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Ksenia Semenova (also Semyonova, Russian: Ксения Андреевна Семёнова, born 20 October 1992 in Novomoskovsk, Russia) is a Russian artistic gymnast. She is the 2007 World Champion on the uneven bars, and the 2008 European Champion on the uneven bars and the balance beam. She was a member of the silver-medal-winning Russian team at the 2008 European Championships. Semenova is also the current European All-Around Champion.

2007

Ksenia broke onto the international scene at the WOGA classic in January where she placed first on uneven bars and balance beam. She continued her success as part of the Russian team at the Gymnix International in Montreal, scoring an exceptional 15.95 on uneven bars, blowing away the rest of the field with her world leading start value of 7.2. She also won balance beam with an exceptional 15.85 and placed 3rd on floor exercise. In march at the Russian National Championships she helped the Cenral region to victory in the team competition, won the uneven bars with 15.975 and took 3rd on beam. Ksenia was unable to compete at the European championships in April but returned to win the uneven bars competition at the Russian Cup in July. Her main competition of the year came at the 2007 World Artistic Gymnastics Championships in September where she succeeded in becoming world champion on the uneven bars scoring 16.35 over Nastia Liukin and Yang Yilin, making her the first Russian world champion in gymnastics since her idol Svetlana Khorkina.

2008

Semenova's first major meet came in April with the European championships, where she helped Russia take silver in the team competition and secured gold in both the uneven bars and the balance beam, with scores of 15.9 and 15.95 respectively. In may she competed at the Moscow Stars World Cup where she won another gold on the bars scoring 16.075. Her success continued in June when she finished 2nd at the Dutch Open, behind Anna Pavlova, the two of them leading an all Russian sweep of places 1 to 6. Semenova had problems during the Russian Cup in July, where she fell on beam in qualifications and on vault in the all around final, but she still managed to take silver behind her teammate Afanasyeva. Aged just 15, Semenova represented Russia at the 2008 Summer Olympics and placed 4th in the all-around, just out of medal contention but surpassing all expectations. Semenova's team was considered to be one of the top four competitive teams (along with China, the USA, and Romania), but narrowly missed an opportunity to medal in Beijing, trailing the third place Romanian team by less than a full point. Semenova also placed sixth in the uneven bars competition. In the team preliminaries, she placed 8th overall on balance beam; her excellent scores almost qualified her to compete in the balance beam finals. However, only two athletes from each country may compete in the event finals. Her teammates, Anna Pavlova and Ksenia Afanasyeva, qualified in sixth and seventh place, edging her out of the competition. Semenova and Afansyeva both earned a score of 15.775, but the tie-breaking rules gave the advantage to Afanasyeva. Ksenia competed in the uneven bars finals placing a respectable 6th, but was left behind the front runners Nastia Liukin, Yang Yilin, He Kexin and Beth Tweddle because of a deficit in start value, which Ksenia had little time to upgrade due to her determination to excel in the all around competition. Ksenia ended the season with a wrist injury that prevented her from competing at the world cup finals in Madrid.

2009

Ksenia started her season at the Russian National Championships where she placed second in the all around to outstanding junior Aliya Mustafina. She won the uneven bars and floor exercise to book her place on the European championships squad. Semenova placed first in the all-around competition at the 2009 European Artistic Gymnastics Championships in Milan, Italy, just ahead of her teammate Afanasyeva. In the event finals, she was second on the uneven bars behind Beth Tweddle of the United Kingdom and third on floor, behind Tweddle and the 2006 World Champion, the Italian Vanessa Ferrari. Semenova also qualified for the balance beam final and finished in fifth place with an uncharacteriscically shaky routine. In July she suffered a minor injury to her wrist keeping her out of the Russian Cup, but has been confirmed to the Russian team for world championships in October along with Ksenia Afanasyeva, Ekaterina Kurbatova and Anna Myzdrikova. After a qualifying round marred by wobbles and a fall on her floor routine, she was 10th going to the all-around but failed to make any event finals. Another fall from the uneven bars during the first rotation prevented her from a better placement and she finished 13th overall.

Routines

As of 2009, Ksenia performs the following routines:

Special skills

Semenova performs the "Tkatchev to immediate giant full" skill on the uneven bars and may be the first female gymnast to perform it.^[2] This move is usually done by men on the horizontal bar. She also performs a Deltchev salto on uneven bars, now an unusual skill in the women's sport and an uncommon piked double Arabian dismount. She has a skill on floor named after her, a double spin in attitude which carries a D rating under the 2009-2012 Code Of Points.

References

External links

• Archived Official Website
• Ksenia Semenova at Fédération Internationale de Gymnastique

Gymnastics portal