Word: all-around
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Somewhere in the Olympic Village as the partying picks up pace, it is not hard to imagine a 14-year-old girl crying. Her name is Roza Galieva. She is the gymnast from the gold-winning Unified Team who successfully fought her way to the coveted all-around competition, only to be robbed of her chance. Her coaches, in their unified wisdom, decided that one of Galieva's teammates, Tatiana Gutsu, was more likely to bank gold even though she had flubbed during the earlier team competition. So they exaggerated a knee injury to bench Galieva, made a quick substitution...
...that, in a nutshell, may explain the curious lack of joy last Thursday evening in the Palau Sant Jordi. The women's all-around should have been an energizing high for rapt spectators. The field of competitors was so deep with talent that on any given day, the gold medal could have hung deservedly on any one of eight necks from four countries. There was enough grace to satisfy balletomanes and enough difficulty to suggest that the laws of gravity ought to be rewritten. Yet there was little of the heartwarming drama that in Olympics past enabled audiences to lose...
...night of the men's all-around, members of the Unified Team were again the ones to watch, but now they were rivals, even competing under different flags. Save for the challenge of Germany's Andreas Wecker, there was little doubt that the ex-Soviets would sweep the medals. The only question was, In what order? The suspense continued right to the end of the last event, when Scherbo of Belarus took the top mark on the rings, a 9.9, which secured him the gold. Ukraine's Grigory Misutin, 21, took silver, while the bronze went to Valeri Belenky...
...Americans, a sixth-place team finish was followed by no higher than a 19th-place finish in the all-around. None of this came as much of a surprise, despite optimistic precompetition talk of a bronze medal. Most of the top U.S. male gymnasts are college students who abide by NCAA guidelines that restrict their training to 20 hours a week, roughly half the practice time of their main challengers. The American women, by contrast, are mostly still in high school and train in private gyms where no restrictions apply. Their discipline and dedication earned them a team bronze...
...women's gymnastics, favored Kim Zmeskal slipped on the balance beam in the team competition (but recouped to help the U.S. to a bronze medal), then bounced out of bounds -- and contention -- in floor exercises in the women's all-around. Shannon Miller stepped gracefully into the breach and took silver. Americans Mike Stulce and James Doehring won unexpected gold and silver in the shot put. And though America's women swimmers were surprised by the Chinese, who seemed to be picking up where the East Germans left off, the U.S. generally did well in the water. In 1988 American...