U.S. Gymnastics Championships : Mills, Hayden Win All-Around Titles

Phoebe Mills, with crowd-pleasing performances on the floor exercise and balance beam, pulled away to win the women’s all-around title in the United States Gymnastics Championships Saturday night.

Mills, who took the American Cup all-around championship earlier this year, scored a 9.85 in the floor exercise and had a 9.8 in the balance beam.

Dan Hayden held off rallying Kevin Davis with high scores in still rings and parallel bars to win the men’s all-around title. Hayden, who lives in Amherst, N.Y., finished with 116.85 points to Davis’ 116.25.

The top 18 men and top 20 women advanced to the Olympic trials Aug. 4-7 at Salt Lake City.

Mills, with a commanding leading going into her final event, had a 9.85 floor exercise to finish with 77.86 total points.

Kelly Garrison-Steves, 21, of the University of Oklahoma, started the day in third place but finished second after a 9.75 on the uneven bars and a 9.9 on the balance beam. She had 77.32 points.

Hope Spivey of Suffolk, Va., started the optionals tied with Mills for first place but she fell off with a 9.4 on uneven bars. Spivey finished third with 77.30 points, closing out with a 9.8 vault.

Defending champion Kristie Phillips, a teammate of Mills at Bela Karolyi’s Gym, provided one of the most thrilling performances in her balance beam segment. But her score was only a 9.8, provoking boos from the crowd.

Scores at the championships account for 40% of a gymnast’s Olympics qualifying score. The remaining 60% will come from the Olympic trials.

The United States will send six men and six women to compete in gymnastics at Seoul, Korea, Sept. 17-Oct. 2.

Tim Daggett, a 1984 Olympian making a comeback from a broken leg, put on a crowd-pleasing performance on the horizontal bars and scored 9.85. He did not compete in the vault, the event in which he broke his leg during the 1987 World Championships.

Daggett failed to complete his floor exercise but he was pleased with his overall showing. “In all reality, I didn’t think I’d ever feel this way again in gymnastics,” Daggett said. “The rewards are doing the routines and hearing the crowd.”

Hayden, a former NCAA champion at Arizona State, scored a 9.8 on still rings and 9.7 on the parallel bars, an event in which he had scored a perfect 10 during Thursday’s compulsories.

Hayden failed to make the 1984 Olympic team, finishing ninth in the trials that year. But he was second in the men’s all-around at the 1986 Olympic Festival in Houston and was second in the 1987 world team trials.

Finishing third behind Hayden and Davis was Charles Lakes of Newhall, Calif., with 116.00 points.

Curtis Holdsworth of UCLA and Wilbraham, Me., and Tom Schlesinger of Nebraska and Boulder, Colo., tied for fourth at 115.00.