Sovetsky Sport. April 4, 1972. The first Dinamo team became the USSR champion in gymnastics for women. It includes L. Turischeva, T. Lazakovich, Z. Voronina, E. Saadi, T. Schegolkova, O. Voroshilina, and N. Molotkova. In second place was the Armed Forces, and in third place was Labor Reserves.
There were twenty-one gymnasts on the podium. Eleven of them live in Belarus: seven from Labor Reserves, three from Armed Forces, and one from Dinamo. I emphasize this fact, because it once again confirms the legimitacy of the republic's team victory at the V Spartakiad of the Peoples of the USSR and, in general, the flourishing of the Belarussian women's gymnastics school. It is also characteristic that Labor Reserves competed in the championship for the first time and competed in the early, weakest shift. The more honorable is the achievement of the pupils of the coaches V. Khomutov, A. Neverovich, and L. Miromanova.
The fight for the individual championship the second day of the all-around competition gave little: it determined only sixteen finalists but then, at the final counting, their results for this day are discarded. But there was not a shadow of calmness or indifference in the actions of our strongest: they performed with full dedication. Here, for example, are Turischeva's scores in the usual order (VT, UB, BB, FX): 9.4, 9.75, 9.7, 98. On uneven bars, she now twists a total of 1,040 degrees.
Second (conditionally) in the optional program was Korbut - Olya does not change at all over the years, she's the same tiny girl with bangs, and this is also the reason for the audience's sympathy: when vaulting, even after landing, she bounced several times on the mats because of her weightlessness, like a ball, and it caused a good laugh and applause. The applause accompanied her fantastic flights on the uneven bars and the end of her beam routine: a tucked back somersault and a forward somersault to land on the floor - one, two, thrills! Compositionally, it is much more logical and reliable than in the previous version with the somersault in the middle.
Both Lazakovich and Burda (who morally rehabilitated herself for her failure of the first day) performed well. But I would like to focus on two gymnasts from the champion team. Familiar to us for a relatively long time, they seem to have suddenly strengthened and blossomed this season. I'm talking about twenty-year-old Elvira Saadi from Tashkent and eighteen-year-old Olga Voroshilina from Voronezh.
The dark, flexible Saadi was dubbed 'the Panther' in Paris. She is impulsive, nervous, and impetuous. Her hands in their modulations are similar, perhaps, only to the amazing hands of the glorious Uzbek dancer Tamara Khanum. Once at a training session they argued about whether it was necessary to have a wave-like movement in one place of the compulsory floor exercise. They asked Elya. And I thought there was no need to ask her; she has a 'wave' in any movement. She lights up when she talks about her floor routine, and Rachmaninoff's Polichinel, staged by E. Sumarokova. She read and thought a lot while preparing it, and she subtly feels all the nuances of the tragic jester's experiences.
Turischeva said that Saadi, like no one else, is able to watch what is going on around her during the competition, and she was asked if it interferes with her inner concentration. Elya said that no, on the contrary, together with the other girls, she does routines and gets inspired, and then the main thing is to keep herself in check. The beam and floor are her crowning events.
Voroshilina, blue-eyed, fair-haired, a beauty, is a laugher. She glows with clarity and kindness. Nature gave her a great gymnastic talent, and she carries it easily and, it seems, unconsciously. The day was unsuccessful for her - she was not used to being so high, third in the rankings. She soared over the beam in her dizzying leap, landed, and fell. Anyone else would have cramped up, but she just doesn't know how to leap any other way. She was confused to the point when it came to the leap, it turned out that she was standing at the other end of the beam, and she herself didn't remember how she got there. But this is all, in my opinion, a minor annoyance. The main thing is that Olya showed what a talent she is, the rest is a matter of work, a matter of her seriousness.
Do not be against me for the fact that I kept silent on this day about the course of the battle. I warned you: sixteen of the strongest enter the finals with the results of the compulsory program known to you. Here in the final - that will be a real fight.
TECHNICAL RESULTS
USSR gymnastics championships. Team results. Women. 1. Dinamo 1 - 449.1; 2. Armed Forces - 436.4; 3. Labor Reserves - 435.25; 4. Burevestnik - 434.95; 5. Trud - 432.45; 6. Spartak - 431.4.
S. TOKAREV