“Me: I’m jetlagged.
Simone: I have too much power on my Amanars on the flat ground of the training gym.”
-Jetlag’s got nothing on our queen, though you’d think Scott Bregman would know better than to underestimate her at this point? Tsk.
Worlds news
Teams are changing…faster than the staff at a Family Dollar. Updates are being made in real time to the worlds rosters here (men’s here), including Team Russia (and Paseka in for injured Angelina Simakova).
Speaking of injuries, Breanna Scott withdrew, and so did Iulia Berar, and Krisztian Berki was there, then he wasn’t. Plus, there’s drama with Cuba, so Yesenia Ferrera won’t be there, either.
Teams are showing up. Those who decided to show up for work are training in Stuttgart, where there’s also some live coverage. Follow Olympic Channel and Stuttgart 2019 for updates, and watch on YouTube.
For Team USA, here’s your women’s selection report, from which we learned that the “independent observer” “observed” via speaker phone, so you know the real decisions were made via dry erase. Plus, don’t miss this clip of Simone connecting her vault into a tumbling pass, and check out these gorgeous training leos!
Read this. Here are the first and second parts of Lauren’s series on the countries that have the best shot at an individual Olympics return, and here’s an overview about how Olympic qualifications will work based on the results from last year’s worlds.
The Challenge Cup winners are here. The FIG World Challenge Cup series winners were announced. Teja Belak won both vault and beam, and Rhys McClenaghan won the pommel series plus Employee of the Month. Enjoy your parking spot, Rhys!
Star status
Riley update. Riley McCusker released a statement on Instagram assuring everyone that she’s OK after a photo with her in a leo circulated and a different update made it seem like she was still training despite having rhabdomyolysis. She says she started feeling sick during nationals and has been resting since her diagnosis. Get well soon, Riley!
Retirements. Viktoria Komova has apparently moved on to coaching. Sorry, everyone. Also, recently retired Nathan Tsuji is joining Cirque-us folk.
Upgrades. Sienna Robinson has boarded the Moors train.
Comebacks. Laurie Hernandez will be on the Olympic Channel on October 4th, and the tweet implies she’ll try a front full on beam?
Staying social
Fun in the sun, ya’ll! Team USA went to the beach before shipping off to Germany, and this happened. Speaking of Team USA, USAG released this video about the worlds team, then they got snarky when someone asked why the selection report hadn’t been posted yet.
It’s a no from Rachael. Rachael Denhollander says she wouldn’t put her daughter in gymnastics. Honestly, every time that woman opens her mouth my heart flutters.
About this 2020 qual process. I don’t get it either. Or rather, I read about it, say, “OK, I get it,” and then promptly forget, every time. See also, the difference between a Ling, Healy, and the other one.
A cake worth 15.366. Aliya Mustafina got her coach a special cake for his birthday, featuring none other than herself.
Pope meetup. Some FIG officials met the pope, weird because gymnastics has nothing in common with the Catholic church. I’m sure it was a rager.
McKayla will keep us posted. McKayla Maroney said on Instagram that she’ll speak up soon about what’s been going on with her. I have one message for McKayla, and it’s: ❤️🌈☀️🍫
Last words
👋
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The Gymternet 
The “Pope meet-up” was due to the 150th anniversary of the Italian Gymnastics Federation! The pic with him playing with a ribbon in front of the laughing leader of the Italian rhythmic gymnastics team is very cute 🙂
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we need a whole post on US team and “the report” !
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AGREED! I don’t feel like reading the report, I need Lauren’s spin on things.
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I’m kind of surprised to see Riley still shooting for 2020 after such a scary diagnosis. But hey, make next year a better one. Some of the other comments slightly concern me but we really don’t know how she’s truly doing until we see her
Also, looks like Morgan improved on day 2. I still think it was the right decision to leave her off the team this year but that is a GREAT starting point going into next year!
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Also Aliya and Oleg Verniaev seemed to announce they are in a relationship on Insta.
They told each other happy birthday and Aliya said “they have known each other for years and realized they have the same destiny” and they both posted pics of each other and a bunch of heart emojis.
(Aliya is divorced from her daughter’s dad)
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O.O
I’ll take “biggest gymnastics power couple since Bart and Nadia” for $400, Alex!
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That double double Laurent spotted Simone on was STUPID high. Like, literally never seen something like that before.
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Regarding Riley’s condition, I think this proved she really was overworked as a result of doing three back-to-back meets–NOT because Maggie overtrained her in the lead up to Worlds. I’m not convinced that Maggie is to blame here, she immediately withdrew Riley after a rough routine on Day 2 of Championships and then Riley was diagnosed with Rhabdo. People are ripping Maggie apart and I’m not seeing any evidence to support that she is culpable. Until we see the evidence, I don’t think it’s right to ‘cancel’ Maggie. Cancel culture literally ruins careers. Sometimes its justified, sometimes it’s not. I welcome anyone else’s opinion on this.
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I understand what you’re saying, just, there’s a difference between “cancel culture” and allegations of mental and physical abuse. I agree that it’s a dismal situation, and I wish SafeSport would move faster with their investigations so nobody’s left hanging for months (most of all the victims and athletes).
I personally believe abuse victims when they share their experience, so I believe those allegations against Haney in the past are true. Unfortunately, you’re right that we don’t know what exactly happened with Riley.
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Totally agree – my first thought was that it was the crazy schedule that caused it and this was exactly why everyone was questioning whether she / others should be going to Pan Ams.
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I agree with all of this.
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I’m trying not to make any assumptions until we see Riley next year and I’m more curious as to how this might affect her Olympic preparation.
Otherwise between Nationals and camp she had a good amount of time to recover. Doctors recommend a few weeks to a few months. I do think that Maggie and Riley need to reconsider pacing. Riley was competing full difficulty at Classics when most gymnasts really take it down a notch and work their way up. At the same time, I don’t think poor pacing is necessarily a crime, it just needs refinement. (It also makes sense because with Laurie, Maggie didn’t have time to pace her with the Olympics coming up so soon)
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Did anyone really still think Komova was not retired? I mean… it’s been a year.
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I think a lot of us just didn’t want to believe the obvious.
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