USA World Championship Team Prediction & Medals

Kyla Ross: Now without Gabby and Jordyn in the picture, Kyla has a real shot at a medal in the All Around, possibly even a gold medal if she can fend off Aliya Mustafina, Larisa Iordache, and her own teammate Simone Biles. She hasn’t regained her amanar and the unique beam connections seen at the training camp have yet to be seen in actual competition.  If Kyla wants to have a shot at the medals she’s going to have to take some actual risk.

Kyla is also the US’s only chance at getting into the bars finals.  Though I don’t think Kyla will be on the podium, you never know, the Russians don’t seem to be at full difficulty yet (Mustafina) and the Chinese are usually very inconsistent.

In my opinion, her consistency and execution will get her far in the competition, but her lack of difficulty will keep her from the coveted gold medal.

Simone Biles:  The 2013 national champion.  She is the US’s best potential all arounder right now and be more than capable of getting into the medals with consistent performances on all the apparatus.  In addition to a spot in the all around, Simone will be looking to make the floor and vault finals.  On floor, she tumbles like no other, performing a double double and double layout in the first 30 seconds.  Her difficulty score is a bit difficult to calculate at the moment because she has been upgrading and downgrading certain moves recently.  She had a 6.2 difficulty at the American Cup, a 6.4 difficulty at Jesolo, and a 6.5 difficulty at Nationals.  A big problem for her is that she has too much power! She’s very bouncy on a lot of her tumbles, especially the first 2.  If she goes clean, the floor final gold could be in her grasp.

She has two vaults under her belt at the moment: an Amanar and a Lopez (Round-off, flic-flac with ½ turn on – salto fwd stretched with ½  turn off) Her 2^nd vault is less difficult than Myckala Maroney’s and thus she will have to pray that Mckayla fumbles in order to secure a gold medal for herself. 

She’s got the difficulty, now has she got the execution and consistency?

Mckayla Maroney:  Her presence at the world championships will secure a gold medal in the vault finals without a doubt… as long as she doesn’t land on her ass again.  Mckayla won the floor competition at Nationals and in my opinion has a good shot at getting into and possibly medalling at World’s floor finals.  She needs to clean up her landings in my opinion, maybe adding a leap or two in her routine, especially after that hard to stick double Arabian, will help out with those landings and raise her difficulty score simultaneously.

The Fourth Spot (Brenna Dowell, Kennedy Baker, Peyton Ernst): With Simone, Kyla, and Mckayla all locks (in my mind at least), that leaves 2 more spots to compete in qualification: on the uneven bars and on the beam.  No offense to the rest of the US national team, but the real world team will just consist of the 3 gymnasts already stated in this article (Biles, Ross, Maroney).  There’s no one else that has proved that they are capable of earning an individual medal at these worlds.  The other member of this team will be going for international experience, not for medals.

This is all assuming that Mckayla Maroney does not compete in the all around in qualification. Maroney has suffered from many injuries the past years that have kept her from really showing her potential in the all around.  She’s not as good on bars and beam as she is on vault and floor but she could be a real all around threat if she’s given the chance.  Plus, after the Olympics, it’s no secret that Marta likes to have an extra gymnast competing in the all around.

Because the entire US team is weak on bars and will have to face off against the Russians and Chinese in the finals, I think Marta’s going to want to put a ‘Beamer’ on the team as opposed to someone who is decent on bars just incase something goes wrong with Simone or Kyla in the qualifications round. Kyla is really the only one capable of medaling in the bars finals at worlds and with her difficulty score, she’s already pushing it.

It’s such a shame that Ohashi is out because she would have been perfect for this spot

Medal Predictions:

Simone: AA (Gold/Silver/Bronze), Vault (Silver), Floor (Silver), Beam (Bronze)

Kyla: AA (Silver/Bronze), Bars (Bronze), Beam (Bronze)

Mckayla: Vault (Gold), Floor (Bronze)

Note: I’m being QUITE optimistic here, I’m not really sure that Mckayla could medal on floor and Kyla could medal on bars but anything could happen in event finals.  Simone however is in fact capable of getting all of those medals, except maybe the beam medal, if she stays CONSISTENT.

2013 Secret Classic RECAP

Now that the 2013 Secret Classic is over I though I'd give y'all my opinions on some of the gymnasts performances.  It's important to note that the gymnasts are more focused on Nationals and Worlds and either use this event to qualify to nationals if they havn't done so already or to debut newly prepared skills.

Kyla Ross

The all around champion and former Olympian gave clean routines on all 4 of the apparatus.  On Vault, Kyla performed solid double twisting yurchenko but I’m anxious to see her amanar and whether she's going to put it in for nationals/worlds. On the bars, Kyla received a massive 15.4.    On beam, I was disappointed that I didn't see some of the connections she was working on at the national camp but once again a typical solid routine from Kyla.  I think Floor Exercise was my favorite part about Kyla's routine.  I love her new routine! Great music and great choreography (and she's not throwing her head back every 3 seconds like in her old floor) Her floor started out well until she got to her dismount, a double pike, in which she fell.  Overall, 

Simone Biles

Disappointing meet overall for Simone.  She had a fall on the uneven bars and a very wobbly beam routine.  Her floor however started out well with one of the highest double doubles I have ever seen.  Nevertheless, she fell on her dismount, a full in.  She decided to opt out of vault which was a smart idea I think.  No doubt she was flustered after her mistakes on the other apparatus and a mistake on her vaults could have caused an injury.  I, along with the rest of the gymternet, was definitely disappointed that we didn't get to see a Biles/Maroney battle on the vault but I guess we'll see who's better at nationals and who Marta decides to send to worlds.

Mckayla Maroney

Mckayla only competed on two events: Floor and Vault.

She debuted a new floor routine laced with her usual dramatic music and dance. As seen in the camp videos, Mckalya now has a double layout as her 1^st tumbling run.  Unfortunately, she went out of bonds on her new pass.

I have mixed feelings about her getting rid of her 3.5 twist but she had many problems with that pass especially on the landing.  Under the new CoP, gymnasts are not required to combine 2 saltos in one tumbling run, so Mckayla (finally!) got rid of her 1.5 stepout to double back replacing it with a double Arabian (with perfect form!) This is a very smart move in my opinion because the double arabian the same value as her original pass and she almost always stepped out of bounders on her double back and was always in danger of actually landing out of bounds for an 0.5 deduction.

On the vault, Mckayla scored a 15.6 on her Amanar and a 15.425 on her Mustafina and she won the vault competition.

Lexie Priessman

The girl who I once referred to as a "sloppier version of Simone Biles" definitely managed to impress me at the Classic.

On vault she did not compete an amanar but she did have a lot of power on her double twisting yurchenko.  On bars, she delivered with a clean and well executed routine.  She did not compete on the beam.  The chicago native did however deliver with a solid floor routine.  She debuted a new floor routine as well, with more mature music and dancing that wasn't as "juniorish" as her last floor.  In her routine, she stepped out of bounds on her double double but was super high in the landing.  Her 2^nd pass, a double layout with a full twist, also was very high.  The rest of her passes were also relatively clean.  She won the floor exercise portion of the Secret Classic.

Mckayla Skinner

Mckalya, in my opinion, is the epitome of the gymnast with a high start value but horrid execution. 

On vault, she competed 2 vaults, a Cheng (6.4) and a DTY and got second in the vault competition behind Maroney.

Floor: 13.05 (6.3 Difficulty)

After landing her double double layout, her double Arabian, double double tucked, she fell on her 2.5 twist. She had low landings on both of her double double passes and stepped/landed out of bounds on her double double layout.  Her double Arabian to stag was perfect though.  Like on the beam, Skinner has trouble on her dance elements ESPECIALLY those split leaps.  She doesn’t reach a 180 degree split on her leaps and that could cause a lot of trouble for her, especially on the international stage.  Skinner's problems with her flexibility and inconsistency remind me of Kim Kelly, who even though placed high at Olympic trials was left off the team for her inconsistency and form errors.  Skinner needs to clean up her execution or she'll be left out like Kim Kelly.

That being said I am extremely impressed with her difficult routines.  The highlights of her competition definitely included her double twisting double layout on floor and her Arabian salto combination and a back full combination on beam.  Sam Peszec and Amanda Borden were going on about how she has the difficulty but just needs to clean up her execution and consistency.

Brenna Dowell

The gymternet seems to have taken a liking to this girl.  She placed 9^th last year at Olympic trials so she’s without a doubt a great gymnast but we didn't see her best here.  I think she could have beaten Kyla with a cleaner beam routine.

On vault she debuted a clean well executed amanar and received a well deserved 15.55.  She also gave a good bars routine with impressive connections.  She had a rather wobbly beam and missed a couple of connections but managed to get through the routine.  Like Skinner, she seems to have a bit of trouble hitting her splits which is a big no no on the international stage (just ask Shawn Johnson).  On floor performed an impressive full twisting double layout and perhaps an even more impressive double front in the piked position and another in the tucked position.