1979 European Gymnastics AA - Sub 1

This is great - haven't seen the AA before. Thanks for posting.

This is incredible coverage! Thank you so very much!

I did not know that Zakharova was an alternate. Had she partecipated instead of Naimushina, she would have been a serious threat to Comaneci on vault and floor.

14 year old Melta Ruhn, Naimushina and Rench...strong partecipants in the Olympics the following year.

Thank you so much for posting this treasure! ✨️💖💖💖✨️ Please forgive me in advance for the long post! ✨️🙏🏻✨️ I've only ever seen clips from Nadia's fabled 1979 'comeback' European Championships, after her previous year's subpar performance at Worlds! Nadia was now a mature young lady, 4 inches or so taller than at her legendary Montreal Olympics, and in the best athletic shape of her life! Apart from Nadia, other legends were present, including the late Yelena Mukhina🥺, the late Yelena Naimushina🥺, obviously off of her game here, Emilia Eberle, Melita Ruhn, Natalia Shaposhnikova, and so many others! It is also wonderful to see some of the less famous gymnasts of the era from other than the 'power' countries! This is like a magical time capsule! It is so interesting to watch the warm ups! Nothing has changed there, except no more hip beats, or horse vault, or unsprung floors! These athletes, the women in particular, were pioneering elements like double backs off of beams with no springs and only a little padding over solid wood! No mats around the vault springboard, etc! They were performing the first full-ins, and attempts at double layouts, on floors that were little more than two inch wrestling mattresses with ZERO springs underneath! At the same time, back at their respective gyms, they were training two separate routines on each event! One was the compulsory exercises that everyone had to perform in the exact same way, and the other their optional routines! Not to mention that some gyms, like the Soviets and Romanians, added extra classes like ballet and drama! I have such HUGE respect for these pioneers of the sport, and the ones that came long before them, who trained and competed on what today would be considered archaic and even unsafe equipment! All that being said, it IS poignant to watch some of the gymnasts, like the Romanians, knowing now what coaches like the Karolyis put them through. 😔 On a more pleasant note, considering it's age, the film quality is astounding!! I've seen video footage from the 90s and early aughts with much poorer quality!