A dropped Club ended her chances of a golden sweep in Rhythmic Gymnastics at The World Games, so Russia’s Arina Averina settled for going three for four. Following her error with the Clubs, which still resulted in a bronze medal, the older Averina twin rallied to take the Ribbon title Saturday in Wroclaw’s Centennial Hall. In Aerobic Gymnastics, meanwhile, China defended a gold, while Japan and Russia also claimed glory.
The Averinas vs the world
After two near-flawless performances resulted in gold medals with the Hoop and Ball Friday, Arina Averina finally made a mistake, dropping a Club mid-routine in her third Rhythmic final. In stepped her identical twin sister Dina to defend the Averina name. Feeding off opportunity, the younger Averina performed like a magician with the apparatus, making one impossible-seeming catch after another for the gold.
Though Arina would go on to best her sister with the Ribbon, Dina’s Clubs routine earned the highest score of the entire competition. Their duel for supremacy in the sport will continue at next month’s World Championships in Pesaro, Italy.
In the wake of the Averinas, Israel’s Linoy Ashram (silver with the Clubs) and Belarus’s Katsiaryna Halkina (bronze with the Ribbon)each captured her second medal of the Games, continuing what for both has been a groundbreaking season.
Japanese Trio at Aerobic
2016 World champion Korea did not advance to the final in Aerobic Trio competition, leaving Japan, China, Russia and France to battle for gold. After a disappointing fourth place finish in Mixed Pairs by Riri Kitazume/Takumi Kanai, Japan’s Trio (Kanai, Kitazume and 2016 Individual Men’s World champion Mizuki Saito) responded by dethroning reigning Games champions China (Li Lingxiao, Ma Dong and Pan Lixi). The Chinese settled for silver.
France’s Trio (Tom Jourdan, Florian Bugalho and Maxime Decker-Breitel) improved from fourth in qualification to grab bronze, the only Aerobic medal for a country that was among the most dominant in Aerobic at The World Games in Cali (COL) four years ago.
China on top of the world
Despite finishing second in qualification, China’s experienced Aerobic Group (Li Lingxiao, Li Qi, Ma Dong, Pan Lixi and Wang Ke) stayed the course to come out on top in the final, dashing top qualifier Romania’s (Dacian Barna, Gabriel Bocser, Andreea Bogati, Dorian Brotei and Lucien Savulescu) hopes for gold. Hungary (Daniel Bali, Albert Farkas, Dora Hegyi, Fanny Mazacs and Panna Szollosi) outlasted Russia for bronze.
A modern victory in medieval clothing
Theatricality triumphed in Aerobic Step, with the Russia’s (Danil Chaiun, Anastasiia Degtiareva, Irina Dobriagina, Aleksei Germanov, Anastasiia Grozdetskaia, Veronika Korneva, Ekaterina Pykhtova and Anastasiia Ziubina) well-conceived routine, depicting a battle between presumably medieval neighboring states (represented by half the team wearing black costumes, and the other half wearing white, all emblazoned with coats of arms) carried the day. China, the defending Games champion from 2013, took silver with a well-synchronised, fast-paced display, while the Hungarian team, inspired by Aladdin (convincingly portrayed by Daniel Erdosi) earned the country’s fourth medal of the Games in Aerobic.