Gabby Douglas Comeback Thread (New goal: LA 2028)

[Denn]

I'll be shocked (happily so) if she does a Cheng. She got her vaults around in 2012 on pure raw talent. But she always had issues with her yurchenko by being off to the side and pre-twisting. It resulted in what could have been a terrifying vault at Pacific Rim in 2012 (really, absolute miracle she nearly landed this)
[..]
In 2015, she still had the same issues of being off to the side and pretwisting. And she never got than Amanar back for competition.

Hm... I actually think this plays into her tendency to pretwist, sort of repurposing it. Now, she actually wants that pre-flight twist. I still share your worry in general about the technique and block, though.

My guess is that she will undertwist the preflight, like many gymnasts who do Chengs do.

 

[irichluck21]

If I were her, I would do the DTY first at Classic, then the Cheng.
Do not want to fall on the first, counting vault toward the AA score she needs to qualify to Nationals.

 

[MaryClare]

I'll be shocked (happily so) if she does a Cheng. She got her vaults around in 2012 on pure raw talent. But she always had issues with her yurchenko by being off to the side and pre-twisting. It resulted in what could have been a terrifying vault at Pacific Rim in 2012 (really, absolute miracle she nearly landed this)



In 2015, she still had the same issues of being off to the side and pretwisting. And she never got than Amanar back for competition.



Now throw in that she's training with Valeri Liukin, who isn't exactly known for this ability to coach vault. She's so talented I don't doubt she can get a DTY back. But a Cheng? Guess we'll see.

Although if a Gabby Cheng makes Roberson redundant, bring it on.

Valeri is a very good technical coach. He just can’t coach vault development. But Gabby doesn’t need that

 

[Doug1233]

If she can do an Ellie Downie style Cheng, her chances of making the Olympic Team have tripled.

A TF bar routine, a safe Cheng, and a passable AA set, would put her on my team.

 

[makam]

If she can do an Ellie Downie style Cheng, her chances of making the Olympic Team have tripled.

A TF bar routine, a safe Cheng, and a passable AA set, would put her on my team.

It would spice things up! Biles, Jones, Douglas, Dicello (?), and...?

I wonder if Simone has the YDP stickable with the extra months of training?

 

[ucrgirl]

If she can do an Ellie Downie style Cheng, her chances of making the Olympic Team have tripled.

A TF bar routine, a safe Cheng, and a passable AA set, would put her on my team.

without crunching the numbers . . . if Suni isn't healthy, I would guess that you take Gabby with "just" a TF bar routine and a passable AA set. A peak Gabby bar routine might add enough over Simone that she would add more to the team than Jocelyn's Cheng (assuming she still has a Cheng).

 

[Denn]

It would spice things up! Biles, Jones, Douglas, Dicello (?), and...?

I wonder if Simone has the YDP stickable with the extra months of training?

I like how you are trying to manifest Kayla D to that team. LOL

Biles' vault: I suspect she has been sticking it every now and then since 2021. She had a couple landings already that were pretty good.

She doesn't really need to stick it to get an insurmountable score, but it sure would be fun to see if any judges throw a 10 for a landing that's as upright as some of them have been! The technique, height, and form are pretty much deduction free otherwise, right?

 

[KristyJ]

I like how you are trying to manifest Kayla D to that team. LOL

Biles' vault: I suspect she has been sticking it every now and then since 2021. She had a couple landings already that were pretty good.

She doesn't really need to stick it to get an insurmountable score, but it sure would be fun to see if any judges throw a 10 for a landing that's as upright as some of them have been! The technique, height, and form are pretty much deduction free otherwise, right?

If you want to be the type of stingy that the judges were when they refused to give McKayla Maroney a 10 in 2012, Simone tends to have a .1 knee flexion and a .1 foot flexion in the vault. I'm honestly not sure I'd want to take them, but they probably would.

 

[Denn]

If you want to be the type of stingy that the judges were when they refused to give McKayla Maroney a 10 in 2012, Simone tends to have a .1 knee flexion and a .1 foot flexion in the vault. I'm honestly not sure I'd want to take them, but they probably would.

Well, I don't want to be. But you're right that the panel might do it. Sigh. Okay, so 9.8 for a stick.

Which is consistent with scores she already has gotten, I think.

 

[Aeris]

A peak Gabby bar routine might add enough over Simone that she would add more to the team than Jocelyn's Cheng (assuming she still has a Cheng).

Sadly I don't think we are going to see one of the best routines Gabby could do for this code:

Healy + "the Douglas-Lee" (full twisting "layout jaeger")
Downie + Pak + Shaposh 1/2
Inbar 1/2 + Ling + Double Front 1/2

A very efficient 7.2 D-score. Instead it looks like she'll do a 6.4, using just a measly regular jaeger and not taking advantage of the .2 connection bonuses she could be getting with her pirouettes.

That said, with how clean her pirouettes can be, I really think she should be capable of getting 9's on execution with a 6.4 routine. Probably the judges will fabricate a few deductions and not let her go past like 8.8 E at most, but even that should still make her a lock, considering the field.

 

[crdubb17]

Sadly I don't think we are going to see one of the best routines Gabby could do for this code:

Healy + "the Douglas-Lee" (full twisting "layout jaeger")
Downie + Pak + Shaposh 1/2
Inbar 1/2 + Ling + Double Front 1/2

A very efficient 7.2 D-score. Instead it looks like she'll do a 6.4, using just a measly regular jaeger and not taking advantage of the .2 connection bonuses she could be getting with her pirouettes.

That said, with how clean her pirouettes can be, I really think she should be capable of getting 9's on execution with a 6.4 routine. Probably the judges will fabricate a few deductions and not let her go past like 8.8 E at most, but even that should still make her a lock, considering the field.

Has she shown all of these skills or are you creating a fantasy routine?

 

[KristyJ]

I guess every gymnast in existence just has a "measly" routine compared to that.......

 

[RedBirdie]

Healy + "the Douglas-Lee" (full twisting "layout jaeger")
Downie + Pak + Shaposh 1/2
Inbar 1/2 + Ling + Double Front 1/2

She's never competed a number of these skills. I'm not saying she can't learn news skills, but this is a lot of new stuff that feel like it doesn't have basis in reality--although there are admittedly very few videos of her training. Maybe she's throwing all this stuff in the gym.

I'll be very curious as to what she competes on Saturday, that's for sure.

 

[JaJa]

She's never competed a number of these skills. I'm not saying she can't learn news skills, but this is a lot of new stuff that feel like it doesn't have basis in reality--although there are admittedly very few videos of her training. Maybe she's throwing all this stuff in the gym.

I'll be very curious as to what she competes on Saturday, that's for sure.

We all will. And it will put an end to (at least some of) the speculation on all sides about Gabby's chances for Paris. Lets see what happens.

 

[MaryClare]

She's never competed a number of these skills. I'm not saying she can't learn news skills, but this is a lot of new stuff that feel like it doesn't have basis in reality--although there are admittedly very few videos of her training. Maybe she's throwing all this stuff in the gym.

Would you relocate to the other end of the country to train with Valeri if you didn’t want to develop your existing skills on bars?

 

[tempest]

I’m still not believing anything until I see something this weekend

 

[Passion]

Would you relocate to the other end of the country to train with Valeri if you didn’t want to develop your existing skills on bars?

I believe she was already living in Texas before she started doing gymnastics again. She bought her ranch there in early 2021.

 

[Aeris]

Has she shown all of these skills?

The upgraded jaeger (if it can even be called that, since a pre-twisted jaeger 1/1 becomes more of a gienger) and dismount are the only things she hasn't shown yet, but they are things she should be capable of, if a good coach had been prioritizing it since her return to training. When looking at her overall skillset and quality, there's not many things that should be out of reach for Gabby on UB. This was always going to be the event where she had the best chances to make her case for the team and win an individual medal.

I'm happy she's at least brought back the chinese pirouettes (and the Downie was predictably easy for her to get too) but her full potential is still yet to be unlocked.

 

[dweiss324]

Calling something the "Douglas-Lee" when the latter has performed it and the former has not, and then acting disappointed that Gabby hasn't performed that routine is wild

 

[Aeris]

It would be called the Douglas-Lee if they both went to Paris with it. Unlikely to happen now, hence the quotes used, but it's something that was a realistic possibility. Many gymnasts could be doing that skill with sketchy technique, it's a loophole that hasn't been addressed. I'm guessing MAG will broach the issue first, since the skill is becoming ultra lucrative in the next code and should lead to a large uptick in the number of people trying it there (this should already be the case in WAG, with the H rating and .2 connection bonus from E pirouettes). I'm not disappointed in Gabby at all, the fault is with the coach for not realizing how to game the code better and maximize her potential.