This was the very last World Cup prior to the World Championships. From the medallists only Sophie Marois and Tijana Tkalcec were not expected to compete in Stuttgart. For everyone else it was the last warm-up before Worlds and for Mexico it was a very successful one.
Talking about Tijana Tkalcec and Sophie Marois they placed second and third respectively on vault. Sophie also took bronze on beam. She was one of three gymnasts to win two medals.
The vault gold medal was won by Puerto Rico’s Paula Mejias (13.575) who was the only one to present a vault above a 5.0 difficulty. Her second vault was valued out of a 5.6 and it was well landed. Paula also advanced to the Floor final where she finished fourth (12.350).
The other two gymnasts to win two medals were Croatia’s Ana Derek who took silver on beam (12.400) and bronze on Floor (12.600); both medalling routines were valued out of a 5.1 and home gymnast Ana Filipa Martins who gave her home crowd joy with a bronze on bars (12.200) and gold on beam (12.400).
However the country that dominated was Mexico who featured Elsa García and Ana Lago in their first international competition since 2016, plus the young talent of Frida Esparza and Ana Paula Gutierrez.
Elsa García took silver on bars with a 13.050, her execution was the highest of all the competitors. Her one and half turn into piked Jeager was particularly beautiful, plus she stuck her double front dismount.
Ana Lago was the gold medalist on Floor with the 12.850. She had a double layout, full twisting double tuck, double pike and double twist.
Ana Paula Gutierrez followed Lago taking silver with a 12.600. Actually Ana Paula came close to winning gold, she had the most difficult routine with a 5.4, opened with a triple twist, but unfortunately for her she landed her last pass out of bounds incurring in a 0.3 neutral deduction.
But the most impressive routine was Frida Esparza’s bars. She presented a routine with a massive 6.1 difficulty heavy in connections: Maloney to Pak to Van Leeuwen, piked Jeager and double layout dismount with a step back. Her score of 13.650 was the highest of the entire competition. Frida’s win meant back to back bars title for Mexico at Guimaraes, last year Ahtziri Sandoval won the bars gold medal.
Source of the picture: Frida Esparza’s Instagram
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