2010 World beam champion Ana Porgras, who won the Longines Prize for Elegance but did not medal at the 2011 World Championships, announced her retirement this week, according to Romanian newspaper Prosport.
"I could not go forward," Progras, 18, told Prosport. "I felt that I physically could not -- it was hard after so many injuries to take it up again."
2011 was a difficult year for Progras, who came into it riding high after victory on beam at the 2010 Worlds. At the French International, she struggled on bars and beam, her best events. Illness kept her out of the 2011 European Championships.
By the time the World Championships came around in October, it was evident that Porgras, though an extremely elegant gymnast, was not going to contend for the all-around title due to her low difficulty full-twisting Yurchenko vault. Coupled with that was her fall on beam in team prelims, which likely cost her the chance to defend her World title in event finals.
She finished sixth in the all-around, still the highest Romanian placement in Tokyo. And there was the Longines Prize, which was well deserved.
Still, the Romanian team was scrutinized by the media following Tokyo, which was the first Worlds in more than 20 years where the women's team did not bring home at least one medal. Coaches Octavian Bellu and Mariana Bitang blamed the gymnasts for not working well enough, with Bellu declaring: "Those who can cope, will cope! Those who won't, won't!" Although Porgras had adapted to Bellu and Bitang's training regimen, Prosport reported, comments insinuating that she was more interested in fashion than gymnastics hurt her deeply.
At the end of the year, Progras announced that she would continue training bars and beam for Romania, but indicated that she would not be an all-around gymnast at the Olympic Games. An elbow fracture in December cemented her decision to retire, and when the Romanians returned home from a training camp in Dijon, France, Progras decided that she could not continue with gymnastics.
That in itself was shocking enough, but Porgras's retirement only six months before the Games is even more stunning. She has left the training gym at Izvorani and returned to her hometown of Barlad, where she will enroll in high school and continue as a normal teenager.
She was not of the mold of a typical Romanian gymnast (excellent acrobat, lacking somewhat in artistry), but instead will be remembered as one of the most elegant and naturally graceful gymnasts in the world during the past three years. Among the Romanians she is one of the most elegant ever, notably on beam and for her two floor routines, "The Second Waltz," (2009-2010) and "La Boheme" (2011).
In spite of encouragement from her parents and Romanian gymnastics officials to return to training, so far Porgras sticking to her decision to retire. "I don't regret that I retired," she told Prosport from her home in Barlad. "I have no regrets...life goes on."
Where does this leave Romania? Without Porgras, the Romanians are down their best all-around gymnast from 2011. However, new on the senior team this year will be 15-year-old Larisa Iordache, an extremely talented athlete who is likely to contend for a place on the podium at the Olympic Games this summer. Catalina Ponor, who made a comeback to elite gymnastics after nearly three years away from the sport, will provide support on vault, beam and floor.
Sandra Izbasa, the 2008 Olympic floor champion who did not compete in Tokyo due to a foot injury, should be back and, based on her 2010 results, a contender for another Olympic medal on floor and possibly vault. Diana Bulimar is another young dynamo with terrific potential on floor. Diana Chelaru has worked an Amanar in the past, while Amelia Racea and Raluca Haidu are both strong on uneven bars, Romania's weakest apparatus.
So Romania will survive. But among her fans, Porgras -- the elegant, dynamic Porgras -- will be terribly missed.
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