Olympic rules stipulate that every competitor must be at least 16 years old in the year of the Olympics, which means they must be at least 15 years, eight months now. How many of the Chinese look like they're old enough for a learner's permit?
This image from Sports Illustrated really shows the contrasts. Look at the hips on the two teams.
The biggest question at this point seems to be whether He is 13 or 14.
The thing that strikes me is that the white girls look much more muscular and well-fed. I could believe the Chinese girls are almost 16 if they've had relatively crappy nutrition. It used to be that people didn't hit puberty until they were 15 or 16, but supposedly because of better nutrition or hormones in the milk or god knows what, puberty is hitting earlier and earlier in the US.
I know! I said to my mom, "It looks like they're actually feeding the gymnasts this year." Because I know that in the past, there have been problems with anorexia and coaches and teammates belittling girls they saw as too husky. The US team this year is a bunch of really STRONG women.
No wonder the Chinese hate and fear the internet. They go to the trouble to get the passports straightened out at the national level, and the regionals have neglected to correct information that some of the girls are 14 on their webpages.
Information is so much easier to control when there is only one source.
See- and I just saw stuff in USA Today (today) saying that The AP and NY Times had dug up the best info, but they didn't say what it was. Motherfuckers.
It's sad to see all the injuries on the American girls.
But yeah this might just be a race difference. Chinese women normally look younger than us.. but yeah.. Some of them look awfully young.. Especially the girl at the front.
I heard something about the younger you are the easier it is to find your center of balance, thus tumbling and throwing yourself around like a rag doll would be easier to recover from gracefully. Once the curves start developing it becomes harder
On a totally different topic, thanks for the add :)