A Tribute to Geza

Present day floor routines are a snooze.  The American routines are basically vaults with shitty leaps to horrid music.  Yes, Gabby, we are looking at you.  The rest of the world isn't that much better.  Back in the day, a Hungarian-Romanian immigrant was vital to the success of Team Karolyi and ultimately, Team USA.  Hungarian-Romanian choreography match with Hungarian-Romanian taste.  Bela, Martha and Geza were a trio of brilliance or hell on Earth depending on your point of view.  What their athletes lacked in difficulty and aesthetics, they made up for with good old fashioned flash.  In the Reagan eighties and early nineties, the crowd ate that shit up and the routines became as iconic as the gymnasts themselves.

At the time, most gymnastics enthusiasts found the choreography satanic, cheestastic and largely insufferable.  We did not know that one day we would long for routines that had one iota of whatever the hell that brand of dance Geza brought to the world.




Nadia may have danced like a five-year-old with epilepsy, but it worked.  There is a certain charm to her spastic, cluttered choreography.  Is she falling all over the floor?  Is she dancing?  Who the fuck knows?!  I'm in.


Kim Zmeskal's Rock Around The Clock was a dumbed-down sequel to In The Mood, but she still ate it up.



The original was better.  Watch this and imagine what Geza would've done with Shawn Johnson.  It sure as hell would've been better than the piece of shit she performed  in Beijing.  Zmeskal's choreography and music matched with her flashy second pass was a Bela-Geza special that made up for her inferior routine construction to the rest of the world.  Bela knew how to teach a double back and it is about all he put in his athletes' routines at a time where actual tumbling was flourishing.


Love it or hate it, this routine was 'it' in Atlanta.  This routine made Dominique a household name and could be responsible for at least eight percent of her book sales.  It is positively infectious.  A normal fourteen-year-old girl would find pounding her fists on the floor infantile, but Moceanu looked about nine and pulled off the tantrum with flair.


Borden wasn't good enough to train with Bela, but her Geza routine made up for her collegiate ability.



Kerri Strug was a rigid gymnast with a neurotic personality.  Geza made the most of it matched with tumbling that benefited from Be;a's boot camp.


Kristie Phillips never could tumble or land anything with her chest above her knees, but the crowd loved her and the judges typically had no choice but to agree.


Mary Lou sells this god awful routine like it is positively brilliant. Somehow, I think it matches her level of taste.


Even Dawes got into it when they finally let her ditch Malaguena.  Her tumbling passes were placed well in the music.  The booming double layout showed off her amazing skill more than her sloppy, bowlegged back-to-back passes.



Geza actually did nice work for girls he believed had actual dance ability.


Sadly, Hillary Grivich wasn't one of them.  Poor Pluto.


I've always wanted to roll on the floor and toil in the shadows with Shannon.


Chelle Stack sold that shit to Seoul and back.  Little did we ever know we'd long for these days and be subjected to the likes of Jordyn Wieber.  Be careful what you bitch about.