All the same, the dramatically increased difficulty of the sport has coincided with a noticeable shift in the gendered self-presentation of gymnasts, and the two would appear to be connected.
It is also a story that demonstrates the difficulty of cutting sports from the Olympics and to what lengths athletes will go to keep their window of opportunity open.
The soft-spoken Henson is not about to complain about the difficulty of playing two sports whose seasons interlock.
Put aside the difficulty of selling a $50,000 sport utility vehicle in a bear market and stagnant economy, or of marketing an automobile that gets about 11 miles a gallon when there is renewed focus on oil consumption.
One reason is the difficulty of staging the actual sports.
Toby Jones plays Neil Baldwin, a real-life figure who overcame learning difficulties to achieve success in the worlds of sport, religion, entertainment and academia.
Sport England said challenges facing disabled people wanting to take part in sport included a lack of specialist equipment, transport issues, difficulty accessing sport facilities, poor information about sporting opportunities, and a lack of self-confidence.
In his cynicism, he brushes away the demands and difficulty and unpredictability (and thus the beauty and meaning) of sport.
Similar experiences of difficulties with entry to countries have occurred in the world of sport with boycotts of athletes in various sporting events because of their country of origin.
League officials and players acknowledged that this would be difficult, given the fragile state of the economy, the difficulty of attracting sponsorship for women's sports and overall decreases in attendance and television ratings for sports in this country.
