What Chellsie’s injury means
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SHANGHAI -- It’s 5:03 a.m. on Monday morning. I couldn’t sleep so I checked my BlackBerry and saw that Chellsie Memmel had hurt her right ankle.
Memmel has had trouble with that ankle at various times during the Olympics trials process, and it is her physical shape that has concerned team coordinator Martha Karolyi since Memmel had shoulder surgery nearly two years ago.
At the end of last year, this was a U.S. team that seemed to be extremely deep.
Besides the group of six that won the world championship gold medal -- Shawn Johnson, Nastia Liukin, Alicia Sacramone, Samantha Peszek, Ivana Hong, Shayla Worley and alternate Bridget Sloan -- waiting on the sidelines were 2006 World all-around silver medalist Jana Bieger and 2005 World champion Memmel, plus two rising newcomers in Mattie Larson and Chelsea Davis.
Worley, who added an elegant and difficult uneven bars routine to the U.S. rotation, was bothered all season by an injured back. But it was a broken leg at the final selection camp that knocked Worley off the list.
Sloan is still looking for top form after knee surgery last March. Bieger’s fearful uneven bars performance at the final ranch camp trial pushed the teary-eyed 18-year-old off the team and into an alternate spot. Hong never exhibited any joy, nor did she improve any of her difficulty marks this season, as Karolyi had hoped.
Davis’ advancement was slowed by a knee injury that caused her to miss part of the national championships, and Larson suffered a leg fracture, though she still managed an uneven bars routine on the final night of the final camp.
A big key for the U.S. team -- if it is to beat the young Chinese team -- is for Memmel to perform well on uneven bars. If her ankle doesn’t heal, Karolyi will have some decisions to make.
On whether Bieger’s clear disappointment over being named as an alternate has hurt her training these last two weeks. On whether Hong can find the inner spark that made her so appealing a year ago. On whether the third alternate, Corrie Lothrop, should be pushed into a spot that she isn’t ready for.
-- Diane Pucin