Jan 31

Written by: Andy Thornton
Sunday, January 31, 2010 2:24 PM

Dong Fangxiao and Yang Yun…and a rarely seen competition from 2000

 

You may have read my recent posts regarding Dong Fangxiao and Yang Yun, where I emphasized the fact that they seemed to appear out of thin air when they showed up on China’s bronze medal teams from the 1999 world championships and 2000 Olympics.  The reason I feel this fact is so intriguing is because they are both strongly suspected of being underage at the time, and the fact that they literally came out of nowhere with essentially no known previous competition results provides even more “indirect” support of the allegations. 

 

Of course we already have plenty of more direct support of their ages anyway….if you count a statement on national television by Yang Yun stating she was 14 during the Sydney Olympics, or documentation provided by Dong Fangxiao for a credential in Beijing suggesting she was also 14 in Sydney, or statements on Dong’s blog about her birthdate also suggesting she was underage….and I’m sure the list goes on.  I have NEVER been one to make hasty judgments like these before having all the facts, but last time I checked an athlete would tend to remember quite well exactly how old she was when she competed in her first and only Olympic Games.  That’s not exactly something we “misspeak” about, as Yang later contested.

 

My strong suspicion is that Yang and Dong WERE underage in Sydney, and supposedly there’s going to be a final ruling on the issue coming up in February.  Personally, I think it could be virtually a landmark decision in gymnastics, considering there are numerous other world and Olympic medalists in history whose ages have later been challenged, and in some cases, confirmed to be falsified…Romanians Gina Goean, Daniela Silivas, and Alexandria Marinescu, to name a few.

 

I recently came across a competition that took place in Canada just two months before the 2000 Olympics in Sydney, in which both Dong Fangxiao and Yang Yun participated.  I searched desperately to find some kind of statement from the commentators regarding the ages of these two, but unfortunately to no real avail.  Interestingly, the ages of just about every other female gymnast in the competition was noted by the commentators…EXCEPT for Dong and Yang.  Though I can’t say for sure exactly why, it’s fishy at best.

Notice during this first segment Elfi and the other commentator note that Anna Pavlova is just 12 years old, Irina Yarotska is 14 and too young for Sydney, Shannon is 23 and considered by some to be “too old,” but when it’s Yang Yun’s turn, she is simply “Yang Yun from China.”  Did she not have a listed age or something?  Hmmm.

 

2000 International Gymnastics Challenge Part 1 (Bars starts at 4:24)

 

Anna Pavlova beat some of the world’s top bar workers at just 12 years old!!!  Yarotska was very impressive too.  I couldn’t BELIEVE the difference between Yang Yun’s bars at this competition and the Olympics just two months later.

 

Yang Yun Bars 2000 Olympics Event Finals

 

Those routine look so different to me.  She went from being a pretty good bar worker with numerous short handstands and a bit of a labored dismount to the third best bar worker in the world in just two months...wow!

 

 

 

Next, we’ll look at some more videos from this competition!

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