Off Balance by Dominique Moceanu

Author:Dominique Moceanu
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Touchstone
Published: 2012-08-14T06:40:15+00:00

It was July 23, 1996, at the Olympics in Atlanta. Team USA was in second place going into the final day of competition. No US Women’s Gymnastics team had ever won team gold. Butterflies fluttered in my stomach as we marched out to begin the day’s events. I said a few prayers, hoping that some divine power would look out for me, keep my leg strong, keep my leg pain tolerable, keep me calm, and give me the strength to deal with the pressure of perfection on this day.

Competing in the Olympics in front of our home crowd was both a gift and a constant reminder that we had to win gold. I was blown away by the overwhelming passionate support of the American fans, and being at home also made me want to win that gold medal that had eluded the US Women’s Gymnastics team for decades. I felt there was no other option; we had to win—for our sport, for our country.

Our team came from diverse backgrounds—socioeconomically and ethnically—and we truly reflected the face of America. I was fortunate to be on a team I believe had the most talented female gymnasts of our generation. I knew we had the goods to win, and I felt gold was within our reach.

In Olympic competition, the rotational order of events is vault, bars, beam, and floor. I breathed a sigh of relief when I saw that our team would begin on the second event, uneven bars, because that meant that our final event would be vault. Vault had always been one of my strongest events in competition, and I had a fairly high percentage hit rate since I began competing as a child. I rarely made a mistake on vault. It was important to finish strong on a power event for me. The adrenaline coursing through me masked the pain in my leg to the point where it really wasn’t bothering me. Things were starting off right.

We were neck and neck with the Russian team, who had come into the competition in first place. Initially it looked like it would be a battle between Russia and Romania for the top medals until the very end, but one by one, Team USA kept hitting, and we inched closer and closer to the top. I could tell by the crowd’s reaction with each of my teammate’s routines that we were on a good roll. I didn’t watch my teammates or competitors. Aside from my own superstition about it, I needed to stay focused and in the zone.

Uneven bars went solidly for our team. I did one of the best routines I’d ever done, and I was so particularly proud to stick the landing at the end of my routine. I knew every tenth mattered and sticking landings was a must. It is the exclamation point at the end of a routine and, to me, if a gymnast doesn’t work on sticking landings, they’re missing a crucial element. It is that extra stamp of perfection.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.