She looks like...

After becoming a serious gymnastics fan, I thought it was time to learn my history. So, about three years ago I went back and watched all of the major United States competitions since the early nineties. It wasn't long until I picked out a few girls who were serious ringers for current elites. Maybe you won't see the resemblance, or maybe you will! Take a look at these four side by side comparisions:

Jordyn Wieber and Kristal Uzalec

This one is MAJOR for me, like they could be sisters.

Hollie Vise and Raegan Smith

This one wasn't as obvious when I put the pictures together but there is definitely something similar about their mouths and they are both tiny!

Aly Raisman and Rachel Tidd

Spoooooky....these two could be twins in these pictures.

Bailie Key and Nastia Liukin

Ok, so I don't think Bailie looks like current Nastia or even 2008 Nastia. I'm talking about vintage 2005/2006 Nastia. The braces certainly help but beyond that, they do look alike.

What do you think? Any other "look alikes" you have noticed??

NOOOOOOOOOOOO

Bailie Key is out for Rio. I'm heartbroken.
Kim said this is not the end for her so Bailie and Norah for 2017 Worlds it is!

Trials Euphoria

Guys, my tickets to Olympic Trials came in the mail this past week. I'm pretty sure I couldn't be more excited! I can't wait to meet Olympians (as they are having that giant reunion, I'm sure I'll stumble upon some!), go to the chalk talk, the parade and of course, see the competition!

The fact that my mom and I will be in that arena when the team is announced is just mind boggling. I keep thinking of when I watched the trials in 2012 and the confetti came down and it was just SO exciting and unforgettable. I'm pretty certain I'm gong to have the time of my life.

In related news...

I'm bummed that Flatley is out for Nationals and of course, Rio. I've been a fan of hers for years and it sucks that injury is putting her out of the running. I think she's extremely talented and had loads of untapped potential so I hope she'll stick around.

With Norah out, I'm basically just rooting for Bailie Key. Ok, it's not as though she's the only one I like and want on the team. I like Simone of course, and I want Aly and Maggie is fine too but Bailie is someone whose gymnastics I really appreciate and enjoy. Plus, the girl has been majorly screwed over in the past and who wouldn't love a little redemption. Gosh, I would just love it if she totally killed it at Nationals and trials. She deserves a spot far more than some others.

We shall see.

Classics and Key

• Juniors Morgan Hurd, Deanne Soza and Emma M (not going to attempt to misspell her last name:) are my favorites. Chiles too if she can get her act together in competition. 
• Aly did herself a big favor by pulling it together for the rest of her night but the bars have never been her friend and I fear she won't be put up on them in Rio if she gets there (bye to the all-around for her)
• Brenna just competing beam was a head scratcher but you know, if the girl wants to just compete and see what happens, more power to her. She obviously likes training elite and is giving Rio her best shot even if it's a long one. 
• Hardly any all-arounders did make the night a bit dull. Gabby on beam is a mess but at least she stayed on. Simone's looked good enough save a few wobbles.
• Let's talk bar workers: Ashton and Kocian looked about the same to me but the gap was pretty big scoring wise. One thing that Maddie K has going for her is that her beam set is better than Locklear's but it's still questionable. I'm not impressed with Laurie on bars at all, she looks heavy on them, sort of like Kyla at the end of her career. 
• Rachel Gowey getting second place was nice. I've been a fan of hers for awhile, maybe she'll get an alternate spot, who knows. I wish she had gotten to go to worlds back in 2014 when she was at her peak. Alas...

And Bailie Key, my new underdog to root for. Her bars looked good in PT and word is that she's training an amanar. After getting screwed over, I would really like it if she could make it onto this team. With her consistency and clean routines she certainly deserves a spot over certain others. 

200 Days!

Today marks 200 days until the opening ceremony in Rio and last week marked 6 months until USA names their team at trials!

I for one, am pretty stoked for the coming months. All of the competitions leading up to the trials and then of course, those themselves should be very intense but very awesome.

Six months...a lot can happen in that time so take this prediction with a grain of salt but I will hereby make a guess as to who will be on our team for Rio based on past performances and future upgrades.

Drumroll....

Simone Biles!!! (Duh)

Aly Raisman!!! (Lest she falls apart a la Worlds again)

Maggie Nichols!!! (Unless she gets Hollie Vise'd which is actually very possible)

Bailie Key!! (Leaving her off the Glasgow team was a terrible headgame but I still thinks Marta likes her)

and...

...last of all

 my girl Norah Flatley!!! (She has to be there, or I'll storm the floor mat at Trials!)

Alternates: Kyla/Gabby/Laurie

I'm sure I'm wrong but I this is more the team I *hope* is named. I actually hope for Kyla to be on there too, I guess she'd replace Norah or Bailie. Now that I look at it, this team is set just about everywhere but maybe weak on bars, though Norah will probably come out with many upgrades. I just don't know...there are a lot of different combos that could happen.

We shall see. 

Here it is!

With Key and Bauman as non-travelling alternates. Not exactly the team I expected but pretty close! No Key is the shock for me but I'm psyched for Brenna!

I'll write more about this later, college calls :).

Whoa, look at Simone and Maggie's arm becoming one! I didn't mean to do that but it's pretty awesome.

The Final Countdown!!

Well, tonight is the nigh folks!! The World's team announcement is drawing ever near and I can't wait to finally find out who will go to Glasgow. The picture above is from yesterday's first night of camp competition. Everyone looks pretty happy, what could this mean?? 

As far as final predictions go, I suppose I'm going to stick to my initial one. Perhaps because I think it's most likely or perhaps because I don't like to go back on my word! Here it is: Biles, Douglas, Key, Nichols, Raisman, Kocian Alt. Skinner.. 

Now, in a perfect world I'd replace Douglas with Dowell but I just don't see that happening. 

We will know soon enough!

World's Team Prediction UPDATED

You heard it here folks! My world team predictions for the good 'ole US of A!

Let's see if I end up being right, because last year I was a clueless sap who thought the team was made up of only 5 people! Imagine!

I digress...

Simone Biles
Aly Raisman
Maggie Nichols
Bailie Key
Gabrielle Douglas
Kyla Ross OR Madison Kocian (this part remains to be seen)

Alt: Kyla (if not named), Maddie K (if not named), Mykayla Skinner, Nia Dennis

The lineup for Quals if Ross makes the team (fingers crossed!)

VT: Ross, Key, Raisman, Nichols, Biles
UB: Raisman, Biles, Douglas,  Key, Ross
BB: Key, Nichols, Raisman, Ross, Biles
FX: Ross, Nichols, Key, Raisman, Biles

What do you think???

Nationals Night Two

Ahhh now I can breathe.

Simone was in beast mode. Beautiful beam dismount, stuck Lopez vault, stuck bars dismount, classic floor. So naturally, despite that one fall on floor, she won by 5 points. Seriously??? This girl is a champ. Can I say that I think she should add a full twist to the Biles move on floor? She definitely has room and power.

Coming in second was Maggie Nichols! She has to be sooo proud of herself, What improvement she's had. Her Amanar looked great, especially on day two. It's funny, in person, her tumbling looks so light and effortless bu tit doesn't quite translate that way on TV. I think the loud booms from everyone's landings doesn't help. They're much more magnified during broadcasts than in the actual arena. Anyway, Maggie deserves a spot on the World's team for sure. That being said, her form isn't so great and I'm a bit of a stickler about those things.

Third was Aly and she looked back to her usual self despite that scary vault. I'm torn with thinking she needs the high D-score from the Amanar but also knowing that it's done so poorly, maybe she's better off with a nice clean DTY. But even with that she still wouldn't score as well as a crappy 2.5 so oh well. I don't really love her floor routine right now. The tumbling is great of course but the choreo and music isn't as engaging as it was in London. Maybe they can tweak it a little.

Then we have Bailie and her tuxedo. This girl is growing on me. I think I can get behind her quiet gymnastics and steady form. She sort of reminds me of vintage Kyla Ross with her lower difficulty but nice execution and consistency. So yeah, I've decided I'm rooting for Bailie Key. And she had a beautiful bar routine

Gabby looked slightly better on some events on night two and slightly worse on others. Her beam was a mess of balance checks and tentativeness but her landings on floor were improved. I still hate that floor routine, something just isn't right about it. Maddie K, Ashton and Bailie can beat her on bars so she really isn't anything special there right now. I wouldn't put her in Glasgow just yet.

I barely saw Madison Kocian because the stupid NBC broadcast only showed like five of the athletes. Made me miss the blasted livestream. They showed her bars and beam. Bars looked a little worse than night one and they took out the standing full from her beam which was a safe move.

Oh Mykayla Skinner, that leo. Good grief, someone needs to tell this girl that Ireland and Scotland are not the same land. Honestly, it's just embarrassing at this point. Her vault is so ugly with that block, sorry I can't give it up. But her floor landings looked nice and she was solid on beam so good effort for her. At 7th place, I don't see her on the World's team.

 Kyla. Sigh. Same issue on bars, headcased vault and a shaky floor. That beam helped a bit but overall a disastrous night for her. Ugh, I so want her to get it together but maybe her body is just tired and needs a break. She's been training elite for so long. It's such a catch-22 with her. If she doesn't upgrade, she hits nice watered down routines but has such a low D-score it's hard to break into the top ranks. If she does upgrade, she barely hits despite having that higher D-score. I don't know the solution because I think everyone is tired of seeing the same routines she's been competing since 2012.

Brenna Dowell had a great first half of her bar routine and then got tired of something and bombed the end. But she hit all the other events so I'm a bit pissed that she wasn't named to the NT. Headgames I guess, Brenna is always the resident punching bag. If she can become consistent on bars and gain some difficulty on floor, I really think she's a contender but sadly, I see her as being alternate again.

Rachel Gowey had a nice showing, even if it was just bars and beam. Did she do the AA at pan ams? I don't know. I hope she hasn't hurt her ankle again. But she did have a great bar set night one and her beam looked solid.

Didn't see much of Bauman or Dennis so no comment there but both were named to the team so they must have done alright.

I'm going to do a leotard post this week so stay tuned!

Natinoals Night One

WHAT IS LIFE?!?

Aly, Kyla, Simone...some other people I don't care about as much.
One by one they fell...
And one by one I screamed and grabbed my face in horror until my sister had to tell me to shut up.

It was like 2006 up in here.

I know people are saying that Simone is human and humans make mistakes but darn it, I don't want Simone to be human. Especially now when there are people who I really don't want to beat her. And yeah, she still won by over a point so that was nice but still.

Anyway, let's back up...

So I had to watch the live stream because out of all of our three hundred channels, we don't get Universal Sports! After a big dramatic episode of "Hooking the Laptop up to the TV"  I finally got to settle in and watch some guy (John something or other) make a big fool out of himself. Twenty minutes later, a beautiful montage of all the US champions for the passed 25 years or so. I yelled out, "Brandy! Kim! Shannon! and so on, right up until my girl Simone.

Let's talk about her first. Simone started out fine and then there were some issues on beam and that fall on floor. And what a strange fall it was, almost like she didn't even set up her landing. Her Amanar was beautiful, stuck like a pro! She had some leg issues coming in for the landing but overall beautiful.

I screamed when Aly Raisman fell on beam, why oh why?  On the bright side, she hit a great FX but the music isn't my favorite and doesn't seem to captivate like in 2012 but it could grow on me. She landed a scary Amanar and had a typical bar routine but I think she can pull through on Saturday. Just no more falls, ok?

Maggie Nichols hit four for four. She did her Amanar vault but I don't really remember much else fro her. She's definitely the dark horse but nothing really stood out for me last night except her upgrading beam dismount that looked pretty good.

Kyla....poor girl. Issues on bars, issues on floor and just so so on beam and vault. Actually her vault can be so much cleaner. I think she only had that one upgrade on UB and took out the others. And on floor, why the hand??? Ugh, if she doesn't kick butt on night two, it is definitely the beginning of the end for her. I want her to upgrade and hit but maybe it's just not in the cards? Whether it be physical or mental, it just doesn't seem to be working out. Prove me wrong Kyla!

For some reason, I expected that Gabrielle Douglas would do alright. I don't like her floor and was glad that it was scored appropriately and she did have some wobbles on beam. Her bars were alright but not as impressive to me anymore. I don't know, I'm so torn on this girl. I'm glad that her comeback is legit and she appears to be working for it but I hate the cockiness and the trash talk of her former gym. It's just petty and unnecessary.

Another girl who seems to always pull it together for Nationals is Mykayla Skinner and pull it together she did. Her form is still atrocious and that floor, good grief but she hit so she should be happy. She only did a DTY for her second vault though which I don't see helping her at all. I don't see her making the worlds team, barring any major injuries for the other key players.

And then there was Kim Zmeskal. Or wait, Bailie Key in Kim's old leotard. And as ugly as it was in the 90's, I thought Bailie looked kind of fabulous in it last night. Still though, I can't seem to get behind this girl. She just seems blah and needs a little spark somewhere. And she needs some height on those leaps and jumps. Honestly, I think she can take this year to improve and upgrade and really take it to the next level. I don't think she's peaked yet, or at least I think she can peak again when it counts.

Let's not forget my girl Brenna Dowell! Wast hat the first time she hit four for four since 2013? I think so. I was so nervous watching her but so happy when she made it through. Her bars had a few potential scary moments but she pulled it off and that beam was GREAT for her! Floor was nice, and solid vault despite landing OOB's. I need her to pull it out for night two. You got this Brenna!

Fellow GAGE girl, Madison Desch did not have such a good night. She fell on beam and on bars which is a shame because her bars are actually quite nice. She did not go OOB's on floor which is rare so I was happy about that.

The WOGA's, I think, have had their day in the sun. Madison Kocian fell on beam despite having a nice bar set and Alyssa Bauman needs more than a nice beam set to keep her relevant.

You know who's fun to watch? Amelia Hundley, girl just goes out and has a good time. I like that she competes for the fun of it and though her difficulty is low, she makes her routines exciting with the way she showcases them.

I know I'm missing some people but these are who I remembered! I'm not going to be home to watch night two live but I'll put it on as soon as I return and will have a blog up on Sunday. I can't wait!
What did you think???