age matters?

I'm not sure what the fuss has been on the Chinese gymnasts ages. I'm aware of a rule on age. I hadn't considered that being more flexible from being younger is an advantage. But given that someone with an extra year of practice, strength, experience, etc should probably overcome that disadvantage in most cases. It doesn't make much sense to be this concerned about it (at least as concerned as NBC commentators have been). In most other sports, youth isn't generally any advantage at all (rookies usually take a year or more to adjust to the skill level and physically). I would suppose here it can be..but it still doesn't seem like it should be nearly so important as it is made out to be.

On the other hand, it doesn't make much sense to be going to Orwellian lengths to cover it up either by removing old news stories on the specific gymnasts as the Chinese have done.

Still though, the best part of the whole story was the recall of a North Korean who was listed as 15 for 3 years in a row back in the early 90s. You'd think someone would have noticed by the second year. That sort of rule evasion is so blatantly obvious as to be amusing. This sort looks to me like either sour losers (America ended up with a good number of silvers herein), or a problem with the rule itself. If we had more government complicity here the NBA or NFL's age restrictions would probably come up just as controversial.