women's gymnastics competition produced?
Ex. 2. Say what instruction you would give to a would-be judge.
Ex. 3. Say what you know about:
* judges in gymnastics competitions
* the evaluation of routines
* possibility for former gymnasts to become judges
Task VIII. a) Skim the text to understand what it is about. b) Time your reading. Its good if you can read this text for 75 words per minute.
Gymnasts And Their Training
The ideal body type for gymnastics is short and light. Gymnastics skills require great strength and flexibility, as well as balance and explosive power. Ages and sizes of competitive gymnasts have been decreasing progressively as their selection and training has become more demanding. The two top female gymnasts in the 1992 Olympics were 15 years old, 137 centimetres (4 feet, 6 inches) tall, and one weighed 31.7 kilograms (70 pounds) and the other 31.3 kilograms (69 pounds).
To produce the strength, flexibility, and power essential for competitive gymnastics requires long hours of strenuous practice, and training procedures are designed to develop not only these physical qualities but also the great courage required to perform intrinsically dangerous movements (1).
In socialist societies such as the former Soviet Union, other Eastern European countries, China, and Cuba, young children selected on the basis of body type and other physical attributes were given opportunities to develop into competitive gymnasts through participation in state-supported training facilities (2) and special schools. In countries such as the United States, the development of young gymnasts has been carried out in schools and organisations such as Turners, Sokols, and YMCAs. However, the intensity and level of work required to produce elite gymnasts today is available only in private training facilities, usually paid for by parents. Recognising the financial cost of these private facilities, USA Gymnastics initiated a programme of stipends paid to a small number of the most talented young gymnasts to offset their training costs. Male gymnasts tend to maintain and even improve performances beyond the peak age for female gymnasts, and their training may continue during college years with the support of athletic scholarships. Collegiate gymnastics is also available for females, but today college-age women are generally considered too old to be involved in the highest level of the sport. One of the most important contributions to the development of gymnastics in the United States was the establishment of the USGF Junior Olympics programme, which provides compulsory exercises and guidelines for several levels of age-group competition for both girls and boys.
Notes
intrinsically dangerous movements - связанные с большим риском
state-supported training facilities - государственные спортивные базы
с) Answer the following questions. If necessary, look through the text again:
What is the ideal body type for a gymnast?
What quality do gymnastics skills require?
Why have age and size of competitive gymnasts been decreasing?
How are the strength, flexibility, and power, essential for competitive gymnastics, produced?
How were young gymnasts selected in socialist societies?
How are young gymnasts selected in the USA?
Where are elite gymnasts trained in the USA?
What was one of the most important contributions to the deve-lopment of gymnastics in the United States?
What does the USYF Junior Olympic programme provide?
Task IX. Read the text without the help of a dictionary
History
The origin of gymnastics can be traced back to the ancient civilisations of China, Persia, India and Greece.
Most of the current competitive exercises may be attributed to the German, Jahn, but the ancient civilisations practised the sport. The Chinese had mass displays of free exercises, as they do at present, and both the Persians and the Indians followed a strict code of physical exercise. But it was the Greeks who really started to modernise the sport.
The distinguished physician, Galen, provided some of the earliest li-terature on the sport and showed how knowledgeable the Greeks were about its fundamentals. Activities like rope-climbing were included in the ancient Olympic Games and, with the rise of the Roman Empire, the Greek method of physical culture spread.
Among the events the Romans introduced was the wooden horse on which they practised mounting and dismounting. Most of the exercises were used for military preparation, but when the ancient Olympic Games were abolished the sport fell into decline for nearly 1,500 years.
It was revived initially by men like Muth, Salzman, and Ling.
(1) Muth's book, “Gymnastics for Youth”, is the first major work on the subject, and Ling, a Swede, regulated a series of free exercises which a number of countries adopted. But the man who made the major contribution to the sport was Jahn. His invention of events like the parallel bars and the rings and his routines for the horizontal bars helped greatly with the modernisation of gymnastics. There was a clash of views between Ling and Jahn, since the Swede felt that gymnastics was an educational system while Jahn viewed it as a club activity. Ling's movements were more rhythmic and fluent while Jahn gave more emphasis to strength movements.
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