With the U.S women’s World team yet to be determined, we can only look to the men’s team to see how the U.S will do at worlds. It might also give some insight to how the women’s team will be chosen.

I see many similarities for both the men and women. The most obvious being they both have one apparatus that is by no means ready for World competition when it comes to the team final and the now infamous “three up, three count” format.

For the men, their Achilles Heel is pommel horse while the women’s is uneven bars. It seems, at least at this point, that the women may fair better than the men solely because they seem to have a bigger pool to pull from for good bar workers. They may not be perfect, but they will help the women medal in Tokyo.

The men, however, seem to not have as large pool to pull from for pommel horse. It is more like a puddle. The only gymnast on the men’s team that can give them at huge blow out score is Alexander Naddour who scored 15.400 and 15.700 at the Visa Championships. The second and third highest scores were 15.350 and 15.150. They may not seem to be too much lower than a 15.700 in real world numbers, but in gymnastics, that can be the difference between finishing in 1st or 4th when it comes to team competition. At last year’s Worlds, the U.S men put up 13s on all three pommel horse routines making them the weakest country on the apparatus during the team final. They seem to have improved dramatically, but they will need to stay consistent in order to improve on their 4th place finish last year. And based on the teams who medaled and had one 15 or a couple of 14s, the U.S should have somewhat of an advantage.

For the women, their highest uneven bar score at the Visa Championships came from National Champion Jordyn Wieber with a 15.200. China and Russia can score from the upper 15s and even into the 16 range. And with no Rebecca Bross to boost team U.S.A, the women will have to work extra hard.

It is also important to look at the strengths of each team as well and where they can capitalize on other teams.

Men’s artistic gymnastics has always been about strength and power. There is no worry that on vault, floor and still rings that the U.S men are set. They are also not too bad on parallel bars and high bar. They just need to be more consistent and clean up their form and landings.

The women have never been stronger on vault. Not only does the U.S have two gymnasts that can do a two and a half twisting layout Yurchenko, but they can score in the 15.900 and 16.000 range which might as well be the new perfect 10. Not to mention we might see more difficult vaults from Alicia Sacromone. The women are also strong on balance beam (even though it was at times hard to tell) and floor exercise. Once again, like the men, they need to be cleaner and more consistent over all.

It will be a great battle for gold at the 2011 Worlds next month. And fans will be on the edge of their seats to watch it go down. 


Alexander Naddour on pommel horse at the 2011 Visa Championshops.
*Note: The info box for the videos states he scored 15.600 but the official paper results show a 15.700 which is why I used that score for the blog*

Jordyn Wieber on uneven bars at the 2011 Visa Championships.