Team USA.. A New Generation

Today I wanted to talk about the future of USA Gymnastics. It seems that with the journey of this past quad, this sport assured us that ANYTHING can happen and nothing is ever guaranteed. I was a little hesitant to write this post because anything can change in the next four years, who knows if the contenders for Rio I'm listing today will even make it another year in the sport. But I decided to write this anyway because I thought looking back on this post four years from now or even two years from now might be pretty special.  





Katelyn Ohashi

I love Katelyn's gymnastics. She's got beautiful lines the judges love and everything in her form all the way to her toe point is perfect. As of right now I'd say she's the best. Yes, I know her recent competitions weren't her greatest but I know she's been struggling with an injury for quite some time. The only thing that scares me is the hot topic of Valeri "screwing her up." Now I'm just as concerned as the next person but I do believe that Martha or someone has probably talked to Valeri about this issue. We all saw what happened to Rebecca and it was tragic but at the same time remember he isn't a complete failure. 






Lexie Priessman

Another phenomenal gymnast. Lexie is powerful and explosive and is able to perform. Her floor routine is already so difficult that if she would have competed it at this years Olympics she probably would've gotten on the Podium in Floor Finals. But that is just it, she is already so good that I'm afraid of how long she can hold on for, she doesn't have much more to upgrade. The other thing is she just verbally committed to the University of Georgia. Now obviously I don't know all the details but Lexie graduates in 2015, a year before the Olympics, so lets hope shes not planning on attending College before the Games. Also this kind of goes simultaneous with the peaking too early subject but in 2016 she'll be 19.. In gymnastics, thats a grandma. 











Bailie Key

This girl is definitely not someone I'm worried about. Bailie is only 13 and certainly has so much talent. But along with her teammate Nica Hults, she is far from peaking. Bailie also has very pretty lines. She executes well, great performer all she has to do is slowly up her difficulty and not have any horrible injuries and I'd say she is my best bet for the team. If I see her bar routine right she not only has a gienger but it is also layed-out, which you don't see too often from U.S girls. I love Bailie and although her floor routine isn't breathtaking choreography, I can't get her music out of my head and I kind of like the music! I'm not in love with the routine but hey, there's a lot worse. 













Veronica Hults

I've been watching Nica on Youtube for a while now and I love her! She has the lines, she will have the execution score once she gets more consistent and she seems to have the ability to make it look like shes floating in the air, kind of like Kyla Ross. I think that with time she'll become so much more confident and so easy to watch. Keep in mind she went from a level 9 to Elite and made it to Nationals the same year. She may not have the difficulty now, but like her teammate Bailie, she will in four years and I think right now they have the best shot at making the team. 












Norah Flatley

I haven't seen much from her, being that she is only a level 10, but what I have seen is phenomenal. Norah is another one of Chow's gymnasts and I think she could have the potential to be his best so far. You may say Gabby is, and no doubt she is a great gymnast and still probably hasn't peaked yet, but I think that this girl could beat her out. Norah has nice flexibility and also great power, and being that she has been with Chow for most of her career I don't think that she will be the headcase that Gabby was. Yes I know she is still a level 10 and the elite world adds so much more pressure, but I think that given Chow's track record with Shawn and how Gabby came to him the mess she was (raw talent and all nerves), she should be just fine for elite competition. Also, she'll turn senior the year of the Olympics which isn't always good but I'm sure Martha will want to give her plenty of international assignments knowing how much she loves Chow.






Simone Biles

Simone is definitely on the rise and she's great, but the one thing she doesn't have on her side is her body shape. Most of you know that Elizabeth Price was an alternate on the Olympic Team this quad and thats amazing! But to be honest, she has more difficulty than Kyla, almost a whole point, other than she may not have been as consistent as Kyla, she would have made the team. That isn't why she didn't make the team, she didn't make the team simply because judges don't like her lines. Thats it. Silly right? Well if you think about it, Jordyn Wieber also doesn't have the prettiest body form either, but being how strong and successful she was in 2011 and 2012 she easily made the team. Once Jordyn got to the Olympics you didn't see her scores as high as they usually were did you? Maybe it had something to do with her stress fracture, but even without her injury the judges just didn't like her shape. Believe it or not, but gymnastics is so much more politics than we realize. And with Simone having 4 more years to grow and develop muscle, the only way she will be making that team in 2016 is if she is as successful as Jordyn was because there are many other girls out there who have those lines and shape the judges drool over. 


I know there are many other gymnasts out there who could be part of that Olympic team in 2016 and we probably haven't heard of some of them yet. As time goes on it will become more clear as to who will make that special team four years from now but for right now, these are some of the ones who stand out to me whether its good or unfortunate.

Wrap Up: The 2012 Olympic Games

Hello again, today I wanted to talk about one of the most exciting events all year, the Olympics. Now I know I'm a little bit late and everyone else and their mom has written at least one of these blog posts, but I thought it would be a good start to my first official blog. So I will be giving my thoughts and an overview of each competition and event that happened in gymnastics at the 2012 London Olympics.

Prelims: 
To be honest, prelims were hard to watch a second time because of everything that went on. I definitely expected and hoped that Aly and Jordyn would qualify for AA finals. Why? I know Gabby Douglas is a phenomenal gymnast she is just plain fun to watch, but there was just something about her that I wasn't so fond of. Maybe it was the fact I've followed Jo and Aly longer, I really don't know but something just didn't click with her. Though in the back of my mind I knew that if she didn't qualify to AA it obviously wouldn't have been a fair battle, but hold that thought. Besides the AA finals situation, I was quite pleased with the performances and results, although I would have liked to see Jordyn in beam finals.

Team Finals:
This was the highlight of gymnastics at this Olympics for me. Everyone from Team USA was spot on! Mckayla's vault, GORGEOUS! After the vault rotation I was pretty convinced that we had it in the bag, and we did. When I saw the line ups for Team final I was disappointed in two things; Viktoria Komova not on floor and Jordyn not on beam. I love love love Komova's floor (although I'm not too fond of her), and I feel like she could have helped Russia a lot more because I assume she would have gone second instead of Grishina. After Grishina's disaster on floor I felt like they just gave up, they didn't fight for it. As for Jordyn not competing on beam I was a little mad because I felt like she deserved to compete on all four events. Jo was so classy in the way she handled everything and in my opinion it wouldn't have been a risk to put her on beam. But Jordyn really did go out there and redeem herself, and I'm so proud of her! I also think that it wasn't a good idea for Gabby to compete AA in team finals because she had competed AA in prelims, then had the All Around final and on top of that two event finals! She could have very well medaled on at least beam but I think she just ran out of gas. Overall this night was my favorite event at the Olympics all together. 

All Around Finals:
This event was definitely not as exciting to watch than I anticipated. Probably by now you kind of have an idea that I'm a Wieber fan and you are probably thinking "shut up about the whole situation," but Jordyn was not the only one to not qualify because of the two gymnast per country rule. Someone who I expected to do extremely well and possibly even medal in this final was Yao Jinnan. Yes, I know she qualified 22nd but she still qualifed, on a horrible day for her and she was fighting an injury. Also, Anastasia Grishina didn't get to compete and she qualified 12th, also had a bad day. FIG better change some of their rules and quick. It isn't fair to those who didn't get a chance to qualify to any final just because their country is dominate in the sport. It should be the best of the best and it wasn't. All three AA gymnasts from China, Russia and USA deserved that chance, end of story. Getting back to the actual competition, overall it went well. I saw who I expected to be on the podium except Aly, though I knew Aliya could take it from her. I'm so happy for Gabby, she obviously deserved it and I'm even more so happy for Chow. He's an amazing coach and he is proof that you don't have to be so harsh on your gymnasts for them to be successful.

Vault Finals:
All I can say is that I was in complete shock that Mckayla fell. I do not recall her ever falling or really even messing up on vault ever! With that being said I think she is right, she didn't deserve the gold with that performance, and based on all of the vaults competed, Sandra Izbasa deserved to win. Even though Mckayla didn't win, there is no doubt she is the best vaulter in the world, I think what happened was simply a fluke and I hope she continues for 2016. I also really wanted Pena to at least land her handspring double front, but I guess not :(

Bar Finals: 
I'm extremely happy with these results, there wasn't anything I didn't like about this event final. Aliya won, He Kexin took silver and Beth Tweddle took the bronze. I actually didn't think Aliya would win here, I thought it would be a battle between He and Beth, but I'm happy Aliya won! I've never been a fan of jam packed bar routines, yeah its quite exciting to watch and probably very hard to do but I've always preferred more fluid routines. I think that if you can incorporate difficult elements into a bar routine while making it look easy and pretty is what makes you a true bar worker, and that is exactly what Aliya is. 

Beam Finals: 
I was a little bit disappointed with this final just because so many girls fell. Its always exciting to watch a beam final and really any final when everyone hits. With Gabby's score on beam during the competitions leading up to this final I thought she could potentially challenge the Chinese, but with her fall on beam and Deng's and Sui's flawless performances, that ended my hopes of her third medal. Again, I think Gabby was over competed, or however you would like to put it, and she just ran out of gas. As for Aly's bronze medal, I am most definitely happy for her! Although she could have had a better routine, I'm so glad she medaled! Moving on to Komova, I was pretty much mad. As much as I dislike her, I love her gymnastics, and with her previous beam scores she could have gotten a silver or bronze, but oh no, she just gave up like she always does. No big shocker there. 

Floor Finals:
The last final. I was nervous for this one, and to add to that I wasn't able to watch it because I was shopping. All I can remember was refreshing my twitter feed every five second and then ranting about what was going on to the poor lady who was at the register. I thought that Jordyn could medal, of course that would mean a flawless routine and maybe someone to mess up a little, but I knew it was possible. Reading that her routine wasn't near as good as I expected was hard because I wanted her to at least get an individual medal but I quickly forgot about it and focused on Aly. I read she had a great performance and was nearly perfect and I thought she had it on lock, until I saw how amazing Catalina Ponor did also. That was just a little nerve wracking for me, and then I found out Izbasa still had to go.... But in the end Aly won, Catalina took the silver and Aliya took bronze! I was very pleased with that because I used to hate Aliya, she was a bit like Komova, or Komova is a bit like her, but after her knee injury she became more humble and proved herself to be a good sport! 

Overall these Olympics were full of drama and excitement, but at the same time everything happens for a reason. I believe that something good has to come out of the bad things in life, and if it weren't for the tears and heartache, I wouldn't have grown to love and respect some of the athletes I do now. You can be the best of the best at whatever you do, but the reality is that if you aren't humble and respectable, what good does it do?

Welcome!

Hello!

  My name is Emily, and I wanted to create this blog simply because I love to write and I love the sport of gymnastics. I am a gymnast and have been for the past year. I did gymnastics for 5 years before I quit due to the decision I had to make between gymnastics and basketball. Obviously at the time I chose basketball. Even though I wasn't involved with gymnastics physically for a while, I always payed close attention to the sport and dreamed of one day starting again. Last year, my Sophomore year of high school, I decided to pick it back up and it has been a hard journey, but I love it more than anything. Anyway, on this blog I will be giving you updates on what is going on in the world we call the "Gymternet." I will be giving you the latest on competitions, training of our elite athletes, and many other topics involved with this beautiful sport. 

   Sincerely, 
       Emily, your newest blogger.


      p.s. bare with me as I get this blog up and going, I'm new to this (: