For 2018, USA Gymnastics has added a third “you can watch this like a real sport” competition into its summer schedule, the previously semi-secret and always unhelpfully named American Classic.

“No one will get this confused with the U.S. Classic!” said USAG, full of wisdom.

Like the U.S. Classic at the end of July, the American Classic is first and foremost an opportunity for gymnasts to achieve the qualifying score necessary to advance to the national championship. The American Classic is therefore a showcase of prudent gymnasts, those who would like two tries to get that AA total rather than one.

But this year, rather than taking place at Martha’s House, the meet is being held at Greg’s House, which seats a cool 15,000+. Meanwhile, Martha’s House seats 4 llamas and a scream. So this is better.

Junior elites compete on July 7th at 11:00am MT, with senior elites at 4:00pm MT. USAG will stream on YouTube. Let’s discuss the major topics.

(Programming note: I will not be able to live blog the American Classic.)

SENIORS

Roster: Shania Adams, Sloane Blakely, Jade Carey, Audrey Davis, Kara Eaker, Jaylene Gilstrap, Olivia Hollingsworth, Madeleine Johnston, Shilese Jones, Emily Lee, Isabel Mabanta, Grace McCallum, Riley McCusker, Alyona Shchennikova. Deanne Soza, Madelyn Williams

Jade Carey all-arounder?
Carey has already qualified to nationals by virtue of being on the worlds team last year, so this meet is more about getting a competition under her belt since she has not appeared at a real meet yet in 2018.

Of note, Carey has been showing bars work on various instasnaps, leading to some anticipation that she might add bars to her repertoire this elite season. Carey was never tragic on bars in JO, but she did not nearly have elite composition and therefore chose to prioritize her main competition events when going elite for 2017. If nothing else, Carey is working toward being a real bars option in college. But like Sacramone finishing 4th AA at nationals in 2015, Carey would have the scores on the other events to get a legit AA total in elite even if her bars is like, “Hi, I’m an 11”

If she’s going for full vault difficulty right now, I’m eager to see where the Amanar is, since that’s the newer of her two vaults and was a work in progress last elite season. Continue reading American Classic Preview →

Super Six previews are weird to do, so here’s one.

At this point, we don’t know which teams will even be competing in Super Six, but we’ve all been watching this unfold for 80 million weeks and have a pretty solid sense of what’s going on.

Last season, we entered nationals with the expectation that Oklahoma would be the winner, LSU had the potential to be a fairly unsurprising upset champion, and Florida could challenge if things got weird. Ultimately, that’s what we ended up seeing. LSU made things a little more interesting than expected after the semifinal, but in the end, things went as regular season performance predicted.

This year, the scenario is not wholly different, with the only major change being that UCLA has become noticeably better than it was last year and should be included in this top-tier, medal-finish conversation (if medals were a thing here). The other differences are of small degree: Oklahoma has separated itself from the pack a little more this season, and Florida has fallen behind Utah with its inconsistent regular-season performances, meaning that a true title challenge from Florida would be more of a surprise than it would have been last year.

But besides going down the rankings and ticking off the favorites in order, it can be helpful to go through previous championship scoring standards to see which teams have proven the ability to meet those standards during this current season.

Winning scores
2017 – Oklahoma – 198.3875
2016 – Oklahoma – 197.675
2015 – Florida – 197.850
2014 – Florida/Oklahoma – 198.175
2013 – Florida – 197.575
2012 – Alabama – 197.850
2011 – Alabama – 197.650
2010 – UCLA – 197.725

The low in here is that 197.575 from when Florida counted a fall and still won, so that’s not too representative. The way scores have been going this year—as compared to the early 2010s—expect a winning total closer to the high-water mark here rather than the low. That’s the first standard to look at. Can you realistically score 197.8+? The winning score is likely to be in that zone. Sure, we could have another 2016 on our hands—not an insane thing to think—but season scoring evidence hasn’t really been pointing that direction. Continue reading Nationals Preview Part 4: Super Six →