Brazil Names a New National Team

We have another installment in the great Jade Barbosa soap opera, which is beginning to veer from the tragic into the frankly somewhat absurd. Guess what happened to Jade this week, according to Globoesporte? Despite the fact that the gymnastics department of her club, Flamengo, has been saved from perdition, its water and electricity were cut off on Monday, meaning the fans weren't working and Jade, who needs to drink a lot of water because she is passing kidney stones, didn't have any water to drink. Eventually, part of the problem was solved by means of a large cooler with drinks, but still, we couldn't help shaking our heads in disbelief. Jade seems to attract bad luck like no other gymnast on the planet, except perhaps the few truly unlucky ones who are in wheelchairs now due to injuries sustained while practicing the sport. Let's hope Jade is spared that fate.

Anyhow, electricity and water cutoffs are not where Jade's problems end. According to UOL Esporte, she does not enjoy a protected status on the national team. At least, that's what new team coordinator Georgete Vidor says. Off the record, it is assumed that Jade's spot on the team is in fact being kept open for her. UOL Esporte even made that its headline today...


Jade's woes at Flamengo continue... (photo: Globoesporte)

Iryna selects new gymnastics team and keeps spots open for Jade, Daiane, and Laís

This Wednesday [today] Ukrainian coach Iryna Ilyashenko took her first decision as commander-in-chief of the Brazilian WAG team. After three days of work at the Center of Excellency in Curitiba, the coach selected the team that will serve as the basis for the next Olympic cycle.

Iryna selected nine of the twelve athletes she intends to use as the group that will seek to qualify for the London Olympics in 2012. Unofficially, three spots on the team will be kept for Daiane dos Santos, Laís Souza, and Jade Barbosa, who are recovering from injuries and did not take part in the selection camp.

In all, eighteen gymnasts took part in the tests that began on Monday in the capital of Paraná State. After analyzing such aspects as physical fitness and technical prowess, the coaches' committee, headed by Iryna, opted for a group of nine official team members and five alternates.

Of the nine official team members, five were not part of the group that worked with Oleg Ostapenko in the last cycle. They are Anna Carolina Cardoso, Bruna Leal, Nadhine Ourives, Janaina Silva, and Priscila Cobello. Still on the team: Ethiene Franco, Khiuani Dias, Ana Claudia Silva, and Daniele Hypólito, all gymnasts who joined the team last year [or much longer ago in Hypólito's case]. The alternates are Nicole Beltrame, Vitória Sampaio, Caroline Himovski, Letícia da Costa, and Nayara Sobrinho.


Ethiene Franco (photo: Stefan Wurzer/Gymnasticsunited)

"We're selecting the girls who have major potential and who stand out during the workouts held these three days. But it's clear that this team is still subject to change. We are planning another two or three selection camps where Daiane, Jade, and Laís will also be assessed. So it's not as if a girl won't be part of the team anymore just because she wasn't chosen today," said Iryna.

Juliana Santos, who was the alternate to the team that competed at the Olympic Games in Beijing, was not present at this Wednesday's selection camp either, because she is injured. She will be reassessed to know whether she will join the team. The gymnast's club, Grêmio, sent an official letter to the Brazilian Gymnastics Federation explaining the athlete's absence. Flamengo did the same thing for Jade Barbosa. On the other hand, Pinheiros, where Laís and Daiane train, did not send the Federation any notification [about its gymnasts' absence].

However, the new team coordinator, coach Georgete Vidor, insisted on emphasizing that the famous athletes do not enjoy a protected status. "We are not granting Jade, Laís, or Daiane any privileges. We want to work with twelve gymnasts on the official team and we have chosen nine girls who have shown to us that they have what it takes to be on the team. But just because three out of twelve team members are still missing, doesn't mean that we are privileging some gymnast or other," the director explained.

The technical committee has already established the dates for the next selection camps. The first reevaluation will take place at the end of April. Later, in July, the athletes will once again be subjected to analysis at Curitiba. "But if even after all these tests, we still have doubts as to whether a particular gymnast is fully ready, we will make a new assessment at the Brazilian national championship in August," said Georgete. The intention is to have a complete team for the London world championships, to be held in October.

"I'm very happy to be continuing. Gymnastics is my life and I hope to develop even more in this new cycle, together with these new girls who are joining the team," said Khiuani Dias, aged 16, who was a strong candidate to make Brazil's Olympic team, only to finish outside the group that was sent to China due to an injury to her right hand.


Khiuani Dias (photo: Stefan Wurzer/Gymnasticsunited)

The new team has a smaller basis than the one that went into the previous Olympic cycle. In 2005, when the last selection camp was held, seventeen gymnasts were invited to join the national team, which at the time was based in Curitiba. At the end of the four-year period, only nine of the seventeen gymnasts were still on the team commanded by Oleg Ostapenko.

Now, in order to try and diminish the "exodus" of athletes, the team will no longer train together in Curitiba. The gymnasts will normally train at their own clubs, and the team will only convene at certain times of the year, just before certain competitions.

All Is Well That Ends Well in Brazil

Today we have two Brazilian updates for you, one regarding the goings-on in Rio de Janeiro, and another one regarding the injuries of some of the country's top gymnasts. Let's start with the latest developments in Rio de Janeiro...

As some of you may have learned from other sources, the financial crisis at the Flamengo sports club, which threatened to leave Diego and Daniele Hypólito and Jade Barbosa without a place to work out, was averted at the last minute. According to this January 26 UOL Esporte article, Flamengo's elite gymnastics program will continue to exist, thanks to the generosity of the city of Niterói, a Rio de Janeiro suburb. Reportedly the Niterói authorities will inject R$80,000 (nearly US$35,000) per month into Flamengo's gymnastics program. In exchange, the Hypólitos and Barbosa will take part in the city's projects to stimulate local kids to get involved in the sport. Now that's what we call an excellent deal...


Happy again: Diego Hypolito (photo: Lydia Gismondi/Globoesporte)

That is not all, though.

According to this February 3 Globoesporte article, the Brazilian Gymnastics Federation may get a new training center in Rio de Janeiro. As those of you who have been following our Brazilian news for a while are aware, the old center in Curitiba (the seat of the Brazilian Gymnastics Federation) was closed last year after a coaching scandal. Now the Brazilian Olympic Committee and Rio de Janeiro State University are in talks to open a new training center on the university campus. If the plans go through, the center will be equipped with the apparatus used at the 2007 Pan-American Games, which is currently in a storage facility owned by the Brazilian Olympic Committee. The establishment of the new training center is a response to the recent crisis at Flamengo, and part of Rio de Janeiro's campaign to raise its profile to further its bid for the 2016 Olympics. Presumably, the facility will be used for pre-meet training camps rather than on a permanent basis. Either way, one more fully equipped training center in Rio won't hurt...

Diego Hypolito: "Flamengo Gymnastics Is a Thing of the Past"

Things continue to be highly unsettled in Rio de Janeiro, where a distraught Diego Hypolito left a meeting with Flamengo President Marcio Braga on Friday saying, "Flamengo gymnastics is a thing of the past. It was a huge blow for me, in a year in which I was supposed to rise from the ashes."

Diego, his sister Daniele and Jade Barbosa met with Braga on Friday to discuss the future of the elite gymnastics program at Flamengo, one of Brazil's foremost multi-sport clubs. According to Globoesporte, the trio were told by Braga that he wasn't telling anyone to leave, but did not have the means to renew contracts. "We have run out of money. We cannot sign contracts that we cannot fulfill," stated Braga, who blames the global economic crisis for the situation. The only solution, he said, would be the arrival of new sponsors or public funds.


Diego Hypolito, Daniele Hypolito, and Jade Barbosa with Marcio Braga
(photo: Globoesporte)

According to other Globoesporte and UOL Esporte articles, Braga once again blamed the Brazilian Olympic Committee (which receives 2 percent of the revenues of the national lottery) for not doing enough to solve the crisis at Flamengo. "We are going through a crisis, but the resources are there," Braga stated, referring to the fortune the Brazilian Olympic Committee recently received to strengthen Rio de Janeiro's candidacy for the 2016 Olympics. "If part of those resources were made available to us, the athletes wouldn't be so unhappy today." He went on to say, "The current system cannot continue. It's a crime against society and the practice of sports."

According to Braga, the directors of Brazil's leading sports clubs (including Pinheiros, where Daiane dos Santos and Lais Souza train) will meet with the Brazilian Minister of Sport on February 4 to find a financial solution to the crisis.

After the meeting with Braga, Daniele Hypolito was quick to point out that the gymnasts still had a month to figure out what to do. However, it was obvious that her brother Diego was not inclined to wait. "I've been cast adrift. Unfortunately, we will have to start looking for a new club. We have places to go, but all I really wanted was to stay here at Flamengo. I don't have much time. I've lost my sponsors. I'm a professional. I don't want things to be like they were in the past, when I didn't have anything to eat," said the double world champion on floor, who reportedly hasn't received his wages for three months and has lost his other sources of income as well.

Apparently Diego told UOL Esporte that he and Daniele had already found a new place to train, but refused to disclose where it was. One of the options would be the new gymnastics club Flamengo's traditional rival Botafogo has offered to set up for the gymnasts in a shed adjacent to the club's stadium. Alternatively it might be an existing top club, like Pinheiros. However, that would require a move from Rio de Janeiro to São Paulo, and we are not sure the Hypolitos are prepared to do that.

To be continued...

Interesting Developments in Brazil

First of all, Globoesporte reports that the Brazilian Gymnastics Federation has canceled the selection camp for artistic and rhythmic gymnasts and trampolinists that was supposed to take place at Curitiba, January 26-28. What with several of their top gymnasts (Daiane dos Santos, Lais Souza, Jade Barbosa) being injured and others (like Diego Hypolito) simply refusing to show up, the Federation must have felt it was no use holding the camp. No new date for a selection camp has been set yet.


Diego Hypolito (photo: Reuters)

Secondly, it seems that Jade Barbosa and the Hypolito siblings may not have to leave Rio de Janeiro after all if their club, Flamengo, does indeed go through with the planned closure of its elite gymnastics program. In an interesting turn of events, the new Olympic sports coordinator of another famous Rio de Janeiro sports club, Botafogo (like Flamengo, best known for its superb soccer team), has offered to set up a training center in a large shed adjacent to the club's Engenhão Stadium. The Botafogo coordinator, Miguel Ângelo da Luz, told Globoesporte that he would try to obtain the equipment used at the 2007 Pan-American Games in Rio de Janeiro, which is currently stored by the Brazilian Olympic Committee. He also stated that Botafogo was not trying to steal gymnasts from its traditional rival, but merely trying to help out. We'll be interested to
see how that pans out...

Quick News Roundup

--- No official Arques results have been announced so far, but poster benoitof, who attended the competition in an official capacity, was kind enough to scan his personal copy of the results of the event finals and post it on Gymnet (scroll down). You can probably see why we got a little confused watching the live broadcast without sound. There were always two event finals going on at the same time: The A final for one event and the B final for another event. All the different age categories competed in the same finals, with the highest-scoring gymnasts from the all-around competition (regardless of age) contesting the A final, and the second-highest-scoring group of gymnasts contesting the B final. A final winners were then presented with their medals along with with the B final winners (both standing on the same medal stand), which made for some confusing award ceremony viewing. But as you can see, we were right when we said Russia's Diana Sapronova won three finals (bars, beam, and floor), leaving vault to Holland's Wyomi Masela, who recently won the same event in a much better field at the Massilia Cup. Interestingly, the highest B score of the day, 9.250 on beam, was awarded to a Finnish gymnast, Reeta Pietila, who did one of the prettiest piked backs we've ever seen.


Reeta Pietila (photo: Oulun Pyrinto)

--- Olympic finalist Ariella Kaeslin, owner of one of the world's finest layout rudi vaults, has been named Switzerland's Female Athlete of the Year, beating figure skater Sarah Meier to the honor. Congratulations Ariella!


Ariella Kaeslin

--- Rumor has it that Ivana Hong, fresh from a much-publicized split with Al Fong, will join Valeri Liukin's training group at WOGA in January. We may be alone on this, but we like the sound of that arrangement. We're not sure Ivana and Valeri are a perfect match characterwise, but Ivana's gymnastics, at least, seems to fit the WOGA style well. And who knows to what levels Nastia Liukin, Rebecca Bross, and Ivana Hong may push each other?


Ivana Hong (photo: Scott Einuis)

--- Globoesporte reports that current vice-president Maria Luciene Resende has won the Brazilian Gymnastics Federations's presidential elections by 13 votes against 5. Resende's plans seem a little sketchy compared with her rival's (for more details, see this article), but she was widely expected to have more support within the Federation than her rival, former vice-president Marco Martins. It will be interesting to see what changes will be made under the new leadership, which inherits a rather tarnished reputation from the old one. It will also be interesting to see if Jade Barbosa will return to the national training center, as she said she might do once the new leadership had been installed.

--- The FIG doesn't seem to believe in updating its website on the weekend, meaning we still don't have a clue who the final competitors in the World Cup Finals will be. Not officially, anyway.

Brazilian Gymnastics Federation to Change Leadership

We always knew gymnastics was popular in Brazil (the fact that Brazilian TV broadcasts every single World Cup competition live speaks volumes), but we didn't realize just how popular the sport was in the South American country until we saw that Globoesporte had devoted an entire article to the Brazilian Gymnastics Federation's upcoming presidential elections, complete with an overview of the two candidates' opinions on a number of issues. Be honest now - have you ever come across an article like that in a sports magazine in your country? Because we certainly haven't.

The reason why the Brazilian Federation's elections are relevant is because, as those of you who've been reading our articles for a while now know, things haven't been well in the Federation lately. A few months ago, Jade Barbosa accused the Federation of, among other things, overworking its gymnasts and neglecting their injuries. Her allegations were confirmed by a number of other gymnasts. Many of the gymnasts' accusations were leveled at Eliane Martins, the current coordinator of the national team, whose mandate is about to end and who will not seek re-election. Her boss, the current president of the Federation, is about to be replaced as well. Needless to say, there's great interest in the new leadership and its plans to redeem the Federation's tarnished reputation.


Jade Barbosa at the national training center in Curitiba. We promise we'll stop posting pics of Jade crying now. (Photo: Reuters)

Below you'll find a very loose translation of the Globoesporte article on the candidates and their ideas on how to get the Brazilian Gymnastics Federation back on track after the scandal.

Federation's presidental candidates propose "reconciliation" with gymnasts

This Sunday the Federation will change leadership after 17 years under Vicélia

This Sunday, after 17 years under the command of Vicélia Florenzano, the Brazilian Gymnastics Federation will elect a new president. The new director, who will take the Federation into the Olympic cycle leading up to London 2012, will have to tackle two great challenges: Firstly, to ensure the continued evolution of the sport in Brazil, and secondly, to "clean up" the organization's image after its conflicts with the country's top gymnasts.

The two candidates for the vacancy have at least one thing in common: They are both connected to the parting president, Vicélia Florenzano. This is because Marco Martins, president of the Brasília Gymnastics Federation, has been a member of the Brazilian Gymnastics Federation for 10 years and used to be the vice-president of the Federation (he left in 2006 due to differences of opinion with the president). As for Maria Luciene Resende, a former president of the Sergipe Gymnastics Federation, she has been the vice-president of the Federation for the last 3 years.

One of the many things on which the two candidates agree is their willingness to use dialog in order to bring about a reconciliation with Jade Barbosa, Daiane dos Santos, and Laís Souza. After the Beijing Olympics, Barbosa accused the Federation of submitting her to extremely heavy workouts, and received support from her two friends. At present, all three gymnasts are recuperating from injuries.


Jade Barbosa's hands (photo: Reuters)

"Dialog is the best way to go about it. People know what is going on, but these are solvable problems. Our management will be actively involved in the process. We know our responsibility is to look after our athletes, and we intend to get together with them to solve all the problems," Maria Luciene Resende told Globoesporte on the phone.

Marco Martins endorsed the words of his rival and admitted that effecting a reconciliation would be a complicated job.

"It will be a lot of work. Therefore, one of the first things we'll create will be a national gymnastics forum, to discuss our relationship with everyone and to establish a solution for these problems. I'm a great believer in talking things over," Martins told Globoesporte.

The two candidates agree on other things as well. Such as the team's new head coach. Now that Oleg Ostapenko has returned to Ukraine, both candidates are thinking of leaving his assistant, fellow Ukrainian Irina Ilyashenko, in charge of the national team. Moreover, they both emphasize the importance of seeking other foreign coaches and preparing Brazilians to work with the team in the future.


Irina Ilyashenko, Brazil's new head coach? (Photo: Murilo Garavello/UOL)

Moreover, both candidates agree that the management of the Brazilian Gymnastics Federation will have to be improved. They both promise to improve administrative routines. Marco Martins is considering separating the Federation management from the national training center (both are currently located in the city of Curitiba); Luciene Maria Resende wishes to analyze the question of the Federation's close proximity to the national training center at a later date.

Both candidates praise the current director, Vicélia Florenzano, for the development of gymnastics in Brazil. It seems they're not blaming her for the recent scandal.

With regard to the evolution of Brazilian gymnastics, both candidates defend the creation of programs to train Brazilian coaches, as well as programs to stimulate basic coaching skills. However, they emphasize that serious investments in the teams will continue to be made in order to guarantee a better performance at the London Olympics.


The national training center in Curitiba (photo: Reuters)

The candidates do have divergent opinions on a few matters. For instance, Marco Martins intends to keep a national team, but wishes to put an end to permanent centralized training. According to Martins, national team members should train at their respective clubs and only get together before competitions; in his opinion, the duration of such joint training camps should be determined by the importance of the competition. He wishes to keep a national training center, but would like to have it established in a bigger city, the better to meet the requirements of the Federation. Furthermore, Martins hopes the Federation will establish a better relationship with the clubs, including the loan of equipment and top coaches.

For her part, Maria Luciene Resende intends to discuss the subject of the national team with her work team and the various state federations. Like Martins, she guarantees greater support to the clubs, but she hasn't actually made any concrete proposals. She intends to analyze the viability of other centers outside Curitiba (the current seat of the national training center) in the future.

Globoesporte expects Maria Luciene Resende to win the election. We'll see how it goes, and whether there will soon be an improvement in the Federation's troubled relationship with its top gymnasts.

Flamengo Talk

After all that stuff about the DTB Cup and injuries, we feel it's incumbent on us to resume our reporting on the Brazilian team. Because, you know, they have injuries too!

The latter sentence would probably be funny if it weren't so hideously true. But unfortunately it's all too true.

Let's start with Jade Barbosa, shall we? According to Globoesporte, Jade didn't recover from her "renal crisis" (read: kidney stones) last week, so the scheduled MRI of her hand didn't happen. She's now scheduled to have it tomorrow. We hope she can actually undergo the examination this time, and that the results won't be too depressing.


Jade Barbosa (photo: Reuters)
Meanwhile, some rather alarming news has reached us concerning the anti-inflammatory drug with which Jade claims the Federation overdosed her during the Olympics and the preceding months, Prexige. Our reader D informed us that Prexige was banned in Brazil a while ago for causing serious liver damage. So we looked into it, and it turns out it has actually been banned in a lot of places. See, for instance, this notice by the Australian government, released over a year ago (!). It's an urgent medicine recall in which Prexige is listed as a Class I drug, which means that its defects are "potentially life-threatening" or could cause "a serious risk to health." Prexige comes in three formulations: 100mg, 200mg, and 400mg. Jade claims she took two or three 400mg tablets a day for several months. She's obviously still alive, but we shudder to think what damage the medicine might have done to her liver.

Try to put yourself in Jade Barbosa's shoes now. You're suffering from a potentially career-threatening hand injury, a foot injury, and kidney stones, and on top of that you have to wonder whether the pills your team doctor prescribed to you might have damaged your liver...? It's all a bit much, really. We haven't always been fans of Jade, but right now we're sending good vibes her way like you wouldn't believe. She obviously needs them harder than Ksenia Semyonova and Anna Pavlova combined. And we're saying that with all the love in our Ksenia-and-Anna-adoring hearts.

As for the MRI, we'll keep you posted.


Jade Barbosa (photo: Reuters)
Meanwhile, Jade's teammates at Flamengo, Diego and Daniele Hypolito, aren't exactly leading dull lives either. They were at the DTB Cup last weekend, baffling spectators and critics alike by being, well, less than stellar. Heidemarie even gave Diego a tongue-lashing for throwing a simple double twist dismount on floor after a press to handstand had gone awry, thus ruining his chances of a gold medal.

Turns out poor Diego actually had an excuse. He is - you've guessed it - injured. He's suffering a bad backache, and only went to Stuttgart because he wanted to make sure he'd qualify to the World Cup Final. He scored just enough points to do so on both floor and vault, but it wasn't easy. "In my floor exercise I tried to do a compulsory strength and balance element called an 'inverted cross,'" said the 2005 and 2007 world champion. "I didn't manage the first time around because it hurt so much, but my second attempt was successful."

And here we were giving him a hard time for throwing a double twist after that. Our apologies, Diego.


The coolest picture of Diego Hypolito you'll ever find
Meanwhile, Diego's sister Daniele (who just competed in her first individual final since the 2007 Pan-American Games) is busy making plans for the future. Although she's 24, she's by no means ready to retire yet. We're guessing that means that she, for one, is not nursing any serious injuries. Knock on wood.

According to Daniele, she wasn't planning to go to Germany last week, but when the other girls withdrew from the competition, she decided to make it part of her plans for - yes, we're getting to it - London 2012.

"After four years and all the effort I put into going to the Beijing Olympics, I didn't expect to be in great shape now. I decided, pretty much at the last minute, to compete here in Stuttgart to show everyone, especially myself, that I am an active gymnast and that I can still be competitive in the sport."


Daniele Hypolito (photo: Reuters)
She's thinking of changing the way she trains, though. "Until Beijing, I always strove to be a complete gymnast, to do the all-around, to do all four events. Now I believe I'll only be able to do that for one or two more years, tops. For 2012, I'll do my best to become a specialist, to prioritize one or two events."

She's not sure yet what those one or two events will be, but she's sure specializing is the way to go. "I'm old, so I'll have to be very good on one apparatus and secure on another one if I'm to help the team," Daniele said last weekend.

Interestingly, Daniele doesn't seem to be involved in the row that her teammates Jade, Daiane, and Lais are having with the Brazilian Gymnastics Federation. "I'm training with Jade at Flamengo, but I'm staying out of this dispute between the Federation and the girls," Daniele said last weekend. "I don't even want to get involved in the election of the new president of the Federation [in December]. I only want to show people my gymnastics."

According to certain sources, Daniele has actually reprehended her teammate Jade for criticizing the Federation. This is all the more remarkable since Daniele has been reported to have had a few clashes with the Federation herself over the last ten years.


Daniele and Jade at the Beijing Olympics (photo: Reuters)
Next up: a post about the Sao Paulo girls, Daiane dos Santos and Lais Souza. Because they're injured too, and because Daiane's injury is actually kind of interesting. Stay tuned.

The Brazilian Scandal: Part 2

We promised you we'd get back to you on the Brazilian scandal. So here we are, presenting our findings. Brace yourselves - it's going to be a long ride.

Over the last few days we've translated our way through several months' worth of gymnastics articles in Portuguese, courtesy of Gymblog Brasil. Most of Gymblog's posts seem to come straight from UOL Esporte and Globoesporte, two of Brazil's largest and most reliable sports sites. We haven't been able to trace all the stories posted in the blog, but we're sure they're legit, so we have no qualms about reprinting them here.

While digging our way through Gymblog Brasil's archives, we came across some interesting stories. (For instance, did you know that Diego Hypolito had a bout of dengue fever a few months before the Olympics? Neither did we. Poor Diego. We've been told by those in the know that dengue fever is unbelievably painful.) In addition, we came across a great interview with Daiane dos Santos which we hope to translate and publish in a few days' time. We learned more about Dos Santos and Laís Souza's injuries than we ever thought we'd care to know. But most of all, we learned why Jade Barbosa always looks like she's about to burst into tears. The girl is having a rough time of it. She really is. Right now she's suffering from kidney stones and a stress fracture in her left foot, and the bones in her right hand are alleged to be as porous as a 50-year-old's. We wish we were making this shit up, but alas, we're not.


Jade and her brother (photo: Globoesporte)

Anyhow, we've decided to spread the story out over a few days so as not to make it too unwieldy. Even so, today's post will be humongous. It will focus mostly on Jade Barbosa and the scandal she unleashed after Beijing. Expect more news about Laís Souza and Daiane dos Santos in a separate post.

First of all, it seems the Barbosa family and the Brazilian Gymnastics Federation have been at loggerheads for a while. Back in July, Cesar Barbosa, Jade's father, was complaining that Jade hadn't received her Federation stipend since January, and questioning the Federation's integrity in contractual matters. But things didn't turn really ugly until September 4, when Mr. Barbosa told the Brazilian press that Jade was suffering from a hand injury and had been doing so for a while. He said it had been obvious to anyone watching her train before the Olympics that she was not going to win the Olympic medals many people were expecting her to bring home.

"Anyone who attended Jade's workouts before the Olympics could see she wasn't going to do well in Beijing," said Cesar Barbosa. "She was in a lot of pain and had lost some of her flexibility. If Jade couldn't even do her exercises properly in training, she obviously wasn't going to obtain good results in Beijing."


Jade Barbosa (photo: FIG)
Mr. Barbosa went on to say that the family was waiting for the results of the medical examinations Jade had undergone the week before to be announced before deciding whether the gymnast required surgery or not. Furthermore, he reported that according to the first doctor who had examined 17-year-old Jade, the bones in her injured hand looked as porous as a 50-year-old's. Her father claimed that this was because "she was forced to train excessively for Beijing, with extreme workouts that were necessary for her to look good there." Mr. Barbosa noted that his daughter had nursed several injuries in her right hand since January, and had not been given sufficient time to stop training and focus on medical treatment instead.

On September 6, the Brazilian Gymnastics Federation's top physician, Dr. Mário Namba, refuted the charges, saying that Jade had been healthy enough to compete in the Beijing Olympics. According to Namba, the athlete had received appropriate care for the injury to her right hand, sustained at the beginning of the year.

"During our training camp in Japan and during the Olympics, Barbosa had a completely normal training regimen," claimed Namba. "Yes, her hand hurt, but we subjected it to conservative treatment, including physical therapy, which allowed it to function properly. If she had been unable to train, we wouldn't have let her compete."

Namba went on to say, "At the beginning of the year, she had an X-ray and complementary examinations. At the time, we opted for conservative therapy. Initially we didn't focus on surgery options. Our treatment yielded appropriate results and allowed Barbosa to perform well during the first half of the year."

Jade in Beijing (photo: Reuters)
Then there was silence for about a week, until September 12, when Jade granted an interview to the Folha de Sao Paulo in which she accused the Brazilian Gymnastics Federation of overdosing her with medicine during the Olympics, causing her to be nauseous and shaky.

The Rio de Janeiro native told the newspaper that she had started to take the anti-inflammatory drug Prexige in February to control the pain in her hand. The drug was prescribed to her by Mário Namba, the Federation's physician. At first, Barbosa took one 400 g tablet per day. By July (when the team was training in Japan) she was on two tablets a day, and by August, during the Olympics, she was taking three pills a day. According to specialists consulted by the Folha de Sao Paulo, it was a case of extreme overmedication.

"I took the pills because of the pain in my hand," Barbosa told the paper. "At first, the pain subsided a bit, but later I began to vomit a lot. I couldn't train well and constantly had the feeling that I didn't have any strength left in my legs."

The gymnast also claimed in the interview that the Federation forbade its athletes to drink water during workouts. "Our coaches wouldn't let us drink water. We could only spray a little water into our mouths to try and refresh our bodies, but secretly we'd try to drink it," said Barbosa.

She then told the newspaper about the kidney stones she has had since 2007, which she blames on the measures adopted by the Federation. "When I was passing kidney stones, I was told by the doctor to drink 1.5 liters of water a day, but the coaches only let me drink a little, and I had to listen to jokes all the time: 'There goes Jade again, taking a sip of her water.'"


Daiane dos Santos (photo: FIG)
The next day, on September 13, Daiane dos Santos admitted that she too had been injured when competing in Beijing. Unlike Cesar Barbosa though, Dos Santos claimed that there had been nothing unusual about the team's preparation for the Olympics. According to Dos Santos, it was the same preparation the team had had before the 2004 Olympics, which saw the girls working out from 8 to 12 AM and from 4 to 7 PM each day.

But Jade Barbosa's story about neglected injuries was about to be confirmed by others. On September 15, UOL Esporte reported the cases of two former national team members who had had problems of their own with the Federation's management and medical staff.

The first case was that of Maíra dos Santos Silva, now 17 years of age, who was a national team member in 2005 and 2006. Maíra left the national training center at Curitiba after having been informed by the Director of the Federation's Medical Department, Mário Namba, that her shoulder required surgery due to torn ligaments and tendons. But according to the former gymnast, she only needed that operation because the Federation had previously neglected to treat an injury and lied to her about the gravity of her situation.

"I often complained about pain to the coaches and Dr. Namba," Dos Santos Silva was quoted as saying. "They'd only give me an anti-inflammatory drug and say I was being fussy. I had several medical examinations, and they always told me the pain was due to dislocation, nothing bad. But one day I couldn't compete anymore, and then they suddenly said I needed an operation."

Maíra said she had gotten injured when she fell during a series of uneven bar routines in February 2006. She claimed the Federation's physicians told her she had merely dislocated her shoulder, and refused to show her the results of the medical examinations. The athlete was discouraged from undergoing surgery. By August 2006, she was unable to train and compete. Shortly afterwards, when she had decided to leave the team, she discovered that she had been lied to.

"I had an MRI scan after my fall, but I wasn't granted access to the results of the scan. When I left the team, I asked for the papers regarding the examinations I'd had after the fall. It was then that I discovered that I had suffered a partial tear in 2006. Only I wasn't aware of it at the time because they never told me. I continued to compete, so the injury only got worse," she said.

Maíra's complaints worried her mother, Sônia Maria, who worked for the Federation as a kind of housekeeper at the Curitiba hostel where the gymnasts lived. Sônia consulted Federation official Eliane Martins, the team coordinator, on the possibility of getting a second opinion on the injury of her daughter, who often returned from workouts complaining about pain in her shoulder. She was met with threats.

"When I asked Eliane [Martins] about the injury, she told me: 'If you want to take her to another doctor, go ahead and do it. But if you do that, no Federation doctor will ever see her again. If she has any complaints in the future, you'll just have take her to your own doctor.' It seemed absurd to me, but as I am from São Paulo and didn't know anything in Curitiba, I ended up accepting the situation," said Sônia, who now lives in Presidente Prudente with her daughter.

Sônia also revealed that the Federation's managers chose to let Maíra compete despite her injury. "Although the MRI scan performed at the end of August indicated that [Maíra] needed surgery, Eliane and the coaches suggested she do not get an operation, as they wanted her to compete in November," said Sônia.


Maíra's case is very similar to that of Roberta Monari, another gymnast who left the national team and now works for Cirque du Soleil in Canada. According to a source close to the gymnast (a source who wishes to remain anonymous), Roberta Monari spent the better part of 2006 complaining of pain in her right foot. Like Maíra dos Santos Silva, she wasn't taken seriously.

"When she said she was in pain and started crying during workouts, they said that she was making excuses so as not to have to train, that she was being fussy. Until the national championships in Goiânia, where she suffered a simple fall during warmup and couldn't compete anymore. Then they finally had her examined and found that she had torn her Achilles tendon. But they had lied to her, because they had known there was a partial tear there ever since April, only they hadn't told her so. When they had announced the examination results, they had said the tendon wasn't completely torn so that she'd agree to compete until the end of the year, wearing some sort of ankle boot," the source said.

Mário Namba, the doctor in charge of the Federation's medical department, was not available for comments at the time of the publication of the article. On behalf of the Federation, Eliane Martins stated that there was no truth to the allegations. She also denied that she had withheld examination results from Maíra dos Santos Silva and neglected Roberta Monari's injury.

"It's strange to see that a while ago, everyone thought the Federation was doing a great job. Now people are changing their minds, and all of a sudden we're doing everything wrong. Interesting to note that these people never started complaining until now. Pure opportunism," Eliane Martins told reporters.


Jade in Beijing (photo: Reuters)
But the story didn't end there. A few weeks later, on October 4, Cesar Barbosa (who was still waiting for a definitive diagnosis of Jade's hand injury) announced that his daughter wouldn't represent Brazil while the current management of the Brazilian Gymnastics Federation remained in charge.

"A return to the team would be risky and I don't want her to run the risk of these things happening again," said Mr. Barbosa in a telephone interview. He was quite emphatic about the whole thing, stating that Jade would only compete for Brazil if the Federation changed leadership.

"Jade will only go back there if there's a change of management. That's our only condition."

The Barbosas may not have to wait very long for the change of management to happen. The current management team's contract expires in December, and Ms. Martins and her team have announced that they will not seek re-election. They claim this decision has nothing to do with the current scandal. "The decision was made in 2006. We've been in charge for long enough," said Eliane Martins, who is part of a group which has run the Brazilian Gymnastics Federation for 17 years, on 7 November.

Meanwhile, Daiane dos Santos and Laís Souza have also distanced themselves from the Brazilian Gymnastics Federation, albeit in a slightly more subtle way. Both athletes recently underwent surgery; neither of them bothered to go through the official channels, arranging everything through their club (Pinheiros) instead. Reportedly the Federation officials were among the last people to be told that Daiane dos Santos had decided to have an osteotomy.

"We sent the Federation an official letter yesterday, saying that we wouldn't do any more competitions for the rest of the year," was all Dos Santos was prepared to say on the subject on October 21. "We're doing everything with the support of our club. The team is in Curitiba and we're here at our club."


Meanwhile, according to a November 11 report, Jade Barbosa has been diagnosed with necrosis in a small bone in the center of her hand. According to her doctor, it's a serious injury caused by repetitive strain. And apparently she's recovering from a small stress fracture in her left foot too.

According to her father, Jade has not done any serious training for two months. "She goes to the gym, sees the girls, and wants to train with them, but she can't. She's only doing leg exercises," Mr. Barbosa was quoted as saying on November 9. He lamented the fact that Jade would miss the World Cup Final in Spain in December. "This is messing up her plans. She's upset and has had psychological counseling since the Olympics."

Moreover, Jade still doesn't know whether her right hand is improving at all. She was supposed to have a new MRI last Monday to assess the state of her hand, but according to a November 11 report, a painful kidney stone attack prevented her from going through with the examination. Jade, who has suffered from kidney stones since 2007, started to feel bad at the end of last week. If she recovers in time, the examination will still be carried out this week. The results of the examination will determine whether or not Cesar Barbosa will sue the Federation for negligence.

Interestingly enough, it seems that no one is blaming Oleg Ostapenko, the Ukrainian coach who was in charge of the Brazilian women's team from 2001 to August 2008, for the current crisis.

While Jade Barbosa has admitted to having had her share of problems with Ostapenko, she seems keen on remembering only the good things about the former head coach. On August 18, just before Ostapenko was due to leave the country, she was quoted as saying, "When he goes away, people won't remember the bad things. The bad things don't matter anymore now. What matters is that Brazil has improved over the last few years."

For her part, Daiane dos Santos believes that Brazil must go on doing things the way Ostapenko did them. "We have to learn how to use what we've learned from him," she said on August 18. "We mustn't go and change things, we must go on the same way."


Oleg Ostapenko with Barbosa (photo: Globoesporte)
To prove that Ostapenko wasn't necessarily the bad guy in the Brazilian story, it was revealed on October 16 that São Paulo's Pinheiros club (where Daiane dos Santos and Laís Souza have trained since leaving the national training center in Curitiba) had offered Ostapenko a job when his contract with the Brazilian Gymnastics Federation expired, which we doubt the club would have done if its two greatest stars had any serious complaints about their former coach. However, the club and the Ukrainian coach couldn't come to an agreement. "In his eyes, a top-level coach only works with three athletes at a time. We wanted him to work with all our gymnasts. Not that he was supposed to personally coach all the girls in the various categories, but we did want him to supervise the whole program. He didn't want that," João Vicente Axe, Director of Artistic Gymnastics at Pinheiros, told UOL Esporte.

UOL Esporte also revealed that Ostapenko's departure from Brazil may not be definitive. Before he returned to Ukraine, the coach returned the keys of the house he used to live in to the Federation's managers. However, according to UOL Esporte, he also bought an apartment in Curitiba, leading some to believe that he might return soon.

To be continued, we expect.