Antolin’s Olympic Hopes Rest on One Unsteady Ankle

Jeanette Antolin’s ankle could let her down at any moment. One bad landing off the uneven bars, one misstep on her floor exercise, one slippery twist on the balance beam and it’s over.

Antolin knows this. The 18-year-old Marina High graduate from Huntington Beach is back at SCATS, stepping gingerly on the beam, making tentative landings off the uneven bars.

Last week Antolin had to withdraw after the first round of the U.S. Gymnastics National Championships. The nationals were the first step in the Olympic team qualifying process.

Antolin is in a hole now. She has petitioned, along with three other injured competitors, including seven-time Olympic medalist Shannon Miller, for inclusion in the Olympic trials that begin Aug. 17 in Boston.

The top 12 gymnasts from the nationals automatically qualified. Antolin, Miller, 1996 gold medal team member Jaycie Phelps and Amanda Stroud must perform their four routines--on balance beam, uneven bars, floor exercise and vault--in front of a panel of judges and U.S. national team coordinator Bela Karolyi on Aug. 15, two days before the trials begin.

In order to be included in the trials field, the injured girls must score better than the 12th-place finisher from nationals.

And then the injured gymnasts must compete two more times and have their injured limbs hold up. And then they must wait and see if Karolyi and a committee of three decide to include them on the six-woman team that will go to Sydney and try to defend the U.S. gold.

It’s a longshot at best right now for Antolin, who made last year’s U.S. world championship team.

The injury could not have come at a worse time. Her coach, Don Peters, would not have been unhappy at all if Antolin had come home from St. Louis, had the bone chips removed and got healthy for her career at UCLA, which will start in the fall.

“But I want to try and finish this,” Antolin said Thursday.

She had rested the ankle for four days and now had come back to work. Antolin knows that every time she lands any kind of jump or dismount she will feel pain. She knows all the pain and work she will do between now and Aug. 15 won’t mean a thing if the ankle gives out in the empty Fleet Center in front of those judges.

But Antolin will not quit. Karolyi told her and her coach that, if she could stand it, Karolyi would like to see Antolin try to get healthy and compete in Boston.

The event where the U.S. women might be the weakest, the vault, is one where Antolin is strong. Since Karolyi has the ultimate say in the makeup of the Olympic team, no matter how the scores turn out in Boston, Antolin took heart from Karolyi’s request.

“I’m not going to quit because Bela said he might need me,” Antolin said yesterday. “So I’m not ready to give up.”

It is not only for the Olympics that Antolin will spend the next 11 days fighting pain. Antolin says she will not be devastated if the Olympics don’t happen for her.

“I’m doing this because I want to finish,” Antolin said before her Thursday workout. “I love competing and doing gymnastics so that’s why I’m going to keep trying. If the team needs me, I’d like to be ready.”

So Antolin went back to work.

First Antolin did her vaults. Peters reminded her over and over, “Over-rotate your landings. Just fall out of them. Don’t put pressure on your ankle.”

Once, Antolin stepped wrong and winced. But when Peters asked if she wanted to stop, Antolin shook her head no.

Then Antolin did her work on the uneven bars. “She did great,” Peters said. “As good as I’ve seen.”

After that was a timeout. Antolin went to nearby a fitness center to have treatment on her ankle--massage, electric stimulation and heat. Then it was back to SCATS to practice on the beam and the floor.

That will be life for the next two weeks. After that?

“I know I won’t be doing this four years from now,” Antolin said. “I don’t think I’ll try for the Olympics again. It will be time to move on. I’m going to UCLA and that will be great, a whole different life. It will be fun to compete for the team, but it will also be fun to have a different life outside of gymnastics.”

Perspective isn’t always easy to come by. Antolin has found it. Just in time.

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Diane Pucin can be reached at her e-mail address: diane.pucin@latimes.com