Horton, Bross Lead After Day 1 Of Gymnastics Nationals

Rebecca Bross took a 2 point lead after day 1 of the US Women’s Gymnastics Championships after her first four events. She has 60.4 points, 2 more than Cover Girl Classic champion Mattie Larson and a bit more than Alexandra Raisman. Bross said she was disappointed with her floor exercise, but it was her step on the beam that was perhaps the biggest struggle in her night. Still, with a repeat of Thursday night on Saturday, Bross will be leaving a national champion.

Even with a fall on the high bar, the most unpredictable of mens gymnastics events, Jonathan Horton’s 90 points accumulated over night 1 of the mens gymnastics put him into the lead, just 1 point ahead of Danell Levya. The defending world champion has added more and more to his high bar routine over the years, but so has Levya, who is shaping up to be his biggest competition. After the 2008 Olympics saw the American men come from pretty much out of nowhere to win Bronze, the team will be serious medal contenders in 2012 with Horton, Levya and presumably Paul Hamm, the 2004 all-around champion.

The men will finish Friday night and the women finish Saturday.

The nationals help determine which gymnasts will compete in this fall’s world championships.

Alicia Sacramone To Attempt Comeback

US gymnast Alicia Sacramone, who became a blog sensation during the 2008 Olympics, is attempting a comeback starting this weekend with the CoverGirl Classic. The event will be her first since the 2008 Olympics, in which two costly falls helped keep the US from team Gold (although her falls alone were not enough of a deduction to keep the US from gold). Sacramone also failed to medal on any of her apparatus events.

While Sacramone says she ‘didn’t have any muscle left’ when she got back into the gym for the first time, no one will doubt her toughness.

After a dream 2007 season in which Sacramone won medals on the vault and the floor exercise, as well as delivering the clinching floor exercise routine to win the World Championships for the United States.

Sacramone will compete only on the balance beam and vault this weekend, and she has just three weeks until the US Championships, during which she will attempt to make next year’s World Championship team.

A captain of the US gymnastics team retiring after falling twice in the Olympics is maybe the worst ending  you could draw up if you were making a movie. But maybe her brief time away from the sport is just the low point of the movie before she gets back into the gym and eventually helps the US women to Gold in London.

US Gymnastics Shines at Pacific Rim

Bridget Sloan

The US team featured only 2 members with World Championship experience, and only one with Olympic experience, but they dominated less experienced Chinese and Australian teams to take the Pacific Rim. The Americans won by more than 15 minutes and finished 1-2 in the all-around events for the Senior and Junior divisions.

Jordyn Wieber, the defending US Junior champion, won the junior title with a score high enough to win the senior title as well.

Unfortunately, a rule change that means only 5 team members can compete at the 2012 Olympics means the United States will be unable to utilize some of their new found depth, but there is plenty of time to carve depth down to an elite group of 5.