Pedro Roque: Portugal relies on Zoe Lima to bring back 1996
Portugal’s dry-spell in the gymnastics arena took 16 years to wane but it has finally given way to the country’s long-awaited shot at returning to the Olympics. Zoe Lima’s outstanding performance in the in the World Gymnastics Championships in Tokyo, enabled
Portugal to secure a berth at the Olympic test event scheduled for January 2012, in London.
The hopes of all Olympic enthusiasts, officials, gymnasts and Portuguese citizens ride on the competence of the athlete who will be sent to represent Portugal in the test event.
The Portuguese Gymnastics Federation set an internal criterion that would help decide which athlete should be sent to London.
Pedro Roque, the women’s national team Coordinator, revealed that four female gymnasts were being trained for the position. These are: Alexandra Choon, Ekaterina Kislinskaya, Filipa Martins and Zoe Lima.
Roque was satisfied with Choon’s performance in the World Gymnastics Championships. He coaches her at Ginasio Clube Portugues in Lisbon.
Analyzing Choon’s current skill level he said, “She improved her D (difficulty) scores a lot on vault and bars,” that shows that her participation in the Worlds worked in Portugal’s favour.
In the World Championships she started off ahead of the last qualified Bulgarian gymnast, before she encountered two falls on the beam that threw her off course and limited her chances.
The Russian-born Kislinskaya did not compete in Tokyo owing to an elbow injury that is still in its healing process.
The accident happened in Kislinskaya’s last month of training when she missed a Stalder transition from the lower bar to the high bar, causing her to dislocate her elbow and rupture two ligaments upon impact with the floor.
Had it not been for the injury, her chances were just as good as anybody else, if not better, since she had the best D scores on the team.
Although Kislinskaya had to sit out the Worlds, she has now recovered sufficiently and Roque hopes she will be ready to compete in a few weeks’ time.
Filipa Martins is the youngest of the four contenders and if this works out for her, it will also be her first global tournament.
Born in 1996, Martins found her age to have prevented her from taking part in Tokyo. However, she will be age-eligible by the time the test events are held.
The fourth contender is Zoe Lima, who seems to be the most promising one of them all. Lima proved her mettle in the World Championships in Tokyo as the best Portuguese woman in the competition.
She also easily meets the criteria set by the Portuguese Gymnastics Federation. “Zoe is already qualified for the test event but we are still preparing Ekaterina, Alexandra and Filipa, just in case,” Roque said.
He added that qualifying for the Olympics means a lot to Portugal, given that they have not made it since Atlanta 1996, powered by Diana Teixeira’s talents.
Tags: