Mikulak makes US Gymnastics team
After a fair amount (for men's gymanstics anyway) of both positive and negative speculation, Sam Mikulak was selected for the US Olympic gymnastics team.
For those not following, he was certainly one of the top 3 best all-around gymnasts, but there are only 2 automatic spots, so when he twisted his ankle on Thursday he was out of the running for those 2 spots. Had to be selected, there are only 5 spots total and there was a lot of concern he wouldn't get a spot due to the small team size and his injury. Probably his pommel horse strengths (the US team's general weakness) helped get him through despite the ankle.
http://www.latimes.com/sports/sportsnow/la-sp-sn-men-olympic-gymnastics…
Congrats to him! Would have been unfortunate had the injury cost him a spot.
that the injury kept him on the high horse?
I can't believe how soon before the Olympics these things are determined. The Opening Ceremony is in about three weeks. Shows how little I know, I guess.
Kind of makes sense though - if you pick close to the games, you have a large pool of talent all practicing as hard as they can to make the team, and when you finally do pick 'em, you know they're peaking right on time for the games.
congrats to mikulak. i'm assuming the ankle will be healed in a few days?
and former competitive gymnast, part of the monitoring team that kept him from competing all the events yesterday. The article quotes Sam as saying if he's picked he'll start practicing Monday. Heck, he finished the competition where he broke his ankles thinking they were "only" sprained.
His ankle may not be fully healed before he practices, but it will be heavily taped and closely watched so he'll be at his healthiest come the actual games. They've got a terrific team, if they can all stay healthy. Congrats, Sam!
Just as I suspected! Congrats to Sam!
U-S-A, U-S-A, U-S-A!
I was at the trials, and Team USA for both men and women is looking pretty strong for medal contention.
Sam from U of M on the men's side, and Jordyn Wieber from Dewitt, MI on the women's side are both really exciting for (state of) Michigan gymnastics. There were a lot of collegiate athletes - it seemed like more than normal. Although they didn't make the squad, there were guys from Illinois, Ohio State, Berkeley, and Stanford (in addition to the beasts from Oklahoma).
If any of you have MGoKids in gymnastics, try to get them interested in pommel horse for men, and uneven bars for women. That is where we have been lagging, and they'll be trying to bring those events up for the young ones.