ARTISTIC GYMNASTICS, Pre-olympics QANTAS 2000 INTERNATIONAL GYMNASTICS CHALLENGE Sydney participants

. . SYDNEY SET FOR TEST Nine months from now gymnastics' best will square off in Sydney in the first Olympics of the new millennium. Top gymnasts -- including artistic, rhythmic and trampoline competitors -- from around the world are scheduled to take part in a pre-Olympic "test" event February 23-27, held in the Sydney Superdome, the Olympic arena. Joining the above athletes will be as-yet-unnamed representatives from Russia and Romania as well as nearly 40 athletes from the host nation (Australia), which will have their 2000 national artistic championships in conjunction with the tournament.		.
EVENT BACKGROUND: This competition is the first held in the Olympic venue and is classified as the Test Event for the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games. ARTISTIC & RHYTHMIC GYMNASTICS: The Top 10 countries at the 1999 World Championships have been invited to the competition. Should any nation not accept the invitation then it will be extended to the next nation ranked until ten countries are confirmed.
The Qantas International Gymnastics Challenge starts on Wednesday 23 February with the Trampoline competition. The top 10 Men and Women, plus the next two highest-ranking Australians from the FIG World Cup meet to be held on Sunday February 20 at Gosford, will compete. .

The Men’s and Women’s Senior National Champions will determined at the beginning of the week in the Qantas Australian Gymnastics Championships: (22-02-2000)

- There are 12 Men entered in the Men’s Senior event on Tuesday February 22 at 7.30pm. The current National Champion is Andrei Kravtsov. The 28 year-old veterans of the sport, Andrei and Brennon Dowrick will face strong competition from the new generation of Australian male gymnasts including
Philippe Rizzo, Damian Istria and Adrian Looney.

.	RESULTs Men

·- There are 20 Women entered in the Women’s Senior event on Wednesday February 23 at 7.30pm. The current National Champion is Trudy McIntosh.
The title of 2000 National Champion will be closely fought between the three gymnasts whom following the World Championships, continued their winning form on the FIG Word Cup circuit. They are Trudy McIntosh, Allana Slater and Lisa Skinner.

·- In this session Trudy McIntosh will perform her new floor routine for the first time. This routine is accompanied by the tune “Waltzing Matilda”. She will also perform her own Vault “The McIntosh”, which was named in her honour being the first gymnast to successfully perform the Full Twisting Front Layout at a World Championships or Olympic Games.

.	RESULTs Women

· The Qantas Australian Gymnastics Championships serve as the sole qualification event for the Australians who will compete later in the week in the

Qantas International Gymnastics Challenge.

· The International Men’s All Around Final is on Thursday 24 February at 7.30pm.
· The International Women’s All Around Final is on Friday, 25 February at 7.30pm
· From these two sessions the top eight gymnasts on each apparatus will qualify for the
Apparatus Finals to be held over two sessions:
· On Saturday February 26 at 7.30pm the apparatus featured will be Men – Floor, Pommel Horse,
Rings and Women – Floor and Vault.
· On Sunday 27 February at 2.00pm the apparatus featured with be Men - Vault, Parallel Bars & High
Bar and Women - Uneven Bars and Beam.

· The first session of Rhythmic competition in the Qantas International Gymnastics Challenge starts
at 12.00pm on Saturday 26 February. This qualification session will be contested by 14 of the 15
medallists from the 1999 World Championships.
The Rhythmic Final will be held at 11.00am on Sunday, 27 February.

(Information: Australian Gymnastics Federation / Thanks!!)

.	NATIONS	AG women	AG men	Rhythmic Gymnastics
	BELARUS	Natallia Naramovich Maryna Zarzhytskaya	Alexander KRYLOV Alexei SINKEVICH	Yulia RASKINA Valeria VATKINA
	BULGARIA		Dimitri LOUNTCHEV Dian JORDANOV
	CANADA	Julie BEAULIEU Emilie FOURNIER	Alexander JELTTKOV	Amelie PLANTE
	CZECH REPUBLIC	Jana KOMRSKOVA
	CHINA	KUI, Yuanyuan YANG, Yan	DONG, Zhen ZHENG, Lihui
	FINLAND			Heini LAUTALA
	FRANCE	Ludivine FURNON Elvire TEZA	Florent MAREE Yann CUCHERAT	Eva SERRANO Aurelie LACOUR
	GERMANY		Sven KWIATKOWSKI Peter NIKIFEROW	Helene ASMUS, Christiane HORNECK
	GREAT BRITAIN	Natalie LUCITT Holly MURDOCK
	HUNGARY		Szilveszter CSOLLANY Zoltan SUPOLA
	ITALY	Martina BREMINI Elena OLIVETTA
	JAPAN		Naoya TSUKAHARA Yoshihiro SAITO Akihiro KASAMATSU	Rieko MATSUNAGA Ai YOKOCHI
	POLAND			Anna KWITNIEWSKA Agnieszka BRANDEBURA
	ROMANIA	Loredana BOBOC Andreea ISARESCU	Loan Silviu SUCIU Rares Iulian Orzata

	RUSSIA			Yulia BARSUKOVA Alina KABAEVA
	SLOVENIA		Mitja PETKOVSEK
	SPAIN	Laura MARTINEZ Sara MORO	Jesus CARBALLO Omar CORTES	Esther DOMINGUEZ Almudena CID TOSTADO
	UKRAINE	Halyna TYRYK Nataliya HORODNIY	Alexander SVETLICHNIY Ruslan MEZENTSEV	Elena VITRICHENKO Tamara YEROFEYEVA Ganna BESSONOVA
	USA	only Jeanette ANTOLIN Robin PHELPS (injured !!)	Sean TOWNSEND Guard YOUNG

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PREVIEW	PARTICIPANTS	RESULTS Trampoline	AUS Championships
.Gymnastics in the Australian Press		RESULTS Artistic	RESULTS Rhythmic