Translation of "The Medal Factory"

For those of you who don't speak Romanian I tried to translate as much as I could of the "Medal Factory" show.

The show that aired on Digi Sport on Saturday November 13th, had as guests Mariana Bitang, Octavian Bellu, Andreea Raducan, the Romanian Olympic team, the six juniors that are in the special program of preparation for the Olympics and the coaches from the Senior and Junior teams.

the Olympic team: Dana Andrei, Amelia Racea, Raluca Haidu, Larisa Iordache, Cerasela Patrascu, Gabriela Dragoi, Diana Trenca, Diana Chelaru, Ana Porgras, Anamaria Tamirjan, Sandra Izbasa (not present).

Juniors: Georgiana Gheorghe, Maria Balea, Andreea Tufa, Diana Rusu, Madalina Neagu, Beatrice Margarit, Diana Bulimar (not present)

The coaches: Lucian Sandu, Marius Vintila, Florin Cotitiu, Liliana Cosma (not present) and for the juniors Lacramioara Filip Moldovan and Cristian Moldovan.

Romanian National Team (before the Worlds)

These are bits of conversations that i managed to translate. I had to make a bit of a selection because the entire show lasted for 45 minutes and the transcript of the entire thing would have been a much too difficult task for a Sunday afternoon:

Mariana: “Let’s ask Anamaria Tamarjan what made her comeback.”

Anamaria: “I realised that I hadn’t done enough in gymnastics”

Mariana: “Bravo Ana! I am glad she has this mentality: she is an European Champion, has an Olympic medal, nevertheless she considers she has not done enough in this sport and I am conviced she will do more.”

Trying to talk to the gymnasts… First up Maria Balea:

“Why did you start gymnastics?”

“Because I liked it (…) I want to become a champion”

Bitang: “Maria is nervous… Let’s ask Larisa”

“I want to go to the Olympics and get all the gold medals”

Bitang: “Larisa, not all of them, let’s leave some for the others”

Larisa: “I want to do something well, not to regret that I didn’t work and I didn’t do what I had to in order to be up there.”

Mariana: “Good, I am sure you will get those Olympic medals”

the Junior team - Silver medal winners at 2010 Euros

What about you, Pitic?

Bellu: (jockingly) you will have to adjust her voice whe you edit this she has a funny voice.

Haidu: “I want to go to the Olympics and win gold, help the team. I will work a lot to get there.”

Host: “Ana, how do you see this winner’s mentality? Mr. Bellu said earlier and Mrs. Bitang as well, that the silver and bronze medals do not count.”

Ana: “I think that the most important medal is the gold, because winning it means that you are the best. Silver and bronze are on the side.”

Bellu: “And they don’t even play your anthem.”

Host: “This is one of your favorites, right?”

Bellu: (smiling) “We don’t have to exaggerate either, because behind a bronze medal there’s a fantastic amount of work and you can pass quickly because of things that depend on youself or on the circumstances from being a gold medal favorite to bronze medal winner. So I say that at the Worlds, Europeans and Olympics, any medal is valuable”

Bitang: “But we’d rather have the gold one.”

Bellu: “Yes, because there are also other benefits after you win it. I am glad they have the jeweler’s inclination. I must also warn Iordache and Haidu that they don’t accept ties at the Olympics, so they will have to fight each other for gold… Only at the Worlds they can both have gold (laughing with Bitang).”

Host: “We slowly come to talk about the future, about London Olympics but also next year’s Worlds in Tokyo. What should we expect?”

Bellu: “I have always tried to avoid making predictions because this is not agriculture, we can't predict anything in a situation in which the circumstances are always changing (…) The perspective depends on the way in which the gymnasts will be responsible, give it all to work and be careful not to have gaps in preparation any more, to add new elements and increase difficulty and once 75% of these are covered, the shape in which you are at that one competition, then the circumstances can be favorable or not, but you must be prepared for anything and to be able to solve whatever is up to you: clean execution, good landings etc.”

Host: “Do we have enough time to catch Russia and the other teams?”

Bellu “Yes, we do have time but it depends how you use it because if you can’t accumulate quickly you can’t remain at the stage of learning the elements one week before the leaving for the Worlds. At one point you must stop and work to stabilize the new elements and combinations.” …”But the difference at the Worlds was obvious and I even saw statistics, the difference was not between our execution marks but our difficulty.”

Bitang: “If we think about it and it was obvious at the past Worlds, the difference used to be of around 10 points now the gap was smaller, 3 points, less than 3 poins. But now it depends on every gymnast because every technician will think the routine according to the gymnasts real and maximum abilities, but then again, only the gymnasts are responsible of how they address the preparation (…) if they really want to get those medals they must upgrade their value, their difficulty in a short period of time. I want to highlight that after the Worlds, most of the people are having a few days off, a recovery break. Given that they unfortunately had such long periods of recovery after injuries, we considered that it’s best to remain in the gym, because they were in a good physical shape after the worlds and learn new skills. This can already be seen, we can see a speed-up in the assimilation of new and very difficult elements, and I hope we will be able to keep this pace even if there will be smoother periods coming, because only now they can learn, now, for one more month or two because then they will have to start repeating whole routines two months before the Europeans - that are scheduled in the beginning of April”

Host: "How did the girls seem when they came back from London? Did they seem more confident, eager?"

Mariana: “During the first two trainings they were enthusiastic and worked perfectly.. if only the contests had been then… I mean they obviously wanted it more.(…)”

Bellu ”The main idea is the continuity. Now this increase of difficulty happened precisely when they say there is a downfall, also in the specialised literature you will find that there will be a general fall after an important contest.. for these gymnasts this fall did not exist and we are glad."

Host: "Were you surprised by this and by the girls’ attitude."

Bitang: “mmm… No, we can’t be surprised anymore, but I think they were surprised, let’s ask them. We had all sorts of experiences so let’s ask the gymnasts. Were you surprised?”

Ana Porgras: “Yes!”

Andreea Raducan: “Gymnastics seems to be different now. When I was a gymnast, we never heard of vacation after the Worlds or Olympics. We just prayed that the five free days to come for Christmas”

Bitang: “See? Nothing is new. This is how we built the results in the past. After a contest ends you don’t stand”… “But Ana tell us more.”

Ana Porgras: "Yes, in the past, we had an easier period after the competitions but now we came back, started training new elements and I was surprised."

Bitang: “And you were surprised: wow! I can do a double twisting Yurchenko!”

Bitang “In London 2012 I want the surprise to be the team. I want them to learn to be a team because they spend more time here than with their own families and I want a REAL team spirit to develop and for them to understand that the more good gymnasts we have, the better the team will be and they must support each other in difficult moments, you must help your mate to get over the difficult time not to encourage her to remain there, I hope they will learn to be united in positive things. (…) I hope they will become one, being a team leader means more than having the best results. You must be a role model for the team mates and everybody else.”(…) "I remember that Andreea Raducan in Ghent in 2001, she was like the vuvuzela, you could hear only her voice in the hall. She had learnt all my indications for all the gymnasts on all apparatuses and she was coaching them even if she had to compete next she was shouting continuously, we need such children in a team”.

Again, you can watch the entire show on eamyy's youtube channel.