To be honest, not that many things are happening. Like maybe 3. Something about calm and storms. Thirteen days until men’s trials and women’s nationals. Twenty-eight days until women’s trials. Fifty-seven days until the Olympics. You can make it. I know it. Just keep swimming.

1. Samantha Partyka retires

Samantha Partyka announced this week that she’s retiring with a chronic case of Lifetime of Gymnastics. It’s a somewhat unexpected development because she seemed to have just recovered and was back on track in April doing the all-around.

For Utah, barely anything could have been worse. This increases the number of lost routines from last year’s postseason lineups to 13 out of 24. A.k.a., more than half. No fun.

The Utes will have Kari Lee returning from her Achilles trauma, ideally on four events, and will be adding Skinner, Reinstadtler, and Tessen, all of whom should be expected to make lineups on multiple events. Theoretically, 13 replacement routines is doable for this group, but each and every one of them will have to deliver as promised, along with increased contribution from sophomores like Schwab, Merrell, and the MIA Shannon McNatt. We’ll get into all this in detail during the preseason, but if you’re like me, you have Obsessive NCAA-Lineup-Creation Disorder and have already decided what Utah’s lineups should be next year. FACT AND DONE.

Utah also now has an unforeseen open scholarship spot, so…any Canadians/Australians/Brits out there eager for a last-minute change of plans? Anyone want to graduate high school early?

2. Florida lineups v. Alabama lineups

In other fascinating NCAA news, Emily Gaskins is switching from Florida to Alabama and had some telling comments about the move, particularly the implication that it’s very hard to make lineups at Florida (extremely true) but will be much easier at Alabama because she’ll be one of the top gymnasts (well…). It’s still Alabama. Making lineups at Alabama is no picnic. Just ask the 2016 freshman class.

If I’m an Alabama fan, I’m thinking, “A) Welcome, we’re very happy to have you, but B) hey, we’re not some throwaway trash school where you can just stroll in and be the only star.” Still, this is an excellent get for Alabama and will help balance out the distribution of elite talent next quad.

It is interesting reasoning, though, because Gaskins won’t be starting until the 2019 season, which is forever away. We have exactly no idea how things will look by 2019. Sure, theoretically, Florida would at that point have Boren, Ernst, Hundley, Baumann, Gowey, Key, Hernandez, Foberg, and Johnson-Scharpf all fighting with each other for lineup spots (which CHRIST ON A CRACKER THAT TEAM). I would be alarmed by that too. But, three years is a long time, and a lot can happen between now and then with people going pro or turning to dust…

3. Larrissa Miller for Australia

As expected, Australia has selected Larrissa Miller for the Olympic spot. It’s the right move, as she’s the most likely to make an event final, which provides the best possible exposure for the program since they don’t have a high-ranking AA contender to send, though making an event final on bars or floor is certainly no guarantee for her either.

With the US, China, Russia, and Germany all likely sending two contenders with 6.5+ D scores, and Great Britain sending a Becky Downie and another 6.3ish, someone with a bars D score in the low 6s may struggle to make it back for the final even with a good hit. Miller will have to hope some people screw up in qualifications.

Not qualifying a team renders this largely a lost quad for Australia, a condition which was foreshadowed in 2013 by the inexplicable decision not to send any gymnasts to worlds to plant the seeds of that next class, that next generation. Somewhat unsurprisingly then, none of Australia’s new seniors in the 2013-2016 quad ultimately developed into high-level contributors, with the possible exception of this year’s emergence of Rianna Mizzen. Australia was left relying on previous-quad veterans like Miller, Little, Mitchell, Monckton, and Brown, without developing the younger ones to step in when inevitable injuries arose. A lost generation.

4. Canada things

Canada also successfully ensured that no one paid attention to its championship by holding it at the exact same time as the European Championship and the Secret Classic and by making its score updates a riddle trapped inside a scavenger hunt. Come on, Canada.

Isabela Onyshko took the all-around title, having completely emerged from the identity of begin a fragile fallsy that she had at the beginning of her senior career to snatch the crown of Canada’s top AAer from Ellie Black, who had a couple UnVaculiks on bars at the event (for the uninitiated, an UnVaculik is bad). In the all-around final, Brittany Rogers continued having that same problem with her pak that she was having much of the NCAA season, but she still remains quite necessary to the Canadian team on both vault and bars.

What are we thinking for the Olympic team? Onyshko, Black, Rogers, a VT/FX, and a UB/BB? Among Olsen, the Woos, Copiak, Roberts, and Gill, there are some options to choose from there.

5. The state of live scores is DIRE

We have to talk about this. Why are all the live scores getting worse? Isn’t technology supposed to get better?

It started during the NCAA season with all this switching from good old BEAVERLOG over to the Great Satan, statbroadcast, which is like BeaverLog except worse in every single possible way. Now, the USAGym live scores don’t even have D scores on them (for the online version), so you might as well just throw some random numbers at a wall for all it means. It’s aggressively unhelpful. Why would you even have gymnastics if you can’t communicate the scores efficiently and effectively? You think we want to watch people just tumble meaninglessly? Hell no. ALL THE SCORES OR BUST.

By far the best live-scoring option we have right now is the Longines scoring app for Worlds/Euros because it’s the most comprehensive and immediate, providing all the ranking, lineup, D score, and E score information we could want along with color-coded updates about who is currently competing and who is simply waiting for a score. Unfortunately, it’s also a barely usable abomination because it runs on Java as a result of WHAT YEAR IS THIS? It might as well run on the power of Fred Flintstone’s feet. Why would you even have Java? The window size isn’t even responsive. I mean…

Someone should create a real, working, helpful live scoring app that all the countries can use, based on the information and format of the Longines applet, except taking place in the current millennium.

6. The Japan team

Japan has announced its Olympic team, and I think we have to give Japan some credit for waiting all the way until June this time instead of naming the team in 2011 as per the usual schedule. Japan always names its teams 18 years before any other country, one of the many reasons Japan and I get each other.

Successfully avoiding any bizarre Murakami drama this time, Japan has named Murakami, Teramoto, Miyakawa, Sugihara, and Uchiyama to the team, a group largely intact and similar to the one that finished 5th at worlds last year, returning all but one TF beam routine. I think we’ll all be keeping an eye on Japan after finishing just two points behind Russia in the 2015 team final, a performance that included counting a 12.200 on beam. Of course, Russia’s performance also included Komova lighting on fire in the middle, so…

7. Secret NCAA

It occurs to me that I neglected to do the traditional list of Secret Classic results by NCAA commitment, which will also allow several more opportunities for Obsessive NCAA-Lineup-Creation Disorder to spread its wings.

FLORIDA
Rachel Gowey 2016-2017
AA – 58.300 (2)
VT – 14.700 (5)
UB – 14.850 (8)
BB – 14.500 (6)
FX – 14.200 (4)

Alyssa Baumann 2016-2017
AA – 58.000 (3)
VT – 14.750 (4)
UB – 13.150 (18)
BB – 15.350 (2)
FX – 14.750 (2)

Amelia Hundley 2016-2017
VT – 15.050 (3)UB – 14.900 (6)
BB – 13.900 (12)

Jazmyn Foberg 2018-2019
UB – 13.850 (13)
BB – 13.200 (21)
FX – 12.800 (12)

Laurie Hernandez 2018-2019
UB – 15.400 (4)

Florida’s 2017 Lineup is a really fun game to play right now. Ideal beam lineup. Go.

Baumann, Gowey, McMurtry, Baker, Ernst, Boyce? Which leaves out Hundley, Boren, Chant, and Fassbender? GAH.

UCLA
Madison Kocian 2016-2017
UB – 15.700 (2)
BB – 13.650 (15)

Marz Frazier 2018-2019
AA – 55.900 (4)
VT – 14.650 (6)
UB – 13.800 (14)
BB – 13.600 (17)
FX – 13.850 (6)

Speaking of beam lineups, Ross, Kocian, Peng, Ohashi. You’re welcome. That will be a nice fight for the other spots too. Hano, Toronjo, Gerber, Shapiro, Meraz, the Glenns, Preston, Savvidou.

I’m dying of balance beam situations already.

GEORGIA
Emily Schild 2017-2018
AA – 55.550 (5)
VT – 14.350 (12)
UB – 14.250 (9)
BB – 13.850 (13)
FX – 13.100 (9)

ALABAMA
Emily Gaskins 2018-2019
AA – 55.000 (7)
VT – 14.550 (9)
UB – 13.700 (15)
BB – 13.650 (15)
FX – 13.100 (9)

OKLAHOMA
Olivia Trautman 2018-2019
AA – 53.900 (11)
VT – 14.600 (8)UB – 12.600 (22)
BB – 13.550 (18)
FX – 13.150 (8)

Ragan Smith 2019-2020 (That’s not a real year)
UB – 14.900 (6)
BB – 14.650 (5)

Kaitlin DeGuzman 2019-2020
AA – 52.550 (12)
VT – 12.900 (16)
UB – 14.050 (11)BB – 13.000 (22)
FX – 12.600 (13)

UTAH
MyKayla Skinner 2016-2017
VT – 15.400 (2)
UB – 13.500 (16)
BB – 14.500 (8)

Abby Paulson 2019-2020
AA – 54.650 (9)
VT – 13.000 (15)UB – 13.450 (17)
BB – 14.100 (10)
FX – 14.100 (5)

LSU
Christina Desiderio 2018-2019
VT – 14.650 (6)
BB – 14.250 (9)
FX – 14.300 (3)

MINNESOTA
Lexy Ramler 2017-2018
AA – 54.750 (8)
VT – 14.300 (13)
UB – 14.000 (12)
BB – 13.550 (18)
FX – 12.900 (11)

PENN STATE
Leah Clapper 2018-2019
AA – 51.250 (13)
VT – 13.400 (14)
UB – 12.650 (21)
BB – 13.000 (22)
FX – 12.500 (15)