Vityafan asked "When does it stop being "old school," exactly?" and I thought it could be a good thread
I always have the idea of 1985-1992 being the golden era of our sport, but I can find that kind of old school beauty in 1996 and even 2000 too.

Once in the lated Short sighted nostalgics thread, Numblemon draw the line at this routine:
Fan Ye 2003
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOr_cMqP4bg
Beautiful, perfect and classy.

Whose are your LAST old school favorites?

Maybe YAng Yun Vaults?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=axndKo5F6jg

Khorkina's FX?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7E2puXlfDtg

Interesting post. Very interesting...you actually beat me to posting it.

I suppose one could look at it as whenever they finally ditched the old style COP scale (scores on a scale of 10.000) for that confusing mess they have today.

But it's definitely going to be a massive gray area, that's for certain.

I think gymnastics changed a lot after 1992. We watched giant gymnasts like Milosovici, Kotchetkova, Miller but also more repetitive works ideas start to be everywhere. Maybe the change of code of points after the Barcelona Olympics can be considered as the turning point.

Old school gymnastics era is also symbolized by historical rivalries: Ussr, Romania, Usa and East German Republic did the gym History. After 92 and the end of the Ussr, gymnastics has entered a new time, former Ussr trainers went abroad and new nations have arrived (Ukraine with Podkopayeva for instance).

So I like the '92 breaking point idea.

Welcome to the forum, Ozrussia!

I like the '92 idea better now that you mention it. The breakup of the USSR was probably the most earthshaking non-war event in modern history, and it also had major effects on the many sports that were formerly dominated by the USSR (who competed as one for the last time in '92).

I like the 1992 idea, and I would also make an argument for 2000. It was:

*the last romania vs. russia team battle
*the last strong all around field, in my opinion
*the last year without 6-3-3 and 2 per country in the all around
*the last olympics where two vaults were required and everybody was trying for vault finals
*the last olympics where gymnasts actually had to compete against one another to make the all around (Khorkina/Zamoldochikova/Produnova/Lobaznyuk)
*the last olympics where the difference between gold and silver in every individual final was less than a tenth
*the last year without specialists

1996, since it was the end of compulsories, could also define the end of old school.

I agree 100% with 1992.

1992 seems good to me.

Why?

Because 1993 saw a big drop-off as far as quality was concerned.

So did 1997.

Not to mention 2001-2003.

Or 2006.



But how about 1989-1991? These were some of the best years for gymnastics, and yes, the Soviets were still there.

I think that 1992 was the last truly old school year and the end of an era. It was the last time that the Soviet Union competed as a team, even though they were the Unified Team. The USSR-Romania rivalry was also there for the last time.

1992 was also the last year that the Romanians had really unique routines. It was just before the Romanians started doing the minimum difficulty to get a 10.0 start value.

For me 1972-1992 was the Golden Age of Gymnastics, with real creative peaks in the 1980s.

I'm going to start a companion poll to quantify the results...

[edit] Here's the link!

I'm torn between 1993 and 2005 and I'm leaning towards the last one.

I think the peak of gymnastics is probably between 85 and 92 but I daresay a part of the concept old school lasted as long as the ten system was in place. Even without compulsories we've seen great old school gymnastics.

The big shift to me was the open ended system. The stuffing of difficulty is what makes the routines so different from the old school ones. There's a big difference in style and artistic quality if you compare 2004 with 2006. Some athletes have old school routines by 2004-2005 and by 2008 they shift to the "how can I stuff more difficulty in my routine" mode.

NAstia Liukin 2005:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcdp1o07tuE
Cheng fei 2004
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f44U9DdIflY&feature=related

I love those athtletes, but their gymnastics style changed.