Agree 100% with your post, and by the way, the OP is wrong about Gabby falling off the balance beam. She did not fall off the beam, rather had a great routine. I feel very bad for the girl who got bumped out of the individual all-around (current world champ, I understand). She is very much worthy, but she too stepped OB on the floor routine (barely). The tragedy is the “only two girls from any one country” rule for individual all-around. Our team is very strong and unfortunately that’s how it worked out. The black girl was a pleasure to watch though, as were the others on our solid team.
i believe she (Gabby) was far and away the best gymnast during the Olympic trials....there’s such a thing as peaking as and athlete and that what Gabby seems to be doing....my heart broke for Jordan Weiber not making the individual finals- its complete BS...sort of like three teams in the AFC North going 11-5 and the NFL saying “sorry- you can only have two teams from each division in the playoffs”...a complete joke...
i’ve been to the games four times (’84/LA, ‘88/Calgary, ‘96/Atl, ‘02/SLC) and this PC/affirmative action has been creeping in...i also trained for the olympics for ten years (track and field) and it used to be there was one standard and if you met it you got in the games...now there’s an A standard for the countries with good athletes and B standard for the countries whose athletes suck and they let inferior athletes in...everyone loved the Jamaican bobsled team in 1988- but they had absolutely no right to be there...ditto for British ski jumper Eddie the eagle for those who remember him....