NEW PRESIDENT!
Lausanne (SUI) / FIG Office, January 8, 2012: On January 6, 2012, the Portuguese Gymnastics Federation elected Mr João Paulo Oliveira do Nascimento e da Rocha as its President. The election follows the resignation of Manuel Boa de Jesus last November.

The Portuguese Federation, which is extremely active on the international scene, is in a difficult economic situation domestically. This resulted in the cancellation, on December 13, of the renowned Portimao Rhythmic Gymnastics tournament, scheduled for April 2012 and which counts towards the World Cup.

The FIG wishes Portuguese gymnastics and its new President Joao Paulo Rocha a swift return to a more stable economy, and will be pleased to quickly restore their international events to its calendar.phs
 

FIG Academy Programme

LAUSANNE (SUI), FIG Office, December 13, 2011: The FIG Academies, a worldwide education programme for coaches in the federation’s six competitive disciplines that was launched in 2002, celebrated the 10th year of its existence in 2011.

With eighteen Academies held throughout the year in fourteen different countries and on all continents, the programme that has as its goal to provide gymnastically developing and fully developed countries with a common knowledge base for the growth of high performance gymnasts, now counts a total of 118 Academies overall. In October, overall participation reached 3,000 coaches, marking an important milestone for this education programme.

The FIG Academy Programme consists of three levels of coach education. Federations may enter at a level that reflects their specific gymnastic coaching education programmes at home. Thus, federations with no gymnastics coaching education or only occasional coaching clinics must begin at Level 1. Those with formal coaching education programmes may begin at Level 2. Those with formal university degree programmes specifically for gymnastic coaches may begin at Level 3. Level 3 candidates who meet special pre-requisites and achieve exceptional examination results will be awarded with an FIG Coaches’ Brevet.

Even though the FIG does not certify or license coaches, federation-oriented responsibility, the seven-day Academy courses conclude with a comprehensive theoretical and practical examination.

Overview of Academies and Levels held in 2011

This three-level FIG Academy Programme has a high performance orientation but is supplemented, in cooperation with the FIG Gymnastics for All Committee, with a cross-discipline Gymnastics Foundations course targeting federations that are in the preliminary stages of establishing organised gymnastics programmes in their countries.

Each year, the FIG allocates a significant sum to its associated continental unions for development projects, with a certain percentage of this contribution being used for the organisation and participation of coaches at the Academy programmes.

Effective as of the year 2012, candidates for mandates within any FIG Technical Committee must have participated at a Level 3 Academy for their respective discipline. However, a Coaching Brevet is not mandatory.

Outlook for 2012

A total of twenty-five Academies are planned in 2012 with the following confirmed to date:

Overview of confirmed Academies and Levels planned for 2012

Hardy Fink, the FIG Director of Education and Academy Programmes, said:  “With the participation now of over 1,700 different coaches from 106 member federations at 118 Academies hosted by 44 countries, the FIG Academy Programme can now claim to be a world-wide programme. The coming year will bring even more Academies to make up for some of the ones that had to be postponed in 2011 because of the political conditions in the Arabian and North African countries. 

The Academy Programme for Men’s and Women’s Artistic Gymnastics has been supplemented this year with a comprehensive Age Group Development, Competition and Testing Programme that was introduced to 17 countries in 2011 to which will be added as many as 25 more during 2012.

The continuing support of the FIG President and Executive Committee has made this unique and extraordinary educational effort possible and has certainly already had a positive impact around the world. Thanks go also to the thirty-nine federations that have permitted the use of over 170 of their experts to teach at these many Academies and courses.”

Check out the detailed summary of completed and planned Academies here!

For more information, statistics, reviews and photo galleries of the FIG Academy Programme, visit the “Education” section on the FIG website.

2012 FIG World Championships, FIG World Age Group Competitions and FIG World Cup competitions in Aerobic Gymnastics

LAUSANNE (SUI), FIG Office, December 2, 2011: The international season for Aerobic Gymnastics in 2012 will be highlighted by the 5th World Age Group Competitions and 12th World Championships in Sofia (BUL), scheduled for May 29 – 31 and June 1 - 3 respectively.

A World Cup circuit including five category B events, all of which featuring qualifications and finals in Men’s and Women’s Individuals, Mixed Pairs, Trios and Groups, complete the discipline’s season.

With stopovers in two continents, the competitions are slated for March 24 – 25 in Aix-les-Bains (FRA), April 21 – 22 in Tokyo (JPN), May 18 – 20 in Ponta Delgada (POR), Azores, October 13 – 14 October in Liberec (CZE) and October 27 – 28 in Kufstein (AUT). The world ranking points collected by the competitors during the circuit will add up to a total with the best four results counting and the top scorers in each discipline being crowned the winner of the overall series at the ultimate event in Kufstein.

The new World Cup Rules 2012 for Aerobic Gymnastics can be downloaded here!

Provisional registrations for the events are now open, with the following deadlines effective for FIG member federations to register their gymnasts via the online registration system:

The directives for the 2012 World Age Group Competitions and the World Championships in Sofia will be published mid-December 2011.

12th FIG Aerobic Gymnastics World Championships
5th FIG Aerobic Gymnastics World Age Group Competitions
Sofia (BUL), May 31 - June 3, 2012
 
LAUSANNE (SUI), FIG Office, December 1, 2011: FIG President Bruno Grandi and Secretary General André F. Gueisbuhler officially signed today at the FIG Head Office in Lausanne, the contract with the Bulgarian  Gymnastics Federation (BGF) for the organisation of the 12th Aerobic Gymnastics World Championships and World Age Groups Competitions, to be held in the capital Sofia, from May 29 to June 03, 2012.
 
The competition will take place in the new and beautiful Armeetz Arena of Sofia  to be inaugurated this year just prior the FIG world championships. For the first time in the history of the discipline, the programme will include Aerobic Step and Aerobic Dance competitions. The event will qualify the gymnasts for the 9th World Games, to be held in Cali (COL), from July 25 to August 04, 2013.

After 2004, it's the second time that the Bulgarian Aerobic Community welcome the World Championships. The event is remembered for the historical world title won by the national heroes Galina Lazarova and Marian Kolev in the Mixed Pairs competition. 

FIG Aerobic Gymnastics Level 1 Academy
Dakar (SEN), November 17 – 24, 2011

LAUSANNE (SUI), FIG Office, November 29, 2011: The first French language Academy for Aerobic Gymnastics was hosted in Dakar, Senegal in the third week of November. It was a Level 1 Academy and the 17th Academy for Aerobic Gymnastics.

This Academy was attended by nineteen coaches from four different federations: Congo, Cape Verde, France and Senegal. It was especially delightful to see Congo at an Academy for the first time making it the 106th FIG member federation to participate and the 48th for Aerobic Gymnastics.

Attendance at this Academy was funded by the FIG Development Fund for Zone 2 of the African Gymnastics Union.

The course leader was Eunice Lebre of Portugal who is a member of FIG’s Scientific Commission and has served as an expert at many Rhythmic Academies. At this Academy she taught all of the theory lectures. There were two aerobic gymnastics specialists: Valerie Grandjean of France who is the French National Coach and a member of the FIG Academy Working Group that developed the curriculum and course material. She was joined by the newly appointed French national coach, Christophe Devillaine who was a multiple World gold medalist as a gymnast and coached the French team at four World Championships.

The highest result over the three part examination (two practical and one theoretical exam) was achieved by David Orta of France. Jennifer Correia of Cape Verde had the second highest result.

Special thanks must go to the Senegal Gymnastics Federation for hosting this 4th Academy in its country. Special thanks must go to President Madame Albertine Goncalves who, as always worked tirelessly to host the Academy in high standard and also assured that there was much media coverage for the event form the print media, radio and television.

During this 114th Academy, the 115th began in Venezuela (for Acrobatic Gymnastics). Three more Academies will be conducted during December – a Level 3 for Rhythmic gymnastics in Tokyo followed immediately by a Level 3 for MAG and WAG also in Tokyo and a Level 1 for MAG and WAG in Chile.