My coach picked me up at a quarter to nine to drive to Corbeille. At first we stopped in Bilthoven
where the judge Elly Bleeker lives. Happily the car had a navigation system, since my coach had never
driven the right way to Bilthoven before :P.
Anna Pobokova was supposed to participate too but she was suffering a back injury and couldn't come. This
was the first competition where I was the only gymmast and my first big tournament too by the way.
After about seven hours driving we arrived in Corbeille.
The organisation gave us the adresses of two hotels and we didn't know which one we had to go to... Elly
knew from last years that the main hotel was Ibis, but there wasn't any Ibis hotel on the list.
We drove to there anyway but there wasn't anything that looked like gymnastics, no little busses and stuff.
So we searched for the other hotels. Hotel Leonarde de Vinci turned out to be the main hotel so we went there
to get our accreditation. They were really happy with my coach, since she already copied all the TV and AV forms.
I was supposed to be in group C and Anna in B, but because she don't participate I could be in B.
All the busses to competition and training would leave from this hotel, the delegations in other hotels would have to
come to here first. Also they wouldn't have the opportunity to go back to their own hotel between the competitions on
one day. We were supposed to be in the other hotel, but since one delegation didn't arrive, we could stay in this one. :)
In the evening we had a training in the competition hall. The space for warming-up was a small room with
a low ceiling, you can't do any throws in it. In competition you would get a small space were you can do some throws during
one routine. Anyway I was warned by so many people for it in advance that it was bigger then I expected anyway.
Training was really bad... I was just shaking on my legs all the time and I had to adjust to the floor (in Holland we never have
such a floor that makes it easier to jump). In the end I got breathing problems too... never had that before and I didn't like it!
Today we had two trainings, first in the competition hall and in the afternoon in a training hall.
During the training in competition hall we had control of the apparatus. Suddenly my hoop was too light (it had been heavy
enough in Dutch competitions and in Portimão but okay)and fortunately my coach had some silver tape so we could make it a bit
heavier. Training was better than yesterday, I did clubs and ribbon today. After the training we had to wait half an hour for the bus
back to the hotel. Lisette and Elly went to the shops but I stayed in the hall and watched the training of France and a little bit of the
Bulgarian group. It was really cool to see them train.
When the bus arrived I saw Elizabeth Paisieva coming out and in the hotel I had seen Jennifer Colino. Really weird and cool to walk around between
such famous gymnasts!
When we came back in the hotel we immediately had lunch, since we had to take the bus to the next training at half past two. It was a large bus
but I think some other countries skipped afternoontraining so we were the only two people in the whole bus.
Training was worse again, I couldn't breath easily and I saw black spots in front of my eyes. I once fainted when I was little and it was exactly the
same feeling. I didn't even did my routines on music, I only did throws because of the small warming-up room during competition.
In the evening my coach took me to a doctor. He said I had short of magnesium and he gave me medicin for it.
When we came back Elly had had the meeting of the judges. She had to do execution clubs both in AA and final. I have to do hoop and ball on the first day.
Today was first competition day. In the bus to the competition hall they controlled for your accreditation really strict and that was good too since the bus
was really full. When we arrived in the hall I didn't have to start yet, the competition would only start in 2 hours. It was an advantage to start a bit later, by that
time there was space to hold for ballet. The whole group was devided in three smaller groups and each group had 20 minutes time on the competition floor. During warming-up
my routines went pretty good and my coach said she really felt better about it now.
Competition today was awful. I had to start with hoop and I had lots of mistakes, I even ended without the apparatus.
Then I had to do ball and it wasn't any better, even worse. About halfway the routine I had to
catch a throw with my feet while I was standing but it bounced of and rolled away out of the floor on the other side of the carpet... I lost a lot of time
and couldn't do many other artistic things too. I came off the carpet and my coach was really angry with me. I deserved it off course but I can't remember her being really
angry with me before...
In the evening we saw the competition of group A which was really cool but there were pretty much mistakes even Tchachina had a lot of mistakes in her first routine (ribbon).
The other two routines today, and I knew I had to do it much better than yesterday or else I might have to forget about Kiev...
In the last minutes of the warming up on the competition floor my ribbon got off my ribbon stick but Lisette pulled meters of tape on it so it would last for the competition :P.
Warming-up was going pretty good again, and also the throws on the small space just before my routines. My first routine was clubs, the routine stayed from last year and feels 'more save'.
Although I can still ruin it sometimes... but not this time, it went pretty good I had one little mistake but compeared by the first day I was really happy with this routine and so was my coach.
After that I still had to do ribbon, which is the hardest apparatus for me but it wasn't really bad this time and I was pretty happy with the second day.
After the first day I had been on the last place but fortunately I rose 4 places after second day and ended 74th. With clubs I even was on a 58th place.
In the evening we watched A group again, which was even nicer now I felt better myself. I tried to take a lot of photos, but unfortunately the seats for participants were not really close
to the floor and the computers and people who calculated the scores were in front too.
Tchachina easily won the competition more than 4 points ahead of Yussupova and Sesina came in third.
Today there was organized a excursion to Paris. Lisette and I went there, only we didn't take the boat trip but
went to the shops around the Eiffel Tower. At first we went to a little shop to buy something to drink for tomorrow in the
car. When Lisette paid she got false money back! The shopowner tried to tell her that it was a euro from Sweden or Norway, countries
that don't have euros at all!
I also bought a blue mini-Eiffel tower on a key ring.
In the afternoon the Grand Prix competition for the best 15 gymnasts of the qualification took place. After the competition all gymnast
had to come on the carpet and they gave a prize to the three best countries. Best was Russia, 2nd Belarus and 3rd Spain if my memory is right. We also
got a beautiful statue of glass with a rhythmic gymnast and the name of the tournament in it.
In the evening there was a banquet. It was held in the sports hall, but I almost didn't recocknized it. We also got a little bear with the name of the tournament
on it's t-shirt.