Wow! It was an interesting National Championships. We had a couple of injuries including Sean Townsend, with a subluxed right shoulder, who has petitioned (and been accepted) to the Olympic Trials. Blaine Wilson decided to retire during the first day of competition. That is such an emotional call to make. It’s so difficult to retire but in your heart you always know when it’s time. Blaine will continue to train with Morgan Hamm as he prepares for the Olympic Trials. He will be a support in the gym if not on the competition floor.

Morgan did a great job at Nationals winning the floor exercise. He also debuted his “air flare”, which this pretty cool break-dancing move that he invented. If he competes it successfully at the Olympics it will be named the “Hamm.”

David Sender won the all-around title with a consistent performance over the two days of competition. Jon Horton was second, followed by Joseph Hagerty. David Durante and Raj Bhavsar rounded out the top five in the all-around.

The individual event champions for 2008 are: Morgan Hamm on floor exercise; Yewki Tomita on pommel horse; Kevin Tan on still rings; David Sender on vault, Justin Spring on parallel bars; and Joseph Hagerty on horizontal bar.

There was a ridiculously wide margin between Paul Hamm and the rest of the pack on the first day of competition, over 4 points! He has amazed everyone that has been covering his comeback after 2 ½ years off. Unfortunately he had a devastating end to the first day of competition. He fractured the fourth metacarpal on his right hand during his Parallel Bar routine. He has already undergone surgery and is currently ahead of schedule in his recovery.

I had recently written about how sometimes an injury close to the Games can be a blessing in disguise. I still believe that. This is an injury with a recovery time of 4-6 weeks. Most athletes tend to get back on the floor faster than expected. Paul has proven himself time and again and is well known for his work ethic and strategic training. He has petitioned directly to the Olympic team based on the men’s selection procedures and won?t compete at the Olympic Trials.

I can still remember sitting up in a suite watching the Olympic Trials in 1996. You have to completely rely on your past performance to decide you future. It?s a painful evening. At the same time if you’ve done your job and proven yourself over a period of time, as Paul has, then the only thing that matters is whether or not you will be healthy and ready on August 8th.

On another note it was great to see the comeback of Justin Spring to competition after an ACL injury last year at National Championships. It’s getting more and more exciting with every day and next up will be the women two weeks from now.

I just returned from the Dominican Republic and a speech in Orlando at the Governor’s Conference on Women’s Health so I am beat. I have a busy month ahead and will keep you up on the travels. Talk to you soon!

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 29th, 2008 at 9:26 am and is filed under shannonmiller. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.