Of gymnastics and .... Tour de France?

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PHILADELPHIA -- USA Gymnastics President Steve Penny compared the women’s Olympic team selection procedure as kind of like cycling, even though that’s a sport that has been awfully drug-tainted recently.

The women’s team still has four open spots even after the Olympic trials have concluded.

‘It’s like the Tour de France,’ Penny said. ‘We still have a stage race right ahead of us, L’Alpe d’Huez. We’ve gone over a few hills, raced a few stages and it’s not always easy to get on the bike again.’

And that’s actually a great comparison. The women have finished four grueling rounds of highly-scrutinized competitions at the U.S. nationals and Olympic trials. Almost all of them are wearing knee or ankle wraps and now they go home and keep training, trying to erase that landing hop or balance beam bobble or that confounding step out of bounds. They do this because up next is more training and competing July 16-20 at the Karolyi ranch and, for the really lucky few, more training and then the flight to Beijing and then 10 more days of competing in team qualifying and team finals and, for the lucky few, all-around finals and event finals.

Climbing L’Alpe d’Huez isn’t so daunting.

-- Diane Pucin