So You'd Prefer Little Gymnast Robots?

I caught a couple of minutes of the women gymnastics competition tonight, specifically a less than stellar balance beam routine performed by a young Romanian gymnast.  Bart Connor, a former Olympian and NBC gymnastics commentator spent about five minutes observing (or lamenting) of how the Romanian gymnastics program has lost its edge since its years as a powerhouse which churned out the likes of his wife, Nadia Comaneci.

Connor mentioned the "lack of intensity" of these new Romanian gymnasts, and how in the past they would spend the time before their performances constantly practicing their routines with razor-sharp precision and focus.   These new Romanian gymnasts had the audacity to make conversation amongst themselves around the chalk stand.  The horror!  You could almost hear Bart Connor with his SNL grumpy old man voice: "The Romanian gymnasts used to be unsmiling silent automatons rotating like a hinge and we used to like it that way!" 

And here's the kicker.  The poor gymnast, who admittedly wasn't that good, fell off the beam and was subsequently hugged compassionately by her coach.  This led to a flabbergasted Bart Connor sputtering, "That wouldn't have ever happened in past Romanian teams!" and I'm convinced he was disappointed, as if he would've preferred the coach to slap the girl across the face and stuff her in a suitcase on the first flight to Bucharest.

So let's assume that while you need to strive for the best of both worlds (you want nurturing guidance which also drives people to success), there comes a point where there's a trade off between iron-fisted discipline and a nurturing and comforting "I'm proud of you no matter what" graciousness, I'll take the latter every day of the week.  If the price of freedom and a teenager's joy is that she misses out on a gold medal, so be it.

Now please excuse me as I force Daniel to practice piano for another hour.