Evolution | Women's Gymnastics 1936-2021

I love the concept of this video and the tidbits of information you've added but skipping the '80s (and '90s) does a great disservice to the whole idea. The '80s especially is the most innovative, creative and fun decade to watch! There's a huge difference between the gymnastics of the '70s and of the '80s. They still had artistry, form and beautiful coreophraphies on floor and beam but they also had big skills on all events, some of which are now banned because they're too dangerous. The vault was forever changed by Yurchenko, on bars they had so many incredibly new skills that are still used today (the Shaposhnikova for example) on top of beautifully weird mounts and dismounts, on floor they had back to back tumbling, Silivas did a double double for the first time, and the coreos were always so fun to watch. They had so much originality that is now almost completely lost. You can't have a video on the evolution of gymnastics without the '80s.

GYMNASTICS BACK IN THE 70'S WAS MORE GRACEFUL AND MORE BEAUTIFUL.

In modern gymnastics it feels like the difficulty matters more than execution so we see more awkward looking or messy routines. If execution mattered more than difficulty it might be more visually appealing with fewer wobbles and step outs and pauses to focus between elements as athletes wouldn't push themselves to do acrobatics they couldn't do perfectly. But instead it's more about pushing the boundaries and developing physical strength. It's still an amazing sport and I'm in awe of the power of today's gymnasts but it feels like they've taken the "artistic" out of "artistic gymnastics".

The 60s was lovely to watch, but my fav goes to my girl Olga Korbut in the 70s! She was wonderful!!

The 1965 beam routine is gorgeous. She’s so talented

1972 was my favorite to watch.

Amazing. Humans have fantastic bodies. Thank you for compiling this very interesting video

I can tell by the comments that people would love for you to do a longer video and cover more years, as well as please do give us the names of the people who you include. I found this to be fascinating and I love the Irish music you used.

I love watching old style beam and bar!!!

Cutting out entire decades misses a bunch of changes. For a retrospective, that's an odd choice.

Le ginnaste di una volta avessero l attrezzatura che c'è oggi sarebbero tutte olimpioniche...oggi manca la grazia...

Back then, it was beautiful, artistic, dance-life, graceful, and elegant. Now it's fast and powerful and very robotic.

I wish connections on beam were flowy like in the 60s more often, at least for the dance steps. I feel like it's all very robotic and blocky even on floors dance steps 😢 Like can we get more flowy steps and connections and that? For example the floor video from 65, the dancing is actual dancing not just some hand and arm movements that are super robotic and don't express much like I see VERY often (not always but probably the large majority of routines I see)

This is so interesting. It almost feels like two different sports. I know nothing about gymnastics and don’t really have the terminology to describe it. All I can say is the 60 and 70s gymnasts were so flexible and elegant. They really had style and grace. I can see in the 2000s where the gymnasts seem to really combine the two. By the 2020s, their athletic skill is amazing. I always wondered, having only seen modern gymnastics, why they bother with what I see as the “dance” elements because it usually looks so robotic and ridiculous on these athletes. The music is usually irrelevant too because it could be any song because the movements don’t look timed to it at all. Now it makes sense that those elements are a holdover from when gymnastics looked very different. I’m torn on what to think. I truly respect the athleticism and power of today’s gymnasts but I love how beautiful the old style gymnasts look performing their routines as well. They’re actually combining dance elements meaningfully with acrobatic skills. I guess if you’re into the beauty side, there’s rhythmic gymnastics but part of me would like to see there be something in the middle that combines artistry along with athletics, and then a form more like men’s that would cut out all of the dancing stuff and let the woman just compete. I think there are some great gymnasts today that would shine if they didn’t have to add some of those dance elements. They don’t look good doing it and it takes away from their skill. We also have some gymnasts that are just so graceful and flowy that lack the power of some of the top gymnasts but as an untrained eye, their routines actually look better and more put together to me. It would be nice if each group had a place to shine.

Loved the whole presentation and choice of music. Excellent collection and narrative 💯⭐

It's so funny watching the original vaults. They literally just did a jump and pose haha

Me parece extraño mostrar la evolución de la gimnasia y no tener imágenes de Nadia Comăneci.

The waving arms all jerkily on beam always killed me 😂 And the floor, hardly anyone ever had movements to the music that flowed together, like back in the 90s before and after, era. It was choppy and didnt go with a beat or flow. Performance definitely lost value. Tumbling is awesome, but just moving arms and spinning around does not a gymnast make lol

Pra mim Olga Korbut sempre será a melhor

HOW AMAZING WOULD IT BE to see our gymnasts today perform the routines from the beginning times..???!!!💜