Gymnast and Olympic champion Gabby Douglas has denied she made a coaching change ahead of the 2016 Summer Olympics.
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To Aimee Boorman, Biles’ coach, the bigger issue was controlling her adrenaline on floor.
Allyson Felix made it easily through the first round of 200-meter qualifying at Olympic Track and Field Trials, winning her heat in 22.93 seconds.
“Just leading up to the Olympic games and heading into trials, everything gets so intense”, Douglas said. But she got better and better with each day. “You just do a lot of numbers and you need that extra comfort of that extra spot”. “If she feels that Christian, my assistant coach, will be able to spot her if needed in Rio as well as energize her, then I want what is best for her”. She’s now married and has kids of her own, just like numerous Magnificent Seven. “For the most part Christian was still my coach and is still my coach in the gym”.
Her one weakness is uneven bars. During her floor routine, Raisman was met with the unexpected when her shoe became loose. The first is difficulty, the “D score”, which comes from a book like your auto mechanic looks at when he figures the amount of time to do a fix. “I have to tell myself it’s not over until it’s over”.
Last year, there was a point when Karolyi doubted that Douglas would even make the team for the world championships. There’s two loops that go around my foot. “I have these challenges and circumstances and for me I love it and it determines if I’m going to give in, give up or push that limit and achieve my goal”. So will the selection committee’s guts: Would they really swallow hard and leave the defending Olympic champ off the team?
And first-year senior Laurie Hernandez was a point behind despite a mistake in her uneven bars routine.
Ashton Locklear’s knees began going numb.
It has been 12 weeks since Maggie Nichols had surgery to fix the torn meniscus in her right knee.
Locklear and Kocian tied on the second day of the national championships two weeks ago at 15.700 – with the same D and E score differences as Friday night – but because Locklear had a better first day, she won the title.
Not only did she make the world team – she wound up second to Biles in the all-around.
Read into that what you will. At the end of the day, all that matters is the opinion of national team coordinator Martha Karolyi, and she hasn’t lost faith in Douglas.
The sloppy ending to her otherwise steady performance Friday, when she wobbled near the end of her beam routine and was unable to save it before jumping to the floor in frustration, left her visibly shaken. She saw more nerves than grace.
“I’m hoping she will be really eager to prove herself in this competition”, said Karolyi. “I’ve got to dive in”.
Lauren Hernandez competes on the uneven bars during the women’s U.S. Olympic gymnastics trials in San Jose, Calif., Friday, July 8, 2016. Also, competing on all four events was a nice bonus for her, as she had a decent floor routine and at least attempted a vault.
MyKayla Skinner wasted no time showcasing her strengths in San Jose.
Karolyi denied reports that she had long ago settled on her lineup but the 73-year-old gymnastic matriarch conceded that in her mind there was an ideal team.
But previous assumptions have been put on hold following a shaky performance on Friday by London all-around champion Douglas, who fell off the balance beam.
“Simone was wonderful!” Retton said.
“It was so hard”, Raisman recalled, “but I just stuck with it because I didn’t want to be sitting on the couch watching the Olympics and thinking, ‘What if?'” “I’m just going to go on to Sunday and bang it out”.
Skinner, who deferred a year of enrollment at the University of Utah for a run at the Olympics, is one of 14 other gymnasts competing for a place on the team.
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While it’s tough to determine a team based on just one night, four of the five spots seemed pretty clear at the moment. After the four rotations, she was seventh in the standings, halfway down the list of Olympic applicants.
