The uneven bars used to be made of the men's p-bars set to different heights - that's why they were so close together!
1954 UB:
Agnes Keleti
[youtube]TARudprB-W4[/youtube]
level 4 shoot thru circle thing is in her routine too.
gymnastics an outdoor sport! like on Good Morning America!
1956 Agnes Keleti Olympic UB
[youtube]Y8VEoYZKryA[/youtube]Parts of it - the holds part - does look p-bar ish and rings-ish
(Hungarian gymnast)
She won the silver in the AA, 1956 Olympics
balance beam in 1954 is:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=NdBz-Gen1d0
also 1956 Olympics:
Larissa Latynina (USSR)
[youtube]pw7EbKVstcA[/youtube]
(Overall of the 1956 Melbourne Olympic Games, incl. Larissa Latynina and Agnes Keleti:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=WSnU8uvZP0s )
uneven bars developments (50s to 2005)
[youtube]_SV_r5UePZI[/youtube]
vera caslavska, larissa latynina, olga korbut, nadia comaneci, ludmilla touricheva , nelli kim, karin janz , elena mukhina , ma yanhong, ecaterina szabo, fan di, ronda schwandi, emelia eberle, daniela silivas, mo huilan , lui xuan , li li, Kim Gwang-Suk ,
lu li , cristina grigoras , lin li , li ya , nastia liukin , julianna mcnamara ,
monica rosu , courtney kupets , zhang nan
-Early 50's UB routines: not really flowing routine, more static holds, circle works, transitions, kips
-Late 50's: trend towards fluid motion, harder circle works, kips and hitting the low bar on their hips (ouch!) - called beats - and wrapping around the low bar while hanging from the high bar - called wraps; also start of release moves, though was almost totally for transitions between the low/high bars.
-Late 1960's/early 1970's: girls get their own uneven bars - separate manufacturing from the p-bars! New design - bars adjustable, with tension cables that held the bars to the floor, bars could be further apart, and also shape changed from more oval to rounder shape...and so started giants!
Funny thing is like a decade ago one of the gymnastics clubs we competed at still had a pair of those oval-shaped bars in their gym (not used for the competition though)! We were like, 'what is this?! lol
