“Tag yourself: I’m the lady who’s not helping.” -Spencer relates to the woman walking alongside Georgia’s new beam, which for some reason takes seven people to lift. I’m the guy at the end who’s pretending to help but is actually not bearing any weight.
NCAA corner
Ready, set, geaux:
Friday meets. Alabama beat Georgia (196.900 to 196.875), and Florida beat LSU (197.500 to 197.425) with the help of Alyssa Baumann, who’s back, baby.
Saturday meets. Oklahoma beat everybody with a 197 flat, a bit low for them since they’re resting professional role model Maggie Nichols, who has a sore heel. Utah dominated against Oregon State, with MyKayla Skinner doing what she does best and getting a 39.625 AA. As usual, everyone is confused by crazy scoring, even the gymnasts.
Monday meets. Georgia beat Iowa State. But they couldn’t do it without breaking some of the equipment, with Sabrina Vega gorgeously taking down the beam. Presumably they’ll just take it out of her paycheck oh wait 🙊.
UCLA beat Arizona State 197.775 to 196.125 with a fancy new Intro, a 10 from Madison Kocian, and a confusingly scored 9.95 from Ohashi, who clearly went out of bounds.
Speaking of Bruins. Ohashi’s been on a media tour, appearing on Good Morning America to talk about body shaming, and connecting with a Dancing with the Stars producer on Ryan Seacrest’s radio show that apparently exists. She also got shoutouts from Janet Jackson and the one and only Stephen Colbert, whom I love dearly so don’t even THINK about it.
P.S. Here’s Part two of our Elites in NCAA series, and a preview of the must-watch gymnasts from NCGA East.
Elite comp news
Stuttgart roster released. The FIG released the “mouthwatering”(?) list of gymnasts competing at the Stuttgart World Cup in mid-March, including Simone Biles and Aliya Mustafina. I mean, that’s great and all, but “mouthwatering”? They’re not tuna melts.
Camp is coming up. Thirty-three lucky ladies will meet at EVO from January 24-27 for the first national team training camp of 2019 and the chance to represent this great nation of bigots.
Programming note. Your official Gymnastics Canada coverage will now be brought to you by Flo.
Wut else happened
Engler’s out. Michigan State University’s interim president John Engler resigned Wednesday after MSU’s board decided to meet to fire him or demand his resignation in response to his comments about survivors (Teal shit: 1, Engler: 0).
The new interim president is Satish Udpa, who was named on Thursday. Survivors like Kaylee Lorincz are on board with the new prez. Meanwhile, Michigan’s Attorney General wants investigators to interview Engler ASAP.
USAG’s new dev guy. Dan Baker is the new USA Gymnastics development coordinator, replacing Mary Lee Tracy, though this wasn’t officially announced until after Gymcastic reported on it. Also, Jennifer Sey has something to say about it, and USAG released other developments.
- Senator Cory Gardner introduced legislation that would create a panel to evaluate the U.S. Olympic Committee and propose changes on Tuesday.
- Rhonda Faehn will be paid $15,000 for the four days she worked at the University of Michigan.
- New USOC CEO Sarah Hirshland spoke with reporters for the first time since her appointment, discussing, in part, funding for SafeSport and the volume of cases.
- McKayla Maroney’s father passed away, she announced on Twitter on Tuesday. According to E News, he was only 59. Sending love to McKayla and her family❤.
Required reading
- Why we victim blame—and why Larry Nassar shows we shouldn’t (ESPN)
- The USOC should be abolished, not reformed (Deadspin; also see: this)
- With John Engler out at Michigan State, Nassar survivors can finally start healing (ThinkProgress)
- One year later: The hearing that forced the world to listen to Larry Nassar’s survivors (HuffPost, series)
- The Ohashi news cycle
- Why isn’t all gymnastics this fun? (Slate)
- UCLA’s Katelyn Ohashi rediscovers her joy of gymnastics and becomes an internet sensation (Los Angeles Times)
- A brief history of viral gymnastics routines (Deadspin)
- Aly Raisman: Don’t judge a victim by her clothing (Cosmopolitan)
Star status
Upgrades. Jordan Bowers showed off some new tricks, and Becky Downie has a new mystery skill.
Comebacks. Laurie Hernandez talked us through her path to Tokyo, and Vanessa Ferrari will come back at the Melbourne World Cup.
Staying social
Congratulations, Aly. Aly Raisman has come to the light side and is a vegetarian now, and her dog is so amazing.
Which UCLA floor routine are you? Buzzfeed is saving the world, one quiz at a time (I’m Kyla Ross 💁♀️).
Blind gymnastics. Maria Paseka decided to Bird Box while tumbling, which doesn’t seem like such a good idea, but I guess is good practice for when our world inevitably plunges into complete darkness.
Gymnasts vs. UFC fighters. Poised and beautiful Peng Peng Lee hosted this challenge wherein a UFC fighter tries to do a gymnastics workout or something, idk I couldn’t stop looking at poised and beautiful Peng Peng.
Because you asked…
…again and again, Lauren answered, again and again. Also, here are the new seniors who will be game changers (or not) for their teams this year.
Last words
Since all of your friends have messaged you asking if you’ve heard of this kid Kathryn Ohushki and if she’s going to the Olympics, tell us one gymnastics thing that should’ve gone viral but didn’t.
Want to help out and qualify for super fun rewards for as little as $1/month? Check us out on Patreon!
The Gymternet 
“Camp is coming up. Thirty-three lucky ladies will meet at EVO from January 24-27 for the first national team training camp of 2019 and the chance to represent this great nation of bigots”
Well I guess I won’t be coming to your blog anymore. Shame thought there was a place to come and enjoy the best sport in the world without leftist haters showing their hate.
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Yes, I can totally understand how your problem is the “leftist haters” not liking bigots, and not with the bigots themselves. 💁🏻♀️ This blog doesn’t bring politics into our coverage, and I am probably the ONLY fair and balanced gymnastics blogger out there in terms of not letting an athlete’s politics color my opinion of them as an athlete even if I vehemently disagree. I don’t care what your politics are or what an athlete’s politics are, and I believe in healthy, respectful discourse between people of differing views to help me better understand why someone might not think the same way as I do.
HOWEVER, I and all of my writers (some of whom are Republican or do not otherwise share my politics) ARE anti-hate, and we’re not going to shy away from standing up for what’s right. Racist, woman-hating teenage boys who wear blackface at basketball games to taunt black players and who disrespect an indigenous war veteran’s culture at a peaceful protest in addition to also chasing girls at a women’s march telling them “it’s not rape if they love it” should go beyond anyone’s political views. So yeah, if you don’t like that we don’t support bigoted teenage boys and a country where the majority of people defend them instead of the people they attack, and if it offends you so deeply that we dared to joke about our country’s bigotry in our snarky weekly news update, which is just one of over a dozen posts we put up in a week none of which have anything to do with anything but gymnastics, then by all means, don’t follow us. Frankly, I don’t want bigots or the people who defend them as my followers, so we’re on the same page.
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GET IT LAUREN!!!!!! ::standing ovation::
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::round of applause::
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Go Lauren go!
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I’d like this but I’m not a member of whatever you need to be a member of, but I like it.
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Hahahaha thank you!
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I don’t care about anyone’s politics here (and I mean that, I totally don’t care. I’m here because I love gymnastics). But I do take issue with defining someone who disagrees with you as a “hater” and a “bigot”. Regardless of someone’s views, I do not hate them if they disagree with me.
And yes, some of your examples are horrible displays of ass-hatery, and worse. By all means, please speak out against that garbage!
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I’m not calling the person who commented a hater or a bigot…I didn’t call anyone a hater (the person who commented called the person who wrote this article one), and only referred to the racist teenage boys as bigots because they are (and anyone who defends that behavior is defending bigotry, though they may not be a bigot themselves).
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I was just thinking that I was getting a little tired of Jessica and Spencer for talking so much politics during a gymnastics show, but I guess it is here now too. I’m a liberal but don’t really get why we are talking about bigotry on a gymnastics blog? The whole Catholic school boys incident is ridiculous. The other two groups were egging them on and adults started this with literal children. Yes, I’m sure that I disagree with the majority of those boys on every political subject imaginable, but honestly I’m not sure what else they should have done. We need to get over our visceral first exactions to situations like this and look st the facts. I as disgusted at first, but the entire situation wasn’tknown and certainly took a few days to come out.
Plus, how do you know they are bigots? Sure, maybe some are but once you start conversations like that, that is how conversations are shut down. It’s like talking about microaggressions, getting woke and all of that shit.
If the left keeps going the way it is, we are going to end up with another four years of Trump.
Still don’t get how this elated to gymnastics though…
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As a clarification, I don’t think there was any blackface to taunt black players. That’s just a story the media took and ran off on its own.
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Supposedly the school’s basketball fans did a blackout (black clothes and black bodypaint), and also a whiteout (white clothes and white bodypaint) and blueout (blue clothes and blue bodypaint.)
IF that is true, somebody should have thought it through and axed the black paint as a VERY BAD idea, but the intention might not have been as awful as it looks in the photo.
The students and faculty at this school seem to be 100% white. If they hired some black or other POC teachers that might help bring some much needed perspective to the school.
Also, schools that discriminate on the basis of race are supposed to lose their non-profit status and any government support, I hope someone will explore that angle in this case.
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Just for another reference, school is not 100% white. It has been noted that some of the African American kids at the Catholic school were called the n word at the beginning of the video.
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What I really am left wondering is just why do we know this? Why do we know various facts about the racial makeup of a random Catholic school in Kentucky? Why do we know about their blackout game? Why, perchance, do I know that the game was over five years ago?
Why are we talking about a situation which resulted in no violence on a gymnastics blog when the situation in question has nothing to do with gymnastics? Or just still talking about it in general?
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Buh-bye
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Yeah I definitely agree things escalate quite quickly. Although I’d say everyone on both sides of the political spectrum have shown bigotry lately
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……..no.
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Bigot-a person who is intolerant toward those holding different opinions.
Going by this definition, there’s definitely bigotry on both sides on issues of sexuality, religion, dietary habits, etc.
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Not sure the intolerance of bigotry constitutes as bigotry
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^^^^^ THAT
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Work Lauren. *snap* *snap*
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Ohashi also appeared in a brazilian sports tv show. It’s not that long, but they talked about her career and about the perfect 10. They also invited her to come to Brazil to perform and to meet Daiane dos Santos lol
Here’s the link: https://globoesporte.globo.com/ginastica-artistica/noticia/ao-som-de-michael-jackson-ginasta-empolga-e-ganha-convite-de-daiane-dos-santos-venha-para-o-brasil.ghtml
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I got Nia Nation! (Actually says it like that)
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Me too!!!
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Holy wack-a-moley! Was so relieved to get to Joana’s comment. I think i 4got 2 breathe while reading.
And now….back to gymnastics. Lol
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“I just want to focus on the gymnastics, dammit. Stop talking about politics!” – person who chose to post a comment entirely about one potentially political word tossed into a 1,000 word article about gymnastics news that was one of eleven articles entirely about gymnastics posted this week.
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I always thought Nina Magee should’ve gone viral. Also Ashley Lambert of Nebraska. Even if just for her “I’m so good even I can’t take it, so I’m just going drop right here” ending. https://twitter.com/Gymtertainment/status/853122979693076480
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Though not everyone likes it, I think Axelle Klinckaert with her Harry Potter routine should go viral. It’s the elite routine I always look forward to.
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