"It's motivation for them." "For them, it's motivation." Head Judge Marina Drozd talks about the All-Russian Young Gymnasts competitions

Marina Drozd, the head judge of the All-Russian Young Gymnasts competition, explained why this competition is important for the athletes and highlighted the strengths of the participants from different regions:

"We're delighted that Ulyanovsk is hosting this competition in a beautiful, modern facility. A very large number of athletes came here; they went through a rigorous selection process. For the girls, this is one of their first big competitions. For them, especially the young ones, it's a great honor to be able to compete in the All-Russian Young Gymnasts competition. It's like the first step toward their future. So, it's a definite motivation for them. It was a very vibrant and colorful competition. Despite their young age, we've known many of these gymnasts for years. And each semester, they've been improving their artistic skills significantly. The changes are clearly visible. It's interesting to watch their new routines. Overall, the gymnasts, performing according to these rules, are starting to feel much more confident and professional, improving in every aspect: the technical complexity of their apparatuses, the technical complexity of their body movements, even though they're still so young. We have a very good young generation".

Marina Borisovna also praised the progress of Veronika Malinina, a student at the Academy from St. Petersburg:

"Veronika has really improved her body difficulties. She has some pretty challenging new turns for us. She performed them brilliantly at this competition. She performed four events consistently, very well, and won this competition by a wide margin."

Veronika won the all-around title at the Young Gymnasts tournament. Her coaches were Irina and Alina Gusarova, and her choreographer was Ekaterina Belova.