Warning about US WAG program.

[OnoNoKomachi]

No, it isn't that they are falling apart. They are less good than they were, that's all.

It's that people have short memories. Because they aren't pulverizing the other teams like they have in the past, there could be a slide back into some of the habits of the Karolyi Era, because maybe it wasn't actually wasn't so bad and they were winning.

Exhibit A - I got this from a College Gym FB Group. It's supposedly from the Skating Lesson. I did not write this


"The pendulum has swung. Cancel culture has had its impact on gymnastics. And this time, the casualty is the athletes.
USA Gymnastics is famous, infamous and notorious. It also carried itself out of the gymnastics wilderness multiple times to become unbelievably successful. And now they are back in the wilderness - just as they were starting to climb out.
The 2025 World Gymnastics Team for the USA is very talented. It is why they were chosen over the inexperienced newcomers. And if you look at the results, you could blame the leadership, you could chalk it up to a bad day, or you could look at the very loud, hypocritical online culture that has helped, hurt, skewed and paralyzed coaches and the athletes they are failing.
Half of Team USA are Florida Gators. Both of Florida’s top coaches accompanied the team to Indonesia. And yet, Team USA failed. Just as Florida has failed to win an NCAA Gymnastics Championship ever since Rhonda Faehn left despite having the most talented roster of the last decade.
When is a coach pushing? When is a coach guiding? When is a coach being abusive? These are all questions that gymnastics has attempted to answer over the last decade. We know that Martha Karolyi was abusive on an unprecedented level. We can always quietly acknowledge that she was strategic, cunning, intuitive and a visionary.
MyKayla Skinner was canceled by Simone Biles for saying something that was partially true - she also lacked self awareness, appeared bitter, and was tremendously inarticulate.
What MyKayla Skinner started saying about the national team camps has been discussed by countless coaches if you talk to anyone involved in gymnastics at the elite or collegiate level.
During the Martha Karolyi era, the pressure to perform at camp was paramount. If you watched the recent USA Gymnastics Pre-Worlds Puff Piece, the camps are unrecognizable. And before you attempt to say that I am arguing for a return to starvation and abuse, I’m not. I’m advocating for a return to the middle.
When USA Gymnastics got rid of Valeri Liukin and the Karolyi Ranch, they also got rid of many of the standards that were key to the success of the program. When was the last time you saw a video of the national team doing the famous national team warm up with the running and conditioning? When was the last time you saw the gymnast competing in physical abilities testing? If you talk to those close to the game, they will say that Simone Biles didn’t want to run as her body got older, so no one had to.
But Simone Biles was raised under the standards of Martha Karolyi and Valeri Liukin. She is also experienced and unbelievably talented. Most members of Team USA at Worlds were guided by Valeri and that system.
In private, people argue that Valeri is far better as a teacher than as a personal coach. Like the Karolyis, he certainly can be a visionary - and he can also injure athletes. And while some would argue about his routine construction on uneven bars or his vault technique, he is credited for guiding coaches to be better at their craft.
If you watch videos of podium training, Chellsie Memmel is kind and supportive. She knows the code and is compassionate. But there doesn’t appear to be any incentive to perform well or consequences for performing poorly. As Martha Karolyi always said, you compete as well as how you prepare. If you watched videos of podium training or the selection camp, the team did just that.
A few things stood out from the video that USAG and NBC Sports produced on the selection camp. There was a tremendous amount of editing. The vault did not have a hard surface to practice meet landings. And they went with gymnasts who could score well; they did not go with gymnasts who displayed consistency.
Skye Blakely is a wonderful talent. I rooted for her to make this team and hoped she could even do all four events. She has the potential to be world class. She is also returning from an Achilles injury and is not on the Courtney Kupets recovery timeline. She bombed day 1 of the selection camp and hit on day 2. This is relatively consistent with how she performed at Nationals. In selecting Skye, the national team essentially announced to the national team that you have to show you CAN hit your routines, but not that you WILL hit your routines.
If you have ever watched the documentary ‘Gymnast’ about Great Britain’s selection process in 2008, they selected athletes who could sometimes hit, not gymnasts who would hit. And the results followed.
Joscelyn Roberson I had had a rough trip to the World Championships. She appears to have reinjured her ankles and her back (expected given her excessive lordosis which is responsible for the line and lack of flexibility she is criticized for).
Who is USA Gymnastics even developing? Classics and Nationals had incredibly weak showings. And the depth is not encouraging if you count out potential comebacks from Olympians or NCAA athletes. If the team is going to succeed in the future, they need to rely on comebacks from Jordan Chiles, Jade Carey, Konnor McClain and girls who find their footing in college.
How can a national team culture even be successful when the girls who are relevant in March are never relevant in the summer? That isn’t just because collegiate athletes are staying around longer. It’s also a result of the ineffective culture of the current women’s elite program. And this isn’t new – this is something that Simone Biles and her teammates were masking over the last four years.
No one is advocating for abuse. But there needs to be standards and expectations. Otherwise, this performance is something that everyone should grow accustomed to. And it wasn’t even a strong field."

 

[Sanzhirovka]

This is simply another person, likely not a coach, conflating abuse and expertise.

The problem stems from coaches with very high expertise but who also employ some sort of abuse to force their gymnasts to follow thier expert advice (which is a lack of expertise in psychology, really).

In the beginning of the Soviet/Eastern European influx of coaches to the West, these coches regularly outperformed other coaches, whether they were abusive or not. That is, their gymnasts got the best results.

Unfortunately, many, many stakeholders including other "local" coaches, looked at these results, and having almost zero clue about the expertise involved in getting those results, drew the conclusion that abuse - being abrasive, threatening, etc - was the key difference.

It wasn't.

But no-one noticed the Eastern European coaches who were not abusive and also got results, because years of propaganda made it just "common sense" that anyone from Eastern Europe was at least a little abusive - they were Communists after all!

In fact, these Eastern European coaches simply on average had far better expertise than Western coaches. (I'm talking both generally and about the 1990s. Now there are many great Western coaches with expertise just as high.)

Furthermore, the culture for abuse already existed in the West. You see it all over even pop culture. Just think of the imo( hideous) song Believer - this is what it is preaching:

....Seeing the beauty through the...
Pain!
You made me a, you made me a believer, believer
Pain!
You break me down and build me up, believer, believer
Pain!
Oh, let the bullets fly, oh, let them rain
My life, my love, my drive, it came from...
Pain!

No pain? Then no life, no love, no drive!

So, there is an underlying culture in no way exclusive to gymnastics or even sport, that is telling people pain is the true path to success. Compete with a frcture! Put up with your abusive coach! That is the price! But pain (psysical or mental) is not the same as sacrifice and discipline.

Sacrifice and discipline under the guidance of an expert coach get results. And there are plenty of examples of humane coaches who do not employ abuse and get very good results internationally.

The author of the above opinion is wrong to say:

(USA's poor showing in Jakarta) is a result of the ineffective culture of the current women’s elite program.

Because the term "ineffective culture" really means nothing at all.

And they immedaitely follow that by saying:

No one is advocating for abuse. But ...

But what? Why the need to put up that defence right away? Very telling. Is the author trying to say they don't advocate abuse, but that what a lot of people claim is abuse actually isn't? What is going on here?

Together with the "but" the author says:

No one is advocating for abuse. But there needs to be standards and expectations.

And so we have come to the conflation: on the one hand "no to abuse" and on the other hand "but standards and expectations!" when in fact what is lost in the author's argument is that standards and expectations are simply better expertise. And that is the point the author should have been trying to make.

 

[Aeris]

Is the author trying to say they don't advocate abuse, but that what a lot of people claim is abuse actually isn't?

I'm pretty sure they're saying that people need to be pushed hard, and it's both possible and helpful to have stern taskmasters and intensely serious training environments, without abuse. Culture has shifted to a point where kids can complain about a teacher raising their voice and enough people will automatically consider it to be abuse, or at least inappropriate behavior. That's a problem.

The issue is not just the expertise of a coach. Someone can have all the knowledge in the world, but that doesn't mean they are motivating a student/group to be their best. If there isn't an environment of demanding absolute excellence, no fear of being reprimanded or not making the cut if you don't try your very best, then most of the time you will indeed not be your very best.

You mentioned the culture previously being that pain is the path to success. While we don't want people ignoring injuries, the fact of the matter is this: being a top level competitor means your body is going to be in pain almost every day. You need to have the tenacity to live with those constant aches, because for you it's worth the goal. People need to learn to push through high degrees of personal discomfort in order to achieve maximum growth. It's tricky to find the best balance.

 

[Rich]

Maybe they should have coaches who travel from gym to gym who are great at one or two event to help elevate it in the us. Like a specialist who can teach bars and inbars to every gym, just basic technique. Then at camp they can award the winners of the technique being taught.

 

[flylioness]

I am not entirely sure where I stand on this but I think the right approach differs from person to person. I agree that tremendous discipline and some sacrifice is required to reach the highest levels anywhere, and that there need to be high expectations to foster success. I also agree that, in general (not talking gymnastics here), the culture of seeing abuse in every stern word has probably gone too far.
However, I disagree that a culture of high expectations and performance needs to come from fear of being reprimanded. And worry about not making the cut is inherent in trying out for a worlds team!

Most high-level athletes (in fact, anyone reaching a high level in anything) are intensely driven and self-critical and that needs to be managed positively, rather than taken advantage of by instilling fear.

I was a low-level gymnast growing up (in the 80s when belittling and calling little girls fat was the norm, but I was never at a level where results would have mattered) but am now an academic at a research-intensive university. Increasingly, the culture here has become one where the university administration think that the more pressure they pile on, the better we perform. For someone with my psychological make-up, threats of losing my job if my next grant application is unsuccessful (no tenure in the country where I live, even as a full professor I can be made redundant at any point), is not conducive to me writing better grant proposals. I do the best I can anyway, and the best is going to be better without threats.

I imagine that at least many high-level gymnasts work in the same way. Yes, they are humans and humans tend to sometimes slack off, but then a gentle reminder of what they are working for and what risks slacking off entails (not making a team) is likely to work better than a telling off and the threat of not making a team. "It is extremely competitive out there and you need to know how much you're willing to invest into being successful - I think for the consistency needed to perform well, we need more repetitions" is a far cry from "You're a slacker and will be cut if you don't work harder". (Note that tone plays a role here, you can say my sentence in a judgmental way, which implies that choosing to do fewer reps makes the gymnast a slacker, or in a non-judgemental way, which respects that either decision is valid, they might just lead to different outcomes.)

When I talk to early career researchers I mentor, I always make it clear that a research career requires enormous commitment and tenacity, but also that not wanting to make that commitment is a perfectly valid choice. It is just that a choice needs to be made consciously rather than kidding oneself that one can coast and be successful.

It sounds from what I read that Aimee Boorman used a similar approach with Simone and it paid off. She pointed out what the consequences of not doing things would be, but left the choice to Simone and passed no judgment on her based on whichever choice she would make.

To me, fear should never be involved in striving to do your best.

 

[makam]

From the essay: Chellsie Memmel is kind and supportive. She knows the code and is compassionate. But there doesn’t appear to be any incentive to perform well or consequences for performing poorly.

Of course there is. These women don't spend 40+ hours a week in the gym and recovering from being in the gym to not fight for a medal. Do we think they just go home and say "oh well, maybe next world championships will be luckier"? Incentive: get a medal, a world recognized achievement commemorating all the hard work of the last 1-18 years. Consequence: not medal, face abuse from supposed fans, potentially never have another chance.

Screaming at people doesn't force them to stay on the beam or not break their connections. Forcing endless repetitions doesn't guarantee every release on UB will be caught forever and ever amen.

If the person who wrote that really wants a return to the karyoli years, or for usag to become a military operation, or a mean girls club where we have teenagers fighting to be top of the pyramid for a year or two before we discard them (looking at you Russian figure skating), fuck that. I'll take 4 minor medals at a world championships over that shit any day.

(No country seems to have piles of young talent just waiting to be released. Russia was 100% dependent on ancient crone Melnikova's results, did Japan bring anyone other than geriatric Sugihara, Italy's new blood underperformed, China had the uneven results they usually have...etc.

 

[Sanzhirovka]

I'm pretty sure they're saying that people need to be pushed hard, and it's both possible and helpful to have stern taskmasters and intensely serious training environments, without abuse. ... <snip>....

The issue is not just the expertise of a coach. Someone can have all the knowledge in the world, but that doesn't mean they are motivating a student/group to be their best. ...<snip>...

While we don't want people ignoring injuries, the fact of the matter is this: being a top level competitor means your body is going to be in pain almost every day.

I highlighted a bit of your comment for context; I hope you don't mind.

First, let me start by agreeing that the author of the opinion above probably did mean what you are presuming, but my point is that they didn't articulate it well enough and I disagree with how they have framed it. Although they may mean well, I still feel they fail to separate "abuse" from "expertise".

This is the line of theirs that leads me to think that:

And before you attempt to say that I am arguing for a return to starvation and abuse, I’m not. I’m advocating for a return to the middle.

My point here is that there is no middle between abuse and results. And it is this kind of argument that leads people who are undecided about the issue to think maybe there is merit to "a wee little bit of abuse". Surely the author means to say something like "healthy eating" is to the middle of "starvation", but is it really? I'd say it can't be in the middle, or you have to have some other extreme that is "better" than leathly eating. And that makes no sense.

Now we can let semantics interfere here, and you are right of course that individual people react differently to different kinds of stimuli. This is indeed a fine line and "safeguarding" only goes so far. But we need to beware of talking about "Starvation and abuse" or "haranguing" and then immediately saying there ought to be a "middle way", because again, that does nothing to really make anything clear.

Specifically in deaing with our sport we have to be extremely careful, because our athletes are very young and often do not know when they are hurting themselves. For example, it's good to set goals right? To achieve some threshold? Well, sometimes young gymnasts set goals that will hurt themselves. I physically had to stop a seven year-old trying to do as many leg lifts as she could in a test, because she got to 35 or so and was going to tear her abs. So, how do we handle that? I think it's realted at least indirectly to what we re talking about. When do we tell a Hungarian gymnast she can compete in the bars final or not? How far do we go to let her decide on her own?

This gets into expertise in psychology that I only really obliquely alluded to in my first post. When you say:

Someone can have all the knowledge in the world, but that doesn't mean they are motivating a student/group to be their best.

Then my response it that this someone does NOT have all the knowledge in the world, their knowledge of motivation is clearly lacking. But again, this is expertise, not something that falls on an "abuse—no abuse" continuum.

Also, when you say

"for the consistency needed to perform well, we need more repetitions" is a far cry from "You're a slacker and will be cut if you don't work harder".

I also wholeheartedly agree. Again though, this is expertise in mental health, well-being, etc. (And by the way, this expertise is sorely lacking in Eastern Europe.)

IIf you, I and the opinion author sat down and had a good discussion, I believe we'd all find we agree on most points.

My argument though - and what I would try to convince you of in that converstion - is that we really, really need to talk about the conversation itself and learn to avoid anything that makes it look like results have anything to do with abuse. I really take issue with "go back to the middle" without defining what the endpoints on each side of that middle are.

We need to say there is no room for any kind of abuse, and talk instead about how we can use mental training to help our athletes reach "high expectations to foster success".

Why is talking tough to one gymnast "okay", but to another it is not? Is there room to define those "borderline actions" in terms of their effect on the gymnast and see if there is something we can learn from that?

My own study, which is not research by any means, just reading a lot, leads me to like Self-Determination Theory which defines motivation in terms of Autonomy, Competency and Relatedness and I find myself asking: how are my verbal and non verbal interactions with my gymnasts enhancing or damaging these things. Am I giving my athlete the Authonomy she needs? How? Is it age appropriate autonomy? Is the atmosphere in our gym one of "relatedness" - how are we fostering that? Competency - are assigments and expectations within the gymnast's ability both physically, mentally, etc?

And this comment is getting too long, so I'll stop. There certainly is a lot to unpack in these kinds of conversations!