Gabby Douglas Comeback Thread (5/29/24 Withdrawn from Nationals)

[cftmoonlight79]

You cannot swap back and forth from Developmental to Elite in one season.

Good lord my poor level 10s don't need to be competing against the likes of that! Level 10s are amazing enough haha. Plus there is a petition process for those established elites. It's bad enough competing against the ones who don't make it.

 

[MaryClare]

Haha didn’t Chuso compete L10 a couple of times at Texas Prime?

 

[irichluck21]

Maybe you could perform/compete as a guest or exhibition or something?
You cannot switch status though.

 

[RedBirdie]

Some invitationals have an "open" session. Those are the sorts of meets people are suggesting.

 

[ruby]

Exactly.
Lots of elites have done that in the past and it would have served her well IMO.

 

[irichluck21]

Gotcha, sorry I misunderstood the op.

 

[RedBirdie]

Heck, WOGA classic has an elite session, why didn't Gabby compete an event or two there?

 

[Hatsumomo]

I think it's part nerves and a lot mismanagement by the Liukins. They should have gotten Gabby out there doing watered-down routines at some low-stakes competitions or exhibitions to ease her back into competition. If nothing else, they should have sent her to more camps. And then have her come into this season with her full-blown difficulty to wow us all.

But also, I really wouldn't have gone with the coach whose only success story is his own daughter. I get she wanted to stay in Texas (girl, I guess), but that state has so many other options since it was the elite gymnastics mecca for the longest time.

 

[ArnoldRimmer]

That DTY looks fabulous — clearly an improvement in the repulsion phase compared to 2016 and earlier.

Doesn't it? I really hope she gets to do it at Nationals.

 

[Laura722]

I think it's part nerves and a lot mismanagement by the Liukins. They should have gotten Gabby out there doing watered-down routines at some low-stakes competitions or exhibitions to ease her back into competition. If nothing else, they should have sent her to more camps. And then have her come into this season with her full-blown difficulty to wow us all.

But also, I really wouldn't have gone with the coach whose only success story is his own daughter. I get she wanted to stay in Texas (girl, I guess), but that state has so many other options since it was the elite gymnastics mecca for the longest time.

If Gabby wanted to compete, she could have competed. She's an adult.

My initial assumption was that Gabby was waiting until 2024 to compete because she wasn't interested in Worlds and wanted time to prepare to come out looking fantastic. I know she was out of the sport for 6-7 years, but I still have a hard time understanding how she is not in full routine shape in 2024 after starting training around July 2022. Perhaps I'm underestimating the difficulty of getting her skills back or she had to deal with injuries.

 

[QuietColours]

COVID this winter could definitely have been a long term derailment. Even if she was testing negative fairly quickly, recovery can take a long time. It definitely derailed her competition come back plan--not having a chance to get that Winter Cup score affected her opportunities all spring.

And I think a lot of it is mental; a lot changes about us over eight years, and she had a lot she was going to have to confront coming back. It may have manifested differently than she was expecting. But that's speculation I am in no way qualified to make

 

[RedBirdie]

Gabby wasn't prepared to compete bars at Winter Cup. COVID may have impacted her comeback, but her comeback already had issues if she couldn't even do an easier bar routine in February.

 

[Gymnbf]

Different people deal with different traumas in different ways.

Goodness, not everything is a trauma or about trauma, and this sort of speculation on the subject is infantilizing when clearly she’s put in that work to compete in the .01% of her sport.

I work with elite and pro athletes across multiple sports. They are a different breed. Not competing isn’t just about reputation. It’s a business, especially for someone like Gabby. Money, sponsorships, and obligations are on the line. You can tout “mental health” all day long but that’s not the reality of elite sports or the elite mindset. Ever tried to be the best at what you do while thinking about your dead dad or abuse? It doesn’t work. That is what’s dangerous in a sport like gymnastics, and the focus on it is likely screwing a lot of these gymnasts up.

If every gymnast took a break when they had an intrusive thought about hurting themselves on a skill, the sport wouldn’t exist. I can’t imagine the choice to for Gabby to pull out was flippant. And if it was, the consequences likely go beyond not being in Paris. Every athlete should have the right to pull out when they want and feel safe enough to do so within their support circle. But that doesn’t mean it’s the right choice, that aren’t consequences, or that it’s a mental health issue.

Frankly, Simone took a physiological issue and ran to the bank with the mental health narrative the media created. That was marketing, not advocacy.

 

[MaryClare]

Goodness, not everything is a trauma or about trauma, and this sort of speculation on the subject is infantilizing when clearly she’s put in that work to compete in the .01% of her sport.

I work with elite and pro athletes across multiple sports. They are a different breed. Not competing isn’t just about reputation. It’s a business, especially for someone like Gabby. Money, sponsorships, and obligations are on the line. You can tout “mental health” all day long but that’s not the reality of elite sports or the elite mindset. Ever tried to be the best at what you do while thinking about your dead dad or abuse? It doesn’t work. That is what’s dangerous in a sport like gymnastics, and the focus on it is likely screwing a lot of these gymnasts up.

If every gymnast took a break when they had an intrusive thought about hurting themselves on a skill, the sport wouldn’t exist. I can’t imagine the choice to for Gabby to pull out was flippant. And if it was, the consequences likely go beyond not being in Paris. Every athlete should have the right to pull out when they want and feel safe enough to do so within their support circle. But that doesn’t mean it’s the right choice, that aren’t consequences, or that it’s a mental health issue.

Frankly, Simone took a physiological issue and ran to the bank with the mental health narrative the media created. That was marketing, not advocacy.

I couldn’t agree more. I hate the hyper focus on mental health at the moment. It actually damages mental health advocacy.

Good for Simone for making the most out of a bad situation. I think sometimes, and especially in gymnastics, we are not used to the idea that these are adults doing a job

 

[JaJa]

I couldn’t agree more. I hate the hyper focus on mental health at the moment. It actually damages mental health advocacy.

Good for Simone for making the most out of a bad situation. I think sometimes, and especially in gymnastics, we are not used to the idea that these are adults doing a job

I hate the hyper focus on mental health as well. But I am in no way convinced that Simone latched onto it as a "marketing strategy" of some sort. She was clearly bewildered by getting the Twisties at the Olympics and the media just jumped to the "mental health" branding and I think she just went along with it not really understanding what had happened. I mean no one really knows what causes the Twisties -- and it could have multiple or various causes depending on the individual --

But this labeling of everything as "trauma" and a "mental health issue" is just ridiulous

Things happen to everyone in life. Elite athletes compete in the face of all sorts of things -- deaths and other tragedies in their families, their own illness etc etc . Its just part of competing. Assuming that poor athletic performance at any given time is trauma related is ridiculous.

 

[Laura722]

IIRC, the initial release on her withdrawal cited her mental health. Then everyone ran on that before further clarification.

I do think Gabby could benefit from working with a sports psychologist if she isn't already seeing one.

 

[QuietColours]

IIRC, the initial release on her withdrawal cited her mental health. Then everyone ran on that before further clarification.

I do think Gabby could benefit from working with a sports psychologist if she isn't already seeing one.

In the Gymcastic interview with Steve Butcher, he said the specific reason they submitted for her withdrawal was anxiety. Everyone recognized the twisties, but the withdrawal they needed had to be a recognized medical reason, and that isn't one. His logic was that anxiety, which can be medicated, is a medical condition and that a gymnast who didn't know where they were in the air would have anxiety. It was a bit round-about, but it was accepted. Once that was given as the official reason for withdrawal, they kind of had to go with it. It would probably be beneficially if twisties (or some better medical term) got added to the reasons for legitimate medical withdrawal from gymnastics competitions.

Simone's also talked in her most recent interview on Call Me Daddy about how the pressure and dealing with the fallout of things like her abuse were culminating mentally during Tokyo, made worse by the isolation of that Olympics. There definitely was a mental health component involved in the onset of that particular instance of the twisties.

 

[JaJa]

There definitely was a mental health component involved in the onset of that particular instance of the twisties.

You do not know that. Correlation and causation are NOT the same thing. Both things could have been happeneing at the same time but independently

 

[Laura722]

Well, Simone did an Amanar about 15 minutes before they walked out. That kind of does suggest some anxiety.

Tom Forster talks about Simone in this podcast starting at about 1:47:30:

 

[navyblue]

In the Gymcastic interview with Steve Butcher, he said the specific reason they submitted for her withdrawal was anxiety. Everyone recognized the twisties, but the withdrawal they needed had to be a recognized medical reason, and that isn't one.

I remember this episode, but I can longer remember the rationale. Why did Simone need a 'medical' reason at all? They were already too late to bring in an alternate... Was it also too late to update the lineup otherwise and so Team USA would have to take 0s on Simone's scratched events instead of swapping in Jordan Chiles?