Gym: Dasha's bittersweet night at the gym

AAP General News (Australia)
08-11-2008
Gym: Dasha's bittersweet night at the gym

By Darren Walton

BEIJING, Aug 10 AAP - Injured star Daria Joura broke down in tears after bravely helping
Australia qualify for the women's team final of the Olympic artistic gymnastics tonight
- only to miss a spot herself in any of the individual finals.

The highly-rated Joura was expected to challenge for a medal in the individual all-around
competition after placing second at the Olympic test event in Beijing last year and also
becoming just the fourth Australian in history to win a gold medal at a World Cup.

Ironically, though, Joura struck gold with her signature floor routine and that was
precisely where her troubles started tonight.

The Siberian-born 18-year-old hurt her leg in one of two mishaps on the floor and,
although she courageously soldiered on to post a vital score for Australia on the uneven
bars, Joura was unable to recover sufficiently to keep her individual medal hopes alive.

"She jammed her ankle and it just got weaker and more unstable as the comp went on,"

Australian coach Peggy Liddick lamented after her spearhead finished in a lowly 42nd position
- well outside the top 24 qualifiers.

"But we wouldn't have made the team final without her strong bars, so she kept it together there.

"Then on the beam, where you need the most stability of course, a little bit of tape
just wasn't going to do it."

Joura's fate was sealed when she slipped off the beam, moments after teammate Lauren
Mitchell twice came unstuck to dash her chances also of making the individual final.

On the positive side, Australia remain in the mix for an historic first medal in Olympic
artistic gymnastics after qualifying in fifth place for Wednesday's eight-team final at
Beijing's National Indoor Stadium.

Gold medal favourites China, with a total score of 248.275, topped qualifying ahead
of fellow superpowers the USA (246.800), Russia (244.400) and Romania (238.425).

Australia (235.450), France (233.875), Brazil (233.800) and Japan (233.175) round out
the finalists.

And while Joura missed out, two of her less-fancied teammates advanced to the 24-woman
individual final, with Shona Morgan qualifying in 15th spot and Georgia Benora in 17th
position.

"They always say the strength of a team is not so much your superstars - your No.1
or No.2 - that the strength of a team is your numbers three, four or five and those girls
came through today," Liddick said.

"Shona and Georgia were troopers. They're the ones that set the pace and the more experienced
girls really didn't have an excuse, and I was really proud of those two."

"But we made it through to the team finals and it's a clean slate. I think in the team
final we'll toughen up a little bit."

American reigning world champion Shawn Johnson was the top individual qualifier.

AAP djw/jds

KEYWORD: OLY08 GYM AUST SECOND NIGHTLEAD

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