Final Results: Juniors | Seniors
Interviews: Lilly Lippeatt | Shilese Jones
Competition Routines
Championships Coverage Page
The chime came across the arena sound system signifying the end of the touch warm-up period for rotation one in Day 2 of the 2018 US Championships. Standing focused and ready, Lilly Lippeatt waited for the announcer to introduce her and the green light to go on. Below the huge American Flag, Lilly begins her beam routine with cheers of go Lilly in the background. She began tumbling down the beam ending in her straight body layout two feet. Solid throughout the routine including her favorite chimmy sideways on the beam scored two tenths better then night one.
Leading off again in rotation 2, Lilly continued to stay true to her goal of making the presentation count. Smiling and tumbling while bringing the audience onto the floor with her during her clapping section was a treat to watch. Her 12.5 was an improvement over her day 1 score.
video by:USA Gymnastics
After her Yurchenko full on vault she moved 1/2 way around the arena to bars where she struggled on her Ricna in day 1. Unfortunately she had the same outcome on day 2 taking her Ricna a bit long and stomach dropping to the mat. However she got back up and finished her routine on a solid note, better then day 1 in my opinion, and finished up her championships with a 11.15. The crowd got a treat in this final rotation however as the top two bar workers for juniors were swinging their way atop the awards podium. Midwest Gym Center’s Sunisa Lee, the class of the meet on bars, sent her huge Nabieva (layout Ray) into the sky before catching and sailing her beautiful Pak salto down to the low bar for 14.75. 2018 National All Around champion Leanne Wong from GAGE, who by the way made huge improvements on bars in one year, scored a 14.25 to which coach Al Fong was ecstatic and raised her hand up to wave to the appreciative crowd in the TD Garden.
The TD Garden crowd erupted when Simone Biles name was announced at introductions of the senior athletes and the energy and support from the crowd continued the whole meet. Our Region 5 ladies were riding a high coming into second day of competition from their performance on Friday in Day 1. Shania Adams started off her day on vault with a nice Yurchenko full. Over on floor, Shilese Jones had a long wait before she was able to salute and compete but she didn’t let it kill her energy launching another double double into the air landing standing straight up and down well just like Simone does. She had a little too much juice coming out of double Arabian and bounced forward. She maybe getting ready to punch a front out of it soon…. we shall see!!
In the second rotation, Shania once again looked very confident and aggressive on her bar set nailing her connections and handstands to finish 8th overall on the event. Shilese power was in over drive on vault as she took a big hop back on her Yurchenko double full for 14.35, a little more then three tenths lower then on night 1.
Video by: USA Gymnastics
Onto the third rotation and of course can’t talk about Shania on balance beam without mentioning her wolf squat turns, text book on what the turns should look like. The turns were so good even Tim Daggett commented on the live broadcast
[highlight]Wow that was great, really calm…. and if you only saw people like her do that you would think it was easy”[/highlight]
After impressing Tim on her mount she nailed her layout layout series and finished up strong with her best landed double full dismount combo of the week for a 13.3 good enough for 7th overall in the competition. While Shania was grabbing Tim’s attention, Shilese was nailing another routine this time on bars to the excitement of her coach Christian. Her combined total for both days of 27.55 landed her in a tie for 6th on the event. The highlight for me in this rotation was the tumbling clinic put on by Jade Carey and Simone Biles, the two best on floor hands down. Yes Simone has a higher start value and scored higher, Jade was my floor champion on night 2.
In the fourth rotation well Simone did another almost perfect Cheng for a 15.6 and vaulting, catapulting herself to the national championship by over 6 points. Back on earth finishing in 2nd was Morgan Hurd, 2017 World Champion, and third went to Riley McCusker, who actually had the second best all around score of night 2 with a 56.7. Shania finished up on floor and almost touch the rafters I think on her double pike which she way over did and bounce and flew out of bounds onto her butt which was a bummer ending to what was otherwise a great competition for her. Shilese headed over to beam where once again had solid routine nailing her standing Arabian and her front tuck cold. She took a small step on her double back dismount combo for a 13.2 and a final total of 109.85 good enough for 5th all around and place on the 2018 USA National Team.
video by: USA Gymnastics
Lots of great gymnastics this past week in Boston. Thats all for this Gymnas Tea party. Next up Pan American Championships and WORLDS!
