Anyone know status of B'room dancing as an Olympic sport?

Larinda McRaven said:
This whole system to me seems incredibly unfair. Lets say that gymnast A's start value is 9.3, B's is 9.6, and C's is 10.
A performs FLAWLESSLY and recieves 9.3
B has a minor flaw and recieves 9.5
C has several flaws and even falls but still recieves 9.6.

C who had the worst routine still gets the gold. Gymnast A is set up from the beginning to practically never get the gold no matter how perfect they are.

Imagine going in to a competition and knowing that the judges are not even going to consider you for anything more than the last, even if you pull off the performance of a lifetime...This system stinks to me, and hardly allows us to reward the true champions. It is like handicapping in golf, but backwards... :roll:
Click to expand...

I don't really understand this criticism.

If you have a very simple routine, you can't expect to win against someone who does something really difficult, unless they really mess up!

A routine with a start value of 9.30 in the high bar for example would probably have none or only very simple releases, a simple exit, and generally no opportunity to mess up. Surely a "true champion" in artistic gymnastics would be a pioneer who would do more difficult and exciting things than anybody else, rather than someone who played it safe by doing things that have been around for decades...

I think that the difficulty of the routine is not rewarded *enough*. In my view at least in the high bar and parallel bars final, the winner was not the one with the best performance, but the one with the safest performance that was just good enough for a 10.0 start value.

Anyway, my view is that any artistic sport that merely aims to recreate the past is dead and will fade away. While I enjoy seeing competitors perform classical and beautiful routines (gymnastics, dancing or elsewhere), these steps we now see as classic were once considered novel and made their creators the foremost competitors of their day. A lot of gymnastics figures are named after the athletes who first performed them and in my view it is the mark of a true champion to create something new!

A judging system should encourage the top competitors to innovate rather than just copy the last generation. I think that in contrast to the detailed prescriptions of the gymnastics judging system, the system employed in dancesport does exactly that.
 
I just wante dto add the one snippet that kind of reinforces the point I was trying to make about that yang wouldn't have automatically won the gold if his start value was 10.0
"There are several important reasons for not going back and changing results the way the South Korean delegation thinks the international gymnastics federation should. Yes, there was an error on Yang's start value, but there are two sets of judges. One set comes up with the starting score; they add up the entire bonus. Then there is another set of judges, six of them that come up with the deductions in the exercise. (For more on judging, see: Inside The Sport: Gymnastics).

As far as the deductions go, you can see they missed a deduction in Yang's routine. They did not take a mandatory two-tenths deduction for doing four holds. There is no way that they took it. If they did, he would not have medaled. Everybody focused on this one small issue of the start value. But if you're going to hold up an issue to that level of scrutiny, then you need to do it with everything. And if you do it for everything, you don't even have to look at another event, you can find a flaw right there."


The full article is here

http://www.nbcolympics.com/timdaggett/5051154/detail.html
 
tasche thanks for the link to that article! That's very interesting...I wonder why no one has brought this up before? Then again, maybe someone has brought it up and I (being uniformed) haven't heard about it. :)
 
Also the one factor nobody seems to mention is how pressure to bump your placements affects how you perform. Lets assume Yang's parallel bar routine score was .1 higher and he was leading he might not have gotten as higher score in the subsequent rounds bc he was feeling comfortable as opposed to striving to get the bronze. Hamm knew he had to be near perfect to bump himself up from 12th place and he did theres no shame in that

The media didn't really cover that bc its more exciting news to state that the judging is crooked. The media would love dancesports drama which is why it SHOULD be included. Theres nothing the public loves more than a scandal. Thow in a few underdogs and surprise breakthrough performances and you've got a prime time winner

Tasche who knows what she likes to watch

Oh yeah maybe put a smidge of dancing somewhere in there
 
kwa445 said:
tasche thanks for the link to that article! That's very interesting...I wonder why no one has brought this up before? Then again, maybe someone has brought it up and I (being uniformed) haven't heard about it. :)
Click to expand...

They were talking about it on the NBC Olympics broadcast the other day. I can't tell you for sure when, because I've been TiVo-ing everything and watching when I have time, but it might have been the same night that they did the "gymnastics gala." They even showed the tape of the South Korean guy's routine, and pointed out where all the 'holds' are.

If we're not hearing more about it, I think it's because everyone is wisely letting it die a quiet death now.
 
Minor tangent, but does anyone remember the specifics of (or even better, have text of) the comments made by Bob Costas regarding DanceSport in Sydney? Thanks!
 
Had two questions, but looks like SD already asked my first. :)

Second question: Does anyone know where one would find a list of the criteria for including something with the Olympics?
 
I'd bet that if you dug around on the International Olympic Committee's web site at www.ioc.org you'd find something. I just tried it, though, and got a "509/Bandwidth Limit Exceeded" error. This basically means that too many people are trying to look at the web site right now :-)
 
SDsalsaguy said:
Minor tangent, but does anyone remember the specifics of (or even better, have text of) the comments made by Bob Costas regarding DanceSport in Sydney? Thanks!
Click to expand...

I haven't seen a transcript or anything, but one remark was him asking "What would happen if Rita Moreno pulled a hamstring?" He also said that DanceSport was not a valid Olympic sport and the whole tone of his coverage dripped with negativity.
 
In this situation what do you think the fair and reasonable thing to do is?

IMHO I think they should run the all around again with a different set of judges or just let the results stand ( note I'm not a US citizen so feel no sense of patriotic pride when a US gymnast wins gold so I 'm not exactly biased in this)
 
I agreee with you, tasche. They should re-run the whole all-around competition.

Hamm is not at fault, here. He did nothing wrong. The coaches (arguably) did. So why should he be penalized? I am a US citizen, true, and I won't get into my politics. Just take my world for it that nationalism doesn't enter into my opinion.

This whole thing is ugly.


Just a question. Could such a controversy arise if ballroom was in the Olympics? It, too, is a subjectively judged sport. So, conceivably, such a dilemma could arise, right? :roll: :? So what would happen, and how would that help or hurt dancesport?
 
Oh my.

First off, there was a mechanism in place for the South Korean gymnast and his coaches to protest the scores during the competition itself. They did not avail themselves of this mechanism.

Second off, it's not Paul Hamm's fault the judges screwed up, so why make him pay for it?

Third off, what about the closer investigations of the tape that showed that the South Korean gymnast did an extra "hold" move, which isn't allowed, and should have triggered an 0.2 deduction that was never actually made?

I mean really, if they're going to go back and demand the results overturned, then I actually think that EVERY SINGLE GYMNAST in the final for that apparatus should have their tape re-examined so that any and all other judging mistakes could be found. Then everyone can be re-ranked for that apparatus, and then the all-around gold, silver, and bronze can be re-awarded to whoever really won them -- not merely just give the South Korean guy the Gold medal. Oh but wait, maybe ALL routines on ALL apparatus for ALL gymnasts in the final should be reviewed, to be ultra-fair.

This is getting silly. Has it been explained anywhere why the South Korean team didn't immediately protest the erroneous start value? There are rules that cover it, so that the problem can be solved right away before situations like this explode all over the place.

Of course, the simplest situation is kicking all judged sports out of the Olympics. Maybe it's time. Or maybe I'm just cranky because I've decided that synchronized swimming is incredibly boring.
 
I'm glad I'm not the only one. Synchronized swimming IS boring.

But it's beautiful, when done well.


I guess what makes me mad about the whole thing is that I perceive it's more about politics than about athletic achievement. Isn't athleticism what it's all about? Or at least, what it SHOULD be about? Grrr. Maybe I'm more sad than mad. Not sure yet. :?
 
robin said:
[If you have a very simple routine, you can't expect to win against someone who does something really difficult, unless they really mess up!
Click to expand...

Really? This tactic seems to work moderately well for me in ballroom...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Dance Ads

Advertise on Dance Forums Reach dancers, teachers, studios, event organizers, and dance-friendly brands. View ad options
Back
Top